Friday, November 15 - James 4

James 4

New International Version (NIV)

Submit Yourselves to God

4 What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? ² You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. ³ When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

⁴ You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.

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FRIENDSHIP WITH THE WORLD

   The Scriptures make a clear distinction between that which is grounded in God and that which is grounded in the world.  The word "world," here, does not refer to God's beautiful creation and His bountiful blessings which we enjoy around us.  Rather it refers to those things which are a part of us because of our sinful nature -- things which we inherited because of the Fall.  They include greed, selfishness, envy, lust, jealousy, pride, and anger. 
   The "world" wants us to give in to these things -- to embrace them and let them have free reign.  The "world" wants us to live according to our passions and the yield to our base instincts.  It tells us that this is "natural," "normal," and "the way it should be." 
   It is easy to give in to the "world," and to become comfortable with our sinful nature ruling the day.

   In contrast, God's Spirit wants us to be a reflection of Christ in the way we live and think and act.  He wants us to put aside the base passions and live, instead, according to the pattern we see in Him.  His ways include patience, love, generosity, forgiveness, and self-sacrifice.  Since our sinful nature runs opposite to these things, they don't come easily.
   Thanks be to God that when Jesus came into our hearts at our baptism, that He also gave us a new heart.  And that new heart, transformed by the Spirit, wants to be different.
   Of course, every day it is a war:  between the Spirit and the world, between the ways of God and the ways of the flesh.  And some days we win, and some days we lose. 
   But the final judgment, in Christ, is victory, because God credits Christ's righteousness and faithfulness to us, calls us His own, and forgives us all our sins.
   May God help you as you face the daily struggle between the Spirit and the world.

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 ⁵ Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us? ⁶ But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says:

“God opposes the proud
    but shows favor to the humble.”

⁷ Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸ Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹ Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. ¹⁰ Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.

¹¹ Brothers and sisters, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against a brother or sister^[d] or judges them speaks against the law and judges it. When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it. ¹² There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you—who are you to judge your neighbor?

Boasting About Tomorrow

¹³ Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” ¹⁴ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. ¹⁵ Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” ¹⁶ As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. All such boasting is evil. ¹⁷ If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.