James 4: 1 – 17
FedUp
1 Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? 2 You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. 3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. 4 Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. 5 Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”? 6 But He gives more grace. Therefore, He says: “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” 7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up. 11 Do not speak evil of one another, brethren. He who speaks evil of a brother and judges his brother, speaks evil of the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. 12 There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. Who are you to judge another? 13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; 14 whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. 15 Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.” 16 But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. 17 Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.
I am not talking about overnight delivery. I am talking about overnight irritation. After reading this chapter, I want to say to James (which of course I can’t) ‘Wow James you sound like you are fed up with all the hypocrisy going on in the church. So, go ahead and let it all out!’ Read this chapter again and see if you agree with my observation. James is going to increase his frustration in his observation of the behavior of his Christian brothers and sisters.
When you go over the book of James my heart goes out to him. I mean put yourself in his shoes. Here he was the second boy in Mary and Joseph’s family. Watching his parents deal specially with his older brother was very confusing to him. When Jesus began His ministry, James had a hard time dealing with all the amazing reports he heard.
James would later be greatly convicted in the things he said and the way he acted to the real Son of God who he grew up with. All this frustration and guilt can be seen in his observation of the way followers of the Lord Jesus Christ were behaving. James builds in his audit of the things that believers were saying and doing, and it comes out in fiery truth.
Let me say about some things that are related to our being ‘FedUp’ with.
All of us have off days, and even if we’re the happiest people on the planet we will generally admit to feeling a bit like life is full of frustrations.
Most of us still feel that overall, for the most part, life is a glorious gift and full of surprises. It’s only when this feeling of pointlessness or hopelessness continues, when you feel permanently ‘fed up’ of life, that something is wrong – if you don’t enjoy life itself then you will stand to get little enjoyment out of anything you do. If it all seems ‘pointless’, or all of it is hard/stressful/depressing, then nothing you can do will bring much enjoyment and it will be hard to feel motivated. Not only is this bad for you, but it can also mean that your relationships and your career suffer as a result.
The first thing to ask yourself is why you are fed up with life. There are many possible reasons, and you are certainly not alone in this thought. As mentioned before, many people will have at some point felt fed up with life, and this tends to be for several reasons.
Stress is one common reason to be fed up with life. If you feel like you’re being pulled in every direction and you have too much going on, then this will be something that affects you 24/7 and not just when you are in the presence of whatever the stressor is. It’s hard to let go of anxiety and if this is something you are feeling all the time, then it can feel as though life is too stressful and just something that will get you down – rather than something to enjoy and explore.
Sometimes it can feel like everything is going wrong – like you are God’s punching bag and one thing falls through for you after another. This is very similar to the stress cause, but essentially if you feel like everything you build up just gets knocked down and everything you try just goes wrong, then it can feel a bit pointless trying in the first place.
Existentialism is the concept that we are alone in the universe and that there is no God and no higher purpose to life. Certainly, even for those with belief systems sometimes the universe can seem a bit mysterious and the motives behind events can seem a bit strange. For others who have not formulated a hypothesis for what life is about, this can go a lot further and the whole thing can seem like a pointless exercise. When you really think about it we don’t know why we are here or what we are here for, and there’s a chance that when we die it will all be over. It’s understandable that these heady subjects can sometimes be enough to take some of the joy and motivation out of life. But the truth is that there is a God and that He cares about us.
Sometimes there won’t be an obvious reason why you’re fed up of life, but it can feel as though you are just viewing the world through a gray fog that takes away the vibrancy and the excitement. You might feel lethargic and depressed and it may be that nothing quite gets you excited in the same way. This suggests perhaps that you are suffering with depression or a mood disorder and there can be many reasons that this can be the case.
Sometimes it just feels like we’re stuck in a rut and like we’re spinning our wheels. Perhaps we had great aims for our life and high hopes – maybe we wanted to be someone who made an impact in this world– but now it is just sinking in that this is unlikely to happen. Perhaps we’re just bored of the same job, the same routine and an apparent lack of progress. This is often the trigger for a midlife crisis or depression.
