James 4:1-3 ESV
“What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.”
The Bible says that the flesh is at war with (against) the
Spirit and the Spirit is at war with (against) the flesh, for the flesh desires
what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh.
And, the acts of the flesh are obvious, for they are sexual
immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, selfish ambition, and the like.
And, so we are warned that those who practice such things will not inherit the
kingdom of God. But, if we walk (in practice) by the Spirit, we will not
gratify the desires of the flesh (See Gal. 5:16-21; cf. Rom. 8:1-17; 1 Jn.
1:5-9; Tit. 2:11-14).
What Happens?
So, what happens when we decide to go against the Spirit of
God and we decide to do what our flesh desires, instead? We hurt other people,
for one. We hurt others physically, emotionally, mentally and/or spiritually
when we decide to do what our flesh craves rather than to submit ourselves to
God to do what he requires of us. And, we hurt ourselves, too.
Even if we think this is just our choice, and that we can
sin in secret, and that no one is really getting hurt by it, we are fooling
ourselves. For, our lives impact other people’s lives every day. The choices we
make do impact other people, for good or for bad, either directly or
indirectly. For, we don’t live in isolation. And, what we practice is revealed
in our attitudes, in our words, and in our behaviors towards others.
One compromise often leads to another to another. What
begins in the mind and heart then moves to acting out what was already being
entertained in the mind. And, oftentimes, because sin never satisfies, the one
craving the sin won’t be content with just one level of sin, but he or she will
have to keep going deeper and deeper into sin in order to keep feeding that
flesh.
And, this happens because the flesh is very deceptive, and
it is very powerful, and because people minimize the power of sin over their
lives and so they get stupid, because they get prideful and they think they can
handle it. And so they let their flesh rule their judgments, and that is when
they fall.
They “overplay their hand,” i.e. they get overconfident
because they think they are in a stronger position than they are. And, this
happens a lot with people living in addiction, for they refuse to see
themselves as addicts, and if they have a few good days, they are convinced
they have licked their addiction, and then it comes back to bite them when their
guard is down.
And, they may even call on God to help them, and they may
even pray for guidance and direction, but then when God does give them the
counsel they ask for, they ignore it, for they think they know better. And,
they don’t end up doing what he counsels them to do, and then they act
surprised when they fall, and that is because they continued to play with fire
thinking they won’t get burned.
So, if your problem is lust, for example, if you pray for
God to help you not to lust, but then you keep going places where you know you
have fallen before, and where you have gotten trapped before, you are just
asking to fail. Or, if you say you want victory over lust, but then you feed
your mind with TV shows or movies that sell sensuality, you are already
self-defeated.
You Adulterous People
James 4:4-5 ESV
“You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, ‘He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us’?”
Honestly, with the cheap grace gospel permeating the church
and spreading like gangrene, as it is, I believe the answer to this first
question is probably “No.” Many people who profess faith in Jesus Christ are
blinded to the fact that their friendship with the world – with the lusts of
the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life – is enmity with
God.
And, that is because they have bought into the lies, and
they have been convinced that faith in Jesus Christ is their “get-out-of-jail-free-card,”
and that nothing is required of them – no repentance, no obedience to Christ’s
commandments, and no submission to Christ and to his death to sin and living to
righteousness.
They feel that their “faith” means they are now forgiven
their sins, that God can’t even see when they sin, and that heaven is now
guaranteed them no matter how much or how often they sin.
So, they don’t see themselves as enemies of God, because
they have been pumped full with all these messages that God loves them just the
way they are, that he doesn’t judge them, that nothing bad is going to happen
to them, that heaven is secured them, that God smiles on them, and that he
delights in them even when they are living in rebellion against him and they
are engaging themselves in sinful practices in direct defiance to God.
And, then, if they begin to get a twinge of guilt about
their sinful practices, many are telling them to just claim who they are in
Christ, as though that is supposed to appease the guilt of their consciences
regarding their sinful practices, and as though it is to make them feel better
about themselves and to not feel bad about their sins.
And, so we need to face the reality here that God is not
pleased with us no matter what we do, that he can see when we sin against him,
and that if we make sin our practice, in direct defiance to God’s commands,
that not only won’t we inherit eternal life with God, but we will live self-defeated
lives on this earth. And, our sins, which we believe are private, are not as
private as we may think they are, for they do impact other people in our lives
one way or another, and they may overtake us, and we may fall big time.
Submit Yourselves to
God
James 4:6-10 ESV
“But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.’ Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.”
So many people have this false impression of what God’s
grace is all about. It isn’t just forgiveness of sins, an escape from hell, and
the hope of heaven. For, God’s grace, which brings us salvation from sin,
instructs us to say “NO!” to ungodliness and fleshly passions, and to live
self-controlled, upright and godly lives while we wait for Christ’s return
(Titus 2:11-14).
God’s grace doesn’t just forgive us our sins and then let us
keep on in living to sin unhindered without guilt. His grace delivers us out of
our slavery to sin and it frees us to now walk in Christ’s holiness and purity.
For, Jesus died that we might die with him to sin and live
with him to his righteousness. He died that we might no longer live for
ourselves, but for him who gave his life up for us. He gave his blood on that
cross to buy us back for God so we would now be God’s possession, and so we
would honor God with our lives (Rom. 6:1-23; 1 Pet. 2:24; 1 Co. 6:20; 2 Co.
5:15; Eph. 4:17-24).
So, we are to submit ourselves to God, and we are to resist
the devil, and we are to flee temptation and draw near to God. We aren’t to
tempt fate, so to speak. God is not ok with us making sin our practice. He says
we must die with him to sin and that we must put on Christ and his
righteousness. And, he says we must walk (in lifestyle) according to the Spirit
and not according to the flesh if we want to have eternal life with God (Rom.
8:1-17).
And, he says we are to repent of our sins, turn away from
them, and turn to him to follow him and his commands. And, this involves
humbling ourselves before God, acknowledging our sin, weeping over our sin, and
truly having heart changes which do a 180, i.e. which turn from darkness to
light, and from the power of Satan to God.
This is like you were going one direction, and now you turn,
and you go the opposite direction of what you were going. You once lived to
gratify the sinful cravings of your flesh, but now you live to please God and
to live to him and to his righteousness, all for his praise, glory and honor.
Our God, He is Alive
Music and Lyrics by
A.W. Dicus
Our God, whose Son upon a tree,
A life was willing there to give,
That He from sin might set man free,
And evermore with Him could live.
There is a God, He is alive,
In Him we live and we survive;
From dust our God created man,
He is our God, the great I Am.
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