James 4
4
Stop Fighting with Each Other
1What causes fights and quarrels among you? Aren’t they caused by the selfish desires that fight to control you? 2You want what you don’t have, so you commit murder. You’re determined to have things, but you can’t get what you want. You quarrel and fight. You don’t have the things you want, because you don’t pray for them. 3When you pray for things, you don’t get them because you want them for the wrong reason—for your own pleasure.
4You unfaithful people! Don’t you know that love for this ⌞evil⌟ world is hatred toward God? Whoever wants to be a friend of this world is an enemy of God. 5Do you think this passage means nothing? It says, “The Spirit that lives in us wants us to be his own.”
6But God shows us even more kindness.#4:6 Or “grace.” Scripture says,
“God opposes arrogant people,
but he is kind to humble people.”
7So place yourselves under God’s authority. Resist the devil, and he will run away from you. 8Come close to God, and he will come close to you. Clean up your lives, you sinners, and clear your minds, you doubters. 9Be miserable, mourn, and cry. Turn your laughter into mourning and your joy into gloom. 10Humble yourselves in the Lord’s presence. Then he will give you a high position.
Stop Slandering Each Other
11Brothers and sisters, stop slandering each other. Those who slander and judge other believers slander and judge God’s laws. If you judge God’s teachings, you are no longer following them. Instead, you are judging them. 12There is only one who creates laws and judges on the basis of them. He is able to save or destroy you. So who are you to judge your neighbor?
Don’t Brag about Your Plans for the Future
13Pay attention to this! You’re saying, “Today or tomorrow we will go into some city, stay there a year, conduct business, and make money.” 14You don’t know what will happen tomorrow. What is life? You are a mist that is seen for a moment and then disappears. 15Instead, you should say, “If the Lord wants us to, we will live and carry out our plans.” 16However, you brag because you’re arrogant. All such bragging is evil.
17Whoever knows what is right but doesn’t do it is sinning.
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GOD'S WORD® Translation ©1995, 2003, 2013, 2014, 2019, 2020 by God's Word to the Nations Mission Society. All rights reserved.
James 4
4
Warning Against Worldliness
1What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions#4:1 Greek pleasures; also verse 3 are #Rom. 7:23; 1 Pet. 2:11at war within you?#4:1 Greek in your members 2You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. 3You ask and do not receive, because you ask #[1 John 5:14]wrongly, to spend it on your passions. 4#Isa. 54:5; Jer. 2:2 You adulterous people!#4:4 Or You adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? #John 15:19; 1 John 2:15; [Matt. 6:24]Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. 5Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit #1 Cor. 6:19; 2 Cor. 6:16that he has made to dwell in us”? 6But #Isa. 54:7, 8; See Matt. 13:12 he gives more grace. Therefore it says, #1 Pet. 5:5; Cited from Prov. 3:34 (Gk.)“God opposes the proud but #Isa. 54:7, 8; See Matt. 13:12 gives grace to the humble.” 7Submit yourselves therefore to God. #1 Pet. 5:8, 9; [Eph. 4:27; 6:11]Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8#2 Chr. 15:2; Lam. 3:57; Zech. 1:3; Mal. 3:7; [Luke 15:20] Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. #Isa. 1:16 Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and #Jer. 4:14 purify your hearts, #ch. 1:8you double-minded. 9#[Matt. 5:4]Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10#ver. 6; Isa. 57:15; [Luke 1:52]; See Matt. 23:12Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.
11 #
2 Cor. 12:20; 1 Pet. 2:1; [ch. 5:9] Do not speak evil against one another, brothers.#4:11 Or brothers and sisters The one who speaks against a brother or #See Matt. 7:1judges his brother, speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. 12There is only #Isa. 33:22 one lawgiver and #ch. 5:9 judge, he who is able to save and #Matt. 10:28 to destroy. But #Rom. 14:4who are you to judge your neighbor?
Boasting About Tomorrow
13Come now, you who say, #Prov. 27:1; Luke 12:18-20“Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— 14yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For #Ps. 102:3; [Job 7:7]you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. 15Instead you ought to say, #See Acts 18:21“If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” 16As it is, you boast in your arrogance. #[1 Cor. 5:6]All such boasting is evil. 17#[Luke 12:47, 48; 2 Pet. 2:21]; See John 9:41So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.
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