However, to be fed up with life is a terrible shame and it means being fed up with everything. When you think about the size of the universe and the beauty of everything in it, then it’s preposterous to suggest that you can be fed up with all of it. Life is filled with limitless possibilities and we are completely free to explore them. It might not feel like it, but that is the reality.
We don’t know the meaning of life yet, or whether there indeed is one, but that is what gives us the freedom to create our own meaning and to create our own purpose. That’s what makes us free and individual rather than all just working toward one goal. That’s the only way it should be.
You then need to create your own purpose, one that gives you fulfillment and happiness. Whether that means creating art that you can leave behind for the world after you’re gone, whether it means living life full throttle and getting as many experiences out of it as you possibly can, or whether it means spending time to raise your children and develop your relationships so that you help them to get the most of life and so that you are remembered by the people closest to you. That said traveling is a great way to shake the feelings of being fed up of life as a change of scene can get you away from life’s stresses, while also helping you to see some more of what the world has to offer you.
At the same time, you need to make the most of your freedom and to explore. This doesn’t have to necessarily mean traveling; but exploring everything else the world has to offer by meeting new people, reading books, learning new subjects and exploring yourself.
If your life is being brought down by a few specific issues, then spend some serious time thinking about how you might be able to address these stressors and start to feel better. That might mean changing job, getting out of an abusive relationship, or looking at your finances. Again, don’t be shy to ask for help where it’s available.
Some lifestyle changes can improve your feelings of depression or stress. For instance, working out more often can help to provide you with more energy and trigger the release of endorphins (feel good hormones), while eating the correct diet can have similar effects, as can getting more sunlight. Installing something like a ‘daylight lamp’ can help you to get natural sunlight in your home and is particularly useful if you suffer from seasonal affective disorder.
If you want to get out of the feeling of being fed up, then I encourage you to try to have God be in your life. He has said that He will keep you in perfect peace if your mind is stayed on Him.
If you question doing this then I ask you to consider giving this a try with all your being for three months. If it does not work out for you like I am stating, then I will gladly refund your ‘misery’.
Having spoken of those who have received the wisdom from above, and through it have found peace, and a message of peace, James now turns to look at those who have refused the wisdom that is from above and are living by their own wisdom, following the endless search for pleasure. And he does it with powerful illustrations which, like many of those of Jesus, are deliberately exaggerated. He speaks of wars and battles, of murder and of adultery, but all as exaggerated pictures of their situation. The point is that they are gross sinners and are to recognize the fact. He declares that the consequences for them of their false attitudes are ‘wars’, and ‘battles’, both nationally, locally and personally, together with an adulterous attitude towards God and the world which brings them into condemnation. James is here using the strongest language possible to bring out their full involvement in bringing displeasure to God. They are willing to ‘go to war and murder’, even if for the most part what they actually do is only quarrel and squabble and fight verbally and spit hate, for war and murder is truly in their hearts. The passage is expanding on the idea of the desires that cause temptation and result in sin and death. It is a picture of those in the church who have lost their first love.
The ‘natural man’ in each failing church member longs for the pleasures that he desires, and then is ready to fight and quarrel for them. He is filled with desire for pleasure and then yields to the temptation. But although he squabbles and hates and ‘kills’, being filled with envy at others and coveting what they have, he does not obtain what he is looking for. For what he is looking for is elusive. It is not to be found in the world. Yet, if only he could see it, it is there waiting for him, for it is available from above. But the fact is that he does not have it because he does not ask for it from the One Who could give it to him (1.5). The last thing he thinks of is looking to God, for he does not consider that God can give him what he wants. And then if he does decide to ask for it from God he does not receive it, because he asks for it for the wrong reasons. He should thus pause and recognize that his problem is that what he wants is not what God wants, but what the world wants, and thus to want that is to be contrary to God. He should therefore ask himself, ‘Has God put my spirit within me so that I might just go on being filled with desires that simply result in envy of others, or has He done it in order that I might seek after Him?’
