James 4
Pastor Sherli Morgan
Have you ever experienced a case of the “wants”? You know…I want a new car, new furniture, a new fishing rod. Okay, so I know nothing about fishing rods, but I do know that most of us at one time or another is overtaken by something that we think we absolutely have to have! Now me…I’m a handbag gal. I’d rather have a beautiful purse than just about anything else in this world. Yet finally in my maturity, I’m learning that I CAN’T have everything I want! (However, now that I think of it, I can be bribed.)
James 4:2 tells us that we don’t have because we don’t ask. Yet in the next verse, he warned us that our asking may be out of a wrong motive. OUCH! Then James wrote about how truly bad we can be – adulterous, enemies of God, proud.
I’d never noticed that the first 6 scriptures in James 4 go along directly with verses 7-8: “Submit yourselves, then to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and He will come near to you.”
Many other verses in this chapter relate to the condition of mankind…that’s us! Talking trash, judging, making big plans for tomorrow when we don’t really know what tomorrow may bring, boasting…has he left anything out?
What’s the cure for a case of the “wants” - for having a divided heart, being envious, judging, boasting, etc? The answer is to submit to God, resisting the enemy of our very soul and heading straight to God. Verse 17 sums it up: “Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins.”
It’s good advice. TAKE it!
When asked about a historical figure (not from the Bible) that she would most like to meet, Grace Covenant's ministry leader for birth - age 2 children and their parents identified Rosa Parks, noting that she “would love to know the strength of conviction and the courage it took to take her place in the Civil Rights movement.”
