James 4 Studies

For those who may wish to ‘study’ this chapter, the following simple resources are provided for you. Each chapter is divided into a number of studies and each study or passage has a simple four-Part, verse-by-verse approach, to help you take in and think further about what you have read.

Passage: James 4:1-3

1 What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? 2 You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. 3 When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

A. Find Out:

1. What question does James first pose? v.1a
2. What answer does he give to it? v.1b
3. What 3 things does he say happen causing frustration? v.2a,b
4. So what conclusion does he draw? v.2c
5. Why do we not get when we ask? v.3a
6. What do we basically want to do? v.3b

B. Think:

1. How are outward actions again seen to flow from inner desires?
2. How do those outward actions so often fail to bring peace in us?
3. What therefore is the answer?

C. Comment:

       In the most recent studies James has been pointing out that the key to our lives is what is on the inside, what is in our heart. He finished the end of chapter 3 by speaking about bringing peace, and so his mind, as a good teacher, turns to the exact opposite. What is going on when we fight and quarrel? It is that desires on the inside of us conflict with other people. We want things but can’t get them; we have desires or wishes which we express in ways that are hostile to other people, yet we still don’t get, we still remain unsatisfied.

      Silly people, he infers, if you want why don’t you ask God, for He is the great provider? Well, we reply, we do ask but we don’t seem to get. That, continues James in this imaginary conversation, is because you have wrong motives for asking, you just want to have to satisfy your selfish desires.

     There, we have gone the full circle, we are back to our inner desires again! We so often focus on outward behavior, but the teacher of spiritual realities knows that it is what happens on the inside that is what is all-important! This applies as much to prayer as anything else. We can make “prayer noises” but if our hearts are wrong and we ask for entirely selfish motives, then even praying is wrong!

D. Application:

1. Do we focus on outward behavior or on our heart condition?
2. Do I pray from right motives, are my actions the expression of a right heart condition?

Passage: James 4:4-6

4 You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. 5 Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us? 6 But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says:

‘God opposes the proud
    but shows favor to the humble.’

A. Find Out:

1. With what does James equate friendship with the world? v.4a
2. What does he say a friend of the world becomes? v.4b
3. What does the Spirit within us do? v.5
4. Who does God oppose? v.6b
5. To whom does He give what? v.6c,a

B. Think:

1. Read also 1 John 2:15-17 How does John describe “the world”?
2. How does this fit with what James says about “the world”
3. What is God working to do, according to this passage?

C. Comment:

      In the Bible “world” has three different meanings. It means the earth on which we live, it means all the people who live on the earth, and finally it is used (as here) to refer to that total system of godless thinking and activity that is materialistic and humanistic and opposed to God. In the letter of John, we see that it is so often expressed through self-centred desires and pride.

     It is no wonder then that James blasts at those who would try to be Christians but at the same time hold onto “the world”; that’s why he calls them adulterous, because they try to relate to two opposing partners. Previously he had been speaking about those who maintain wrong inner desires; now he calls this spiritual adultery.

      Look, he says, you can’t love “the world” (this ungodly, self-centred way of thinking and living) AND God, the two are opposed to each other, they are enemies. The Holy Spirit that God puts in Christians is HOLY and He yearns to make us more and more like Jesus, He is jealous or envious for us, He (rightly) is upset if we share ourselves with someone other than God, with a false ideology that is based on self! God is opposed to that way of thinking but will bless those who humbly submit themselves to Him as they recognize their need of salvation through Jesus.

D. Application:

1. Loving “the world” is opposition to God.
2. We need to check the whole basis of our thinking and living.

Passage: James 4:7-10

7 Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.

A. Find Out:    

1. What are we to do in respect of God? v.7a
2. What are we to do in respect of Satan & what will happen? v.7b
3. What again are we to do in respect of God? v.8a
4. How are we to prepare ourselves? v.8b
5. How are we to change our outlook? v.9
6. What are we to do before God and what will He do? v.10

B. Think:

1. To whom do these chastening words come?
2. What does this passage convey about God?
3. What does it convey about Satan?

C. Comment:

      If we are truly righteous with a completely clear conscience, relax! James isn’t speaking to you! He has been speaking to those with wrong inner desires (v.3), and to those with divided hearts (v.4), and now to those who have been proud, who have allowed sin in their lives, who are “double minded”. He recognizes that part of the cause of this state of affairs is Satan, so let’s see his counsel.

