James 4:1-17
James 4:1-17 (Good News Translation)
1Where do all the fights and quarrels among you come from? They come from
your desires for pleasure, which are constantly fighting within you. 2You
want things, but you cannot have them, so you are ready to kill; you
strongly desire things, but you cannot get them, so you quarrel and fight.
You do not have what you want because you do not ask God for it. 3And when
you ask, you do not receive it, because your motives are bad; you ask for
things to use for your own pleasures. 4Unfaithful people! Don't you know
that to be the world's friend means to be God's enemy? If you want to be
the world's friend, you make yourself God's enemy. 5Don't think that there
is no truth in the scripture that says, The spirit that God placed in us is
filled with fierce desires. 6But the grace that God gives is even stronger.
As the scripture says, God resists the proud, but gives grace to the
humble. 7So then, submit yourselves to God. Resist the Devil, and he will
run away from you. 8Come near to God, and he will come near to you. Wash
your hands, you sinners! Purify your hearts, you hypocrites! 9Be
sorrowful, cry, and weep; change your laughter into crying, your joy into
gloom! 10Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. 11Do
not criticize one another, my friends. If you criticize or judge another
Christian, you criticize and judge the Law. If you judge the Law, then you
are no longer one who obeys the Law, but one who judges it. 12God is the
only lawgiver and judge. He alone can save and destroy. Who do you think
you are, to judge someone else? 13Now listen to me, you that say, Today or
tomorrow we will travel to a certain city, where we will stay a year and go
into business and make a lot of money. 14You don't even know what your life
tomorrow will be! You are like a puff of smoke, which appears for a moment
and then disappears. 15What you should say is this: If the Lord is
willing, we will live and do this or that. 16But now you are proud, and
you boast; all such boasting is wrong. 17So then, if we do not do the good
we know we should do, we are guilty of sin.
your desires for pleasure, which are constantly fighting within you. 2You
want things, but you cannot have them, so you are ready to kill; you
strongly desire things, but you cannot get them, so you quarrel and fight.
You do not have what you want because you do not ask God for it. 3And when
you ask, you do not receive it, because your motives are bad; you ask for
things to use for your own pleasures. 4Unfaithful people! Don't you know
that to be the world's friend means to be God's enemy? If you want to be
the world's friend, you make yourself God's enemy. 5Don't think that there
is no truth in the scripture that says, The spirit that God placed in us is
filled with fierce desires. 6But the grace that God gives is even stronger.
As the scripture says, God resists the proud, but gives grace to the
humble. 7So then, submit yourselves to God. Resist the Devil, and he will
run away from you. 8Come near to God, and he will come near to you. Wash
your hands, you sinners! Purify your hearts, you hypocrites! 9Be
sorrowful, cry, and weep; change your laughter into crying, your joy into
gloom! 10Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. 11Do
not criticize one another, my friends. If you criticize or judge another
Christian, you criticize and judge the Law. If you judge the Law, then you
are no longer one who obeys the Law, but one who judges it. 12God is the
only lawgiver and judge. He alone can save and destroy. Who do you think
you are, to judge someone else? 13Now listen to me, you that say, Today or
tomorrow we will travel to a certain city, where we will stay a year and go
into business and make a lot of money. 14You don't even know what your life
tomorrow will be! You are like a puff of smoke, which appears for a moment
and then disappears. 15What you should say is this: If the Lord is
willing, we will live and do this or that. 16But now you are proud, and
you boast; all such boasting is wrong. 17So then, if we do not do the good
we know we should do, we are guilty of sin.
God bless you.
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