Wisdom From Above/h2>
When a trial arrives and we don’t know what to do, most of us turn inward. We analyse, strategise, and lean on whatever understanding we can muster. James 1:5–8 cuts directly against that instinct. The passage opens with a frank diagnosis: in trial, you lack wisdom. Not as a failure, but as a fact. And the remedy James offers is not a technique or a discipline. It is prayer, directed toward a God who gives generously and without reproach.
In this sermon from our series in James, we explore what it means that God gives haplōs, with singleness and whole-heartedness, and that He gives without finding fault with those who ask. We consider how the Lord Jesus Christ, the wisdom of God, is the fullest answer to every prayer for wisdom in every trial. And we examine the contrast James draws between the person who asks in faith and the double-minded person, unstable as a wave, who reaches toward God while still gripping their own understanding. The call is a simple one: ask, and ask again.