      First it is to SUBMIT TO GOD, which means a laying down of your life to Him. To do that will mean, secondly, DRAWING NEAR TO GOD, seeking Him out, coming to a place of fresh awareness of Him. As you do that you will also realize that you need to PURIFY YOURSELF BEFORE GOD and, as you come to meet with God to put your life right, you will need to come in SOLEMN AWARENESS of what you are doing and who it is you are coming before.

     James is quite clear that it is a solemn and serious thing to put your life right before Almighty God and it should take time and serious reflection. When we come like this then three things will happen: first the enemy will flee from you, second the Lord will appear to come close to you and third He will lift you up out of that state you were in.

D. Application:

1. Sin, in whatever form, is not something to be treated casually. It needs repentance and renunciation, to receive God’s forgiveness.
2. Dealing with our sin is a serious business!

Passage: James 4:11-12

11 Brothers and sisters, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against a brother or sister or judges them speaks against the law and judges it. When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it. 12 There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you – who are you to judge your neighbor?

A. Find Out:

1. What are we not to do? v.11a
2. What happens if we do that? v.11b
3. What happens when you judge the law? v.11c
4. Of what is there only one? v.12a
5. What is he able to do? v.12b
6. What are we not to do? (Implied) v.12c

B. Think:

1. When we speak against another, what is the attitude behind it?
2. How do you think judging a person judges the law?
3. What in this, do you think it is saying in respect of God?

C. Comment:

       In chapter 3 James had spoken about internal issues followed by their expression through what is spoken. In this chapter he has also been speaking about wrong internal desires and now moves on to the expression of some of them by words spoken against others in the family of God. If you speak ill of another you are judging him, you have weighed his character, found it wanting and are declaring his failure.

      If you do this you also judge the Law, and you may be doing that in two ways: first you may be pronouncing on what is right and wrong in respect of this person and in that sense put yourself above the Law. Second you are disregarding the royal law (see also 2:8 and Leviticus 19:18 and Matthew 22:39) and are not loving your neighbor as yourself, for you would not slander yourself!

      God is to be the only one who judges people, and He alone has the right to decide whether they warrant life or death. For us, we are to love and accept one another and leave the Lord to sort out their problems! The next time you are speaking about someone else, check to see the nature of what you are saying. Is it negative and judging? In which case you are in trouble with the Lord!

D. Application:

1. Speaking wrong about others is sin.
2. Sin, in whatever form, requires repentance!

Passage: James 4:13-17

13 Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ 14 Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. 15 Instead, you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.’ 16 As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. All such boasting is evil. 17 If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.

A. Find Out:

1. How do some people speak? v.13
2. But what is wrong with that? v.14a
3. How does James describe our lives? v.14c
4. How should we speak? v.15
5. Instead, what do we do so often, and what is that seen as? v.16
6. What is described as sin here? v.17

B. Think:

1. What foolish use of words is picked up by James today?
2. What is similar and what is different from yesterday’s verses?
3. How are words and heart linked in today’s thoughts?

C. Comment:

      In the previous verses James had spoken about slanderous words. Now he picks up on boasting words. As he had said in the first part of chapter 2, our mouths sometimes run away with us and our mouths give us away, they reveal what is in our hearts.

      The boasting words referred to in the present passage reveal pride in the heart, they show a man planning his future without any reference to God. Not only is that foolish in itself but the fact is that so often we make plans for tomorrow but when tomorrow comes things happen, that we have no control over, and which completely cast aside all of our pretentious planning. So, if that happens tomorrow, we shouldn’t be so sure of ourselves for longer periods of planning either. Instead, in humility, as we submit ourselves to God, we may make our plans but always recognize that they will only be fulfilled if it is the purpose of God for that to happen. Boasting is evil, it elevates self and allows pride to reign in our lives.

      Finally, James says, if you as a Christian know what is right, if you know how you ought to speak, what sort of attitude you ought to have, then ensure you do it, for if you don’t do what you know you ought to do, that will be sin.

D. Application:

1. The heart is revealed by our words.
2. Humility and submission to the will of God should be ours.