James 4:13-17 (ESV)

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.

This is a strange paragraph. What does the last verse, “So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin,” have to do with the rest of the paragraph? The reader is instructed not to presume upon the future. We don’t know what will happen tomorrow. Life is short and fleet. All of that makes sense, and the James concludes, “So, do what you know is right.” I would have concluded, “So, stop presuming upon tomorrow,” or “So, stop bragging about what your plans,” or “So, stop trusting yourself and start trusting God, realizing that he can change your plans at any moment.” That would seem an appropriate conclusion, but that is not what James says. He says to do what you know is right. It is considered sin if you do not do what you know is right. What’s the connection?

Arrogance is the connection. Arrogance makes plans and expects them to work out without considering that God may have other plans. James warns, “you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.” Arrogance not only presumes upon the future, it presumes to determine for itself what is right and wrong. Arrogance knows what God says is right, but chooses to pursue its own will instead. Arrogance asks, “What is right for me?” instead of asking, “What does God say is right?” Arrogance is the connection between presumption and disobedience.

How many times have we heard the statement, “You have to find what is right for you.” But is that true? If by that you mean that you have to discover what God is uniquely leading you to do, then it might be a right statement. If, on the other hand, you mean that you have to discover what feels right to you, or what you decide is right, then you are missing the point. Life is not about us. Truth, morality, obedience, and sin are not based on us. They are based on God and his will. It is arrogance to presume anything else.

The Greek word translated arrogance in James 4:16 refers to a quack “making empty boasts about having ‘cures’ to rid people of all their ills.” It is a snake-oil salesman. It is a person making empty promises with bold arrogance. It sounds like some preachers we hear today. I chatted with a man on a shuttle bus the other day. He was quite taken with a preacher he had heard. The preacher promised that all we have to do is speak the word out loud and we can bring it to pass. The man spoke blessing on his business and the next day he was offered a new job. This validated, in his mind, the truth of the preacher. The problem is, it is really bad theology, and there was absolutely not gospel in the message. The man I talked with was really taken with the preacher, and with the power of his own words, but there was no mention of Jesus. There was no mention of grace. There was no mention of the cross. There was no mention of life beyond this life. It was a gospel of arrogant self-focus. I can’t help but think that James would not approve.

Arrogance takes lots of different forms. It presumes upon the future. It decides for itself what is right and wrong. Ultimately it puts us in the place of God. In the name of faith, we develop a self-centered independence and expect that God is pleased. God-centered faith begins with humility, not arrogance. God-centered faith starts with dependence, not independence. God-centered faith begins with God. Too often our faith begins with us. God forgive us. Today may we walk in humble dependence, recognizing that every moment is ultimately in the hands of God. So how do we live in that kind of system? Do what you know is right. “Whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin” (Jas 4:17). Anything else is arrogance.