“Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.” James 1:12 defines and explains the theme of the book. You say, what is the theme of the book? Well, look up at verse two. “My brethren, count it all joy when you fall in various trials.” Any of you have any trials this week? I can just see you the minute it hit, going, “Man, I’m so glad that trial hit!” I don’t think so. “Count it all joy.” is a word “hēgeomai” is actually an accounting term, and it means add up all the facts and come to the right conclusion. And the facts that we’re supposed to add up are the instruction of the Word of God.
What does James tell us about our trials? The “various” simply refers to different kinds. There are all different kinds of trials: personal relationships, personal problems, and difficulties that come along. We should include all of them in “counting it all joy.” How do we do this? We can only do this because we know something. “Knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.” He says, “Let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.” His point is simply this; it takes testing and endurance to become mature.
Spiritual maturity is like training for an athletic event. You have to be disciplined. You have to be focused. You have to be consistent in your training. And we have to be consistent in applying God’s Word to the test and the trials of our life, if we hope to come to a point of spiritual maturity. That is the theme of the book. You’ll notice that the word is “trials” in verse two. It’s translated “temptation” in verse 12. It’s the same word. Why is that? Because in every trial you’re going to face temptations, and every temptation, you’re going to face trials. When the trial hits, what’s the temptation? Stop listening to anybody. Forget the word of God. Start screaming and yelling. In other words, get mad; that’s the temptation. Or it may be that I’m under a trial and I want to find something to lift me, encourage me, comfort or gratify me. And there’s that fleshly temptation. The temptation is the enemy wants us to go here, see this, do this. The Word of God is saying, “No.” The test is, am I going to follow God’s word or am I going to follow the enemy? Testing and temptation always come together.
James 1:12 speaks of “the crown of life,” mentioned again in Revelation 2:10. This is the crown that is given for enduring in your faith to the end. It’s holding out and pressing on to the finish. If you fail to finish the race, you don’t get this crown. Let’s let this passage challenge us to draw near, to be obedient, to face our tests, our trials, and our temptations, and to come through with faith.
The full video from which this is derived is here:
https://youtu.be/RYnaYj_WoBg
More on our potential rewards is here:
https://basictraining.org/crowns