James 4
1 What causes conflicts and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from the passions at war within you?
Whence [are] wars and fightings among you? not thence — out of your passions, that are as soldiers in your members?
2 You crave what you do not have; you kill and covet, but are unable to obtain it. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask.
ye desire, and ye have not; ye murder, and are zealous, and are not able to attain; ye fight and war, and ye have not, because of your not asking;
3 And when you do ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may squander it on your pleasures.
ye ask, and ye receive not, because evilly ye ask, that in your pleasures ye may spend [it].
4 You adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever chooses to be a friend of the world renders himself an enemy of God.
Adulterers and adulteresses! have ye not known that friendship of the world is enmity with God? whoever, then, may counsel to be a friend of the world, an enemy of God he is set.
5 Or do you think the Scripture says without reason that the Spirit He caused to dwell in us yearns with envy?
Do ye think that emptily the Writing saith, 'To envy earnestly desireth the spirit that did dwell in us,'
6 But He gives us more grace. This is why it says: “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
and greater grace he doth give, wherefore he saith, 'God against proud ones doth set Himself up, and to lowly ones He doth give grace?'
7 Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
be subject, then, to God; stand up against 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.
draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you; cleanse hands, ye sinners! and purify hearts, ye two-souled!
9 Grieve, mourn, and weep. Turn your laughter to mourning, and your joy to gloom.
be exceeding afflicted, and mourn, and weep, let your laughter to mourning be turned, and the joy to heaviness;
10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you.
be made low before the Lord, and