Humility Cures Worldliness

James 4:6-10

"To submit" is to surrender and to obey. Talk humbly with God and He will give you grace.

God stands behind us to protect us from the evil one. This is conditional upon us drawing near to God.

"Cleanse your hands" is a picture of what the Christian needs to do if he has gotten into sin. If you have been dabbling in sin, you better mourn and not laugh about it, and get right with God.

James repeats at the end of this passage for us to humble ourselves, surrender to Him, and He will lift us up!

Prayer Perspective

James 4:1-5

James begins by saying that wars and fights come because you want things that you cannot have. Your desires for pleasure are messing you up!

1 John 3:15 says that if you hate someone, you are the same as a murderer. Perhaps this is what James is referring to when he mentions that we are murderers.

James points out two dilemmas:
1) Either you don't ask for what you should ask for, or
2) You ask for things that you should not ask for.

God answers prayer in His will. Be open to listening to God. Ask Him to help you to know better how to pray. He wants to help you all through the day with every circumstance that arises. Just ask at the moment when you need help!!

James concludes these verses by saying that we should not abandon God and become a friend to the world and the flesh. God wants ALL of us, not part of us. The Holy Spirit is jealous for us.

Two Kinds of Wisdom

James 3:13-17

You don't just talk about wisdom, you DO wisdom. Head knowledge put into practice is real wisdom.

Wisdom can lead to pride and be self-seeking. It can lead to confusion and back-biting.

But the wisdom from God is pure, peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy, full of good fruits, without partiality, without hypocrisy.

If you want to show that you are wise, DO something!

Beth's Birthday

The Untamable Tongue

James 3:1-12

The same tongue can produce beautiful words and hurting curses. Something is wrong! A Christian's tongue ought not to be expressing opposite messages. Our tone of voice sends signals- and sometimes undesired signals. What meaning do you want to come across?

Taming our tongue can only be done by supernatural power. No man has the power to tame it on his own. And lastly, we all must be willing to say that we are sorry because our tongues are not perfect yet!

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I get such a kick out of Beth. Several times since Anne and Paul have gone back to school, she wants to say something about them and refers to them as "the kids". Where does she get that?

Blogging Again

Empty chairs at empty tables. And time marches on.

We have been studying the book of James for a while so I will pick up in the middle of it where we stopped when y'all went back to school.

James 2:14-26

This is the passage on "Faith without Works Is Dead". Dad said that your concern for your brother needs to be apparent by how you act towards him when he is in need. We are to help people and be concerned about them.

Also, James 1:18 teaches that we are saved by faith, and there is no question that James is starting a new theology on works based religion. He isn't.
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Last night at the dinner table, Beth announced that she cannot wait to grow up and have children of her own because then she will not have to do the work (I guess she meant school, cleaning, and washing the dishes)

So parenting is the easy end of the deal, eh? I wander if any of my perceptions of reality could be so flawed?