Monday after the Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity Sunday
Posted on September 25, 2023 by under
Scripture: James 1:2-12 (NKJV)
1:2 My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. 4 But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. 5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. 6 But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. 7 For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; 8 he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.
9 Let the lowly brother glory in his exaltation, 10 but the rich in his humiliation, because as a flower of the field he will pass away. 11 For no sooner has the sun risen with a burning heat than it withers the grass; its flower falls, and its beautiful appearance perishes. So the rich man also will fade away in his pursuits.
12 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.
Devotion
St. James encourages the faithful to remember patience and humility, especially in the face of various trials. The world encourages us to complain. The devil would have us think that we already possess all wisdom and therefore have the right to carry on with many words and much indignation when we suffer some difficulty or injustice.
The world is thoroughly damaged and filled with sin, so there is never a lack of things to complain about. But the Lord and His faithful servants remind us that Christ is our cause for comfort and patience! “In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). It is the harder work to which we are called, to be patient, humble, and even cheerfully hopeful, but our Savior has given us His own example.
The way of Christ’s cross is difficult, but the results are holy and profoundly better than anything the way of the world offers us. The broken wisdom of self-important complaining does not bring us to better ends; it distracts us and weakens us as we are looking at our own feelings, rather than the power and victory of Jesus Christ’s cross. If we see our trials as part of our life in the crucified Savior, that is the wisdom and stability that the Lord’s Holy Spirit gives us!
Collect: Lord, we pray Thee, that Thy grace may always go before and follow after us, and make us continually to be given to all good works; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture and Devotion for the Monday after the Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity Sunday. Monday, September 25th, 2023.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