James is now probably speaking mainly to those in the churches who are mere enquirers, or onlookers, or hangers on, although there may even at this stage be more genuine believers who had become complacent in their faith, and thus lukewarm. These are the opposite of the genuine seekers after wisdom. And he points out that because their spirits are not looking to God, they fail to receive what in their hearts they are looking for. The consequence is that they fight and squabble with each other, or even go to war, in order to obtain what they think will give them pleasure and satisfy their desires. But in fact they never receive it, because they are looking in the wrong direction.
1 Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members?
He considers their wars and their squabbling and their belligerence with each other. From where, he asks, do they come? And then he answers his own question. They are the consequence of the wars within themselves, their wanting more and more of the pleasures and desires of the world, which, once having tasted, they cannot bear to be without. For those very pleasures are at war within every part of their bodies (‘their members’) pressing them on into further conflict. We can compare here the fleshly desires that war against the soul (1 Peter 2.11). They want satisfaction at all costs as the battle rages within them. The picture is of people in turmoil within because of their determination to have their pleasures, as each one battles with everyone else in order to get what he himself wants. The language is that of the battlefield, but in most cases what is in mind is probably the local ‘battlefield’ at work and in the household. For those who live like this there can be no peace.
The pleasures were no doubt of various kinds, for James does not specify them. They would include gaining the pleasure of recognition for its own sake, gaining pleasure in achieving status for reasons of personal vanity, gaining pleasure in getting their own way, gaining pleasure by getting revenge for imagined, or even real, slights, to say nothing of the more openly ‘sinful’ pleasures of engaging in sex or seeking monetary enhancement by improper methods. All these could cause ‘wars and battles’ among members of the congregation. And they are simply a few among many possibilities.
2 You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask.
He then builds up a picture which reveals how they go about obtaining what they want, for they will do anything rather than ask God for it and fulfil His conditions. And yet in the end they desire in vain because they do not get what they want. They will even ‘kill’, with the mind even if not in reality, because they are green with envy, with their covetous eyes on what others have, or on other people’s positions, but they still do not really find what they are looking for, for they are never satisfied. So then they fight and ‘go to war’ in order to obtain what they think their enemies have. But all the time what they are looking for is elusive. They do not find it because they do not ask God for it. Notice the parallels, ‘you are at war -- and you desire, you kill and you covet’. The picture is of a continual activity. The need for pleasure leads on to squabbling, leads on to desire, leads on to murder, leads on to further coveting, leads on to further war, and so on in an endless sequence.
It should be clear by now that James is depicting this in deliberately strong Most do not literally ‘go to war’ for what they want, they simply ‘battle’ with one another, or with those on another layer of their group. They are murderers at heart. They hate, and they threaten, and they plot and they purpose harm. After Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount most Christians would see hating and revealing contempt as being the equivalent of murder.
All the time they fail to obtain their hearts desire because they do not go to the One Who alone can satisfy the heart. They do not ask God for it, or if they do it is with the wrong aims and the wrong motives. All their thoughts are on pleasure and desire and warring among themselves, and not on pleasing God. Those who fall, having failed to be spiritually strengthened by the testing’s and trials that they have faced, are tempted by their own desires, are enticed and allured, and this gives birth to sin which finally results in death.
3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.
Even when they do sometimes ask God for it they still do not receive satisfaction of heart. And that is because their motives are wrong. The failure is since they ask for the wrong reasons, because their motives are totally selfish. Their sole aim is simply to enjoy the fulfilment of their earthy desires and aims. They want to dissipate whatever benefit that they obtain on pleasure. They reason that they want what they are asking for because it will enable them to use it up for their own worldly satisfaction. They are caught up in the vortex of the world. Their heart is not really on God.
