Warning Against Worldliness “DRAW NIGH TO GOD”
Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.
Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness. James 4:7-8
INTRODUCTION
The author of this Epistle was probably the Lord’s brother, mentioned with Joses, Simon and Judah, and often in the Acts of the Apostles. See Mar_6:3; Act_12:17; Act_15:13; Act_21:18. He was bishop, or president, of the church at Jerusalem, and this letter was probably written from that city. The emphasis laid on the nearness of our Lord’s advent points to a date near A.D. 70. The Epistle may have been written in Hebrew, and was addressed to the Hebrew section of the Church. It lays great emphasis on the sublime ideal of character which Christianity had raised, and to maintain which demanded the constant diligence of all professing Christians.
OUTLINE OF THE EPISTLE OF JAMES
THE MEASURE OF A CHRISTIAN
The Grace of Humility
8. Why are our prayers often unanswered?
WARNING AGAINST WORLDLINESS
From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?
Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.
Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.
Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.
Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy?
But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.
Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.
Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.
Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.
Speak not evil one of another, brethren. He that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law: but if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge.
There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy: who art thou that judgest another?
Comments by
F.B.Meyer
on
James 4:1-10
“DRAW NIGH TO GOD”
The Apostle returns to “the jealousy and faction” of the previous chapter, Jas_3:14, and says that these evils are traceable to lust, that is, to inordinate desire. The restless inward war is the prolific parent of failure in speech and act. If we would pray more and better, we should soon find the inner fires dying down.
In Jas_4:5, R.V., margin, we learn that God has placed His Spirit within us, and that He yearns for complete control over our hearts. He can best overcome inordinate desire and teach us how to pray. God wants more of us. His love is insatiable in its yearning for every room and cupboard of our inner life, and He is ever wishful to give more grace.
There are four conditions which we must fulfill, if God is to have full possession:
1. We must be subject to the will of God, Jas_4:7;
2. We must draw nigh to God, Jas_4:8;
3. We must cleanse our hands and purify our hearts, Jas_4:8;
4. We must humble ourselves in His sight, Jas_4:10.
Then God will fill the soul, the sluice gates of which are open to Him.
Choose a Sermon on
James
by
Pastor Jeff Arthur.
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