There is an important lesson for us all here concerning prayer. It reminds us that God is not there just to give us whatever we decide that we want. His promises with respect to prayer are not open-ended but are given to those who are seeking to fulfil His will, and in order to help them in the fulfilment of that will. Thus, if I regard iniquity in my heart the Lord will not hear me (Psalm 66.18), for the eyes of the Lord are towards the righteous, and His ear is open to their cry, while the face of the Lord is against evildoers (Psalm 34.15-16). For the fact is that He is only near to those who call on Him in truth (Psalm 145.18). It is if we ‘ask anything in accordance with His will’ that He hears us, so that we can know then that we will receive an answer to our prayers (1 John 5.14). For the promise ‘ask and you will receive, seek and you will find’ is not regarding anything we choose, but has in mind the seeking of the good things of God, and especially the Holy Spirit (Matthew 7.7-11). When we dare to pray ‘for Jesus’ sake’ we must ensure that we are praying for what Jesus would want us to have. We cannot ask in His Name for what is contrary to His will.
4 Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
They are also like adulteresses craving what will satisfy their thirst for pleasure. They have turned from God Who gives to all men liberally and are looking to the world for their pleasure. And they like what they see in the world, and so they concentrate their attention on it. For what the world is after is not what God is after. All that is in the world, the desires of the flesh, the desires of the mind, and the search to be ‘someone’, is not of the Father but is of the world (1 John 2.16). Thus each one who makes himself a friend of the world, and its aims and ambitions, also thereby makes himself an enemy of God. The point is that we cannot always choose the environment in which we find ourselves, but we can always choose what we will set our hearts on, and James makes clear that to choose the way that the world chooses is to take up a position of opposition towards God. There is no question of having both God and the world. We cannot serve both God and Mammon (Matthew 6.24).
The reference ‘A friend of the world’ is in stark contrast with Abraham who was the friend of God (2.23). All must choose whom they will serve. Abraham had his eyes on God. These ‘adulteresses’ have their eyes on the world. The question, therefore, for us is, Where are our eyes fixed?
5 Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”?
The spirit that God has put within man was never intended to have these envious longings.
If James is referring to the Spirit or to God, how can it be said that He ‘yearns jealously’? The answer to that lies in the references in the Old Testament which speak of God’s jealousy over those who He has chosen as His own. It is a jealousy of love. He will not give up His own to others, neither to other gods nor to the world. In the same way Deuteronomy 32.11 likens God to an eagle ‘yearning over its young’.
The commendation is either demonstrating how contrary friendship with the world is to the spirit God has put within us, or indicating the strength of God’s love for us.
The condition of some of God’s professed people having been revealed somewhat emphatically, James now calls on them to get back to God, responding to His jealous love which seeks to bring their spirit back to Him. It is a question of humbling themselves, submitting themselves to God, resisting the Devil, and then drawing near to God so that He can draw near to them.
6 But He gives more grace. Therefore, He says: “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
The One Who jealously yearns over their spirits, offers them more than the world can ever do as ‘He gives more grace.’ If they humble themselves He promises that He will cause His grace, His undeserved love and favor, to overflow towards them. For while those who remain proud (having a sense of arrogant superiority over others) and continue to hold to the world will be resisted, He will give His undeserved favour to the humble in overflowing measure, as the Scripture has promised. ‘More grace’ indicates grace over and above His grace active in their initial conversion, or it may simply be saying that ‘He gives more and more grace as it is needed’.
The need for humility is regularly stressed in the Old Testament, especially when His people have sinned against Him. God dwells in the high and holy place, but it is with him who is of a humble and a contrite spirit (Isaiah 57.15).
7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
The phrase is possibly based on Psalm 37.7. ‘Submit yourself to YHWH’. They are therefore to subject themselves humbly to God, as Joshua the High Priest had done before them when he stood at the bar of God (Zechariah 3.1), submitted before Him so that He might determine his case and the case of the people, while they humbly awaited His verdict. They were to turn from the world and own His Lordship They are to turn from their ways, submit to God, and thus resist the Evil One.
Because of this submission they will be resisting the Devil and he will flee from them, as Satan fled from before Joshua (after Zechariah 3.3 Satan drops out of sight and is heard of no more).
The way in which we are always to resist Satan when it is a question of dealing with the pride of life and the friendship of the world is by submission to God. Then all Satan can do is run. While for His people all the glories of the world will seem as nothing when their eyes are on God.
8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
Then they can once more approach God, and He will draw near to them. He will welcome them in friendship. Then they will be able to ask and He will give, because their hearts will be right towards Him. In the same way once, Joshua had been cleansed he too was able to draw near to God (Zechariah 3.6). Drawing near to God continually will be the way by which they will be able to continue in their new walk of holiness.
When they resist the Devil by submitting to God he will flee, when they draw near to God He will draw near to them. For the one thing that the Devil cannot stand is God, while those who submit to Him may come to Him without fear, knowing that they will be received. This picture is of a host welcoming his honoured guest.
Now the way by which they can submit to God and draw near to him is explained. It is first by being cleansed. They are to cleanse their hands by letting go of all that has defiled them and walking in the will of the Father and purify their hearts by fixing them firmly on God and obeying the truth (1 Peter 1.22), no longer being doubleminded. For a doubleminded man is unstable in all his ways (1.8).
The hands were how men performed their actions. They were thus to make them clean by doing good and hating evil (Isaiah 1.16-17). The cleansing of the hands therefore indicates the cleansing of their personal, practical behavior.
‘Purify your hearts’ emphasizes the need for them to be cleansed within, in the inner man, which is responsible for men’s thoughts (Mark 7.21-23). The time for ceremonies is past. What is required now is genuineness of action and heart.
9 Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.
Included within the way of cleansing is true repentance in tears. They are, as it were, to have their own Day of Atonement. The word for ‘affliction’ indicates ‘experiencing hardship’ (as a good soldier of Christ - 2 Timothy 2.3), thus connecting with the purifying effects of the trials in 1.1-12. Note that the verb indicates that it is something done to them to which they are now to respond. And in response to that affliction (1.10) they are to mourn and weep over their sin and failure. All the pleasures and joys that so long they had sought for are to be mourned over and seen for what they are. He is not recommending a life lived like this continually, but an initial genuine repentance so as to clear the sin that has been besetting them out of their lives.
10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.
The result of their humbling themselves before God is that ‘the Lord will exalt you.’ He will lift them up to share His glory (Isaiah 57.15). Jesus Himself repeatedly declared that it was the man who humbled himself who alone would be exalted (Matthew 23.12).
From this point on until 5.12 there will be an emphasis on judgment, and on seeing life in the light of it. The passage parallels 1.9-12, with its references to judgment, to the rich and poor and to the frailty of the rich. It proceeds in four stages:
First, he gives a warning against judging others since it is God and not them Who is Lawgiver and Judge. They need therefore to recognize their humble position and control their tongues accordingly and leave judgment to God (4.11-12).
That is then followed by the question as to how they can possibly judge others, both in view of the difference between them and God which has previously been described (verses 11-12), and in view of their own brevity of life which is like a vapor that rapidly dissipates and is gone, this being something that should especially be considered by those who live to seek gain. They need to recognize that their whole life is subject to the will of God. And he concludes by pointing out that, knowing that they ought to be doing good, for them not to do so is sin. The suggestion is therefore that in the light of their frailty they would do better by concentrating on doing good rather than on making profits (4.12b-17).
He then exposes those who exploit others in order to build up wealth that is in the final analysis temporary and corruptible, reminding them that they too have to face the Last Day and that the cries of those whom they exploit reach up to God (5.1-6).
After that He points ahead to the Lord’s coming as Judge and advises all God’s people in the light of it to wait with patience and meanwhile not to judge others (5.7-12).
Finally, he stresses that if they are open and honest, avoiding the devious use of oaths, they will not fall under judgment (5.12).
There is also another interesting pattern. Starting with the need not to judge others because it is God Who is the Lawgiver and Judge and ending with the reminder that He will in His own time come to judge, he sandwiches in between them what the behavior of the rich should be in the light of it. Those who go about seeking gain rather than doing good, and those who seek to exploit others and destroy the unresisting righteous, need to consider their ways. For life is uncertain, and riches corrupt. Neither can be relied on.
The passage starts off with a warning. Aware that his strong words and his appeal to repentance could now result in some members of the church judging others James issues a strong warning against their doing so. The Lord Jesus says there it is one thing to seek to help one another, as they should, but it will be quite another to issue harsh and hypocritical judgments. For the one who so judges set himself up in God’s place as lawgiver and judge, which ill accords with his cry for humility.
11 Do not speak evil of one another, brethren. He who speaks evil of a brother and judges his brother, speaks evil of the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge.
The idea here is that they ought not to speak against one another critically or in condemnation, often without being aware of the facts. Thereby they could do them great harm, both personally, and in the eyes of others. Many an innocent man has been personally destroyed, or has had his reputation destroyed, by malicious tongues. Once again we are being reminded of the importance of controlling the tongue (3.1-12), of what causes wars and fighting’s among men (4.1), and of the need to be humble (verse 10), that is, to be meek and lowly in heart (Matthew 11.29). For those who speak against their brothers are guilty of misuse of the tongue, and of stirring up a violent response and of exalting themselves in comparison. And as we shall see, he points out that it is also wrong because it is to put those who so speak in the place of God. The thought here is not that of avoiding giving loving assistance to a brother (Matthew 7.5) but of being overcritical and unhelpful and being guilty of harsh judgment and condemnation. It is a matter of balance and motive, and in such matters, we are to be swift to hear, and slow to speak (1.19).
And one reason why no man should speak against another and set himself up as judge is because by doing so they are speaking against the Law and judging the Law. But we might ask, why should that be so? And the answer is, because of what the Law teaches which by their activities they are refuting. He has told us, for example, that we should not be ‘talebearers’ (Leviticus 19.10). If we then disobey this, we are passing judgment on the Law that it is wrong and does not apply to us. The same applies to passing judgment on all those parts of the Law which stress love and mercy, such as, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself’ (Leviticus 19.18). We would not like to be judged by others ourselves, and so we should also avoid judging others. And thus, by judging others we are passing a verdict against that Law. We are saying that it is unworkable and not to be observed. But rather than doing that we should approach all with love and sympathy. (Of course if they are blatantly and unrepentantly openly scorning the Law that will be a different matter. Then it will be God Who is passing judgment. But that is not the question that is being dealt with here).
The point here is that those who are doers of the Law and those who are judges of the Law take up a totally different attitude. ‘But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law, but a judge.’ The judge is concerned with judging, not with doing. But they have to be concerned with doing. Thus, they exclude themselves from being judges. They are no longer impartial.
12 There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. Who are you to judge another?
For in the end they need to recognize that they have no right to set themselves up as judges because that is the prerogative of God alone. He alone is the One who both gives out and determines the Law and is finally responsible to judge those who break it. For He alone is the One Who can save and to destroy. Note here the intimation that the lawgiver and judge can be a Savior as well as a Destroyer. God’s Law, having required the ultimate in justice, ever from the beginning leaves room for mercy through forgiveness and the shedding of the blood of a substitute.
The contrast between man in his inability to act as judge in contrast with the great Judge Himself, now leads up to the question of the frailty of life and the need to recognize that our lives are at God’s disposal. For men should recognize, especially those who are running round with the aim of building up wealth, that not only must they not judge each other, but that they are unable even to judge how long they will be here on the earth carrying on with their normal occupations. Rather then they should look to themselves and recognize that, being aware of the need to do good, if they fail to do so it is sin (which will, of course, be brought into judgment).
Now James finally faces them (and us) up with the truth about themselves. They are not important enough or sophisticated enough to behave like God and judge their neighbour. Indeed they are so frail that with all their big ideas they do not even know whether they will last another day (verse 13). What they should therefore do is recognize that all are in the same situation together, and should do what the Law says, and that is that they should love their neighbors as they love themselves (therefore seek to do them good (verse 17). That is far more in accord with what they are than the idea that they have a right to pass judgment.
13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; 14 whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.
‘Come now.’ This is the first of two ‘come now’s which introduce two scenarios, both of which are intended to make them face up to serious facts. The first of these reveals the frailty of businessmen whose main concern is monetary gain, since how long they go on living is in God’s hands, and the second reveals the frailty of businessmen’s riches, and the fact that God knows how they are behaving. What they should therefore rather be doing is concentrating on doing what they know to be right (verse 17).
This first case is of those who are so sure of how their lives will turn out that they make plans accordingly. They say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into this city, and spend a year there, and trade, and gain wealth”.
James would appear to have a special concern for those who travelled around and had no settled church home. It was easy for such men to lose touch with their faith. But they also provided a lesson for all.
Notice their arrogance as far as God is concerned.
1. They believe that they can regulate their time as they wish (‘today or tomorrow’).
2. They believe that they can choose their destination (‘into this city’).
3. They believe that they have all the time in the world (‘spend a year there’).
4. they believe that they can do what they want without regard to God’s requirements (‘trade and gain wealth’),
Whereas what they should be doing is recognize the frailty of their lives, and that what they will be able to participate in depends totally on the will of God, thus recognizing that the most important thing that they should do is what is good (verse 17). They should therefore ask themselves, ‘what is His will?’ But they do not do so. They forget that they are mortal, and the result is that they have big ideas about themselves. They forget the words of Proverbs 27.1, ‘do not boast yourself of tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring forth’. Compare also the rich fool who forgot that ‘tomorrow we die’ (Luke 12.16-21). That is why they think that they can judge their neighbor. It is also why they think that they can run their own lives just as they please. But they are wrong on both counts.
For what they should remember is what their lives are. They are not substantial. They are rather like a puff of smoke which appears for a short while and then disappears. They are like an early morning mist that soon clears away (Hosea 13.3). For life is brief, and in the midst of life we are in death. So in view of that it is in this light that they should measure how they ought to live, both with regard to judging others (in the face of the fact that we might ourselves face judgment at any time), and with regard to doing good (verse 17). It is in this light that they should determine what they (or rather God) consider to be important. And if they truly recognize that their lives might disintegrate like a puff of smoke at any moment, they will undoubtedly put more consideration into looking at the things that are unseen, and building up treasure in Heaven (Matthew 6.17-18), for they will recognise that the things that are seen are temporal, and will soon pass away, while the things that are unseen are eternal (2 Corinthians 4.18).
15 Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.”
They should therefore live each day as though it might be their last, and recognize that every day that they have after that, is a gift from God, (for the truth is that every day someone somewhere falls dead, with medical experts not knowing why it happened). They ought then to say, “If the Lord wills, we will both live, and do this or that.” And if they do that they will not consider making gains so important.
Please notice that he does not say, ‘if the Lord wills we will get gain’. For if they live in the light of eternity their perspectives will change. They will be more concerned with spiritual gain and with the Lord’s will, and with doing good to those in need (verse 17), because they will recognize that they may shortly have to give account.
16 But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.
But instead of doing that they glory in their arrogant words. They say ‘we will do this and that’ regardless of their mortality, and of God and eternity. But to glory in that way is evil. It is to be casual over what is very important. It is to follow the way of the world and be a friend of the world. It is to indicate that their minds are not set on things above. It is to live in the light of this world, and not of eternity. It is to be earthly minded and not heavenly minded. It is to overlook the requirements of God, and His concern for their daily lives.
17 Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.
There is really only one conclusion that they should come to. They should recognize their mortality and put their efforts into what they know that God wants them to do, and that is to ‘do good’. For if they know what He wants of them and do not do it, for them it is sin.
Thus the stress is on the fact that we should be putting our efforts into doing real good in the world, which is, after all, what we know that we ought to be doing. And for us also, knowing that this is what we ought to do means that it is sin if we do not do it.
We should note that the emphasis here, as throughout his letter, is on what we should be doing, not on a negative ‘what we should not do’. For when anyone knows what they ought to do, (such as 1. Avoiding the judgment of others; 2. Being aware of frailty, and therefore looking at things that are unseen rather than having gain as their first concern, because they and it will soon pass away and they will leave it all behind, and especially 3. Doing good wherever possible), and yet does not do it, then that is sin. So he is bringing out that we can sin by what we do, by the attitude that we take up towards life, and by what we do not do, doing genuine good towards others. And it is that that should be our first consideration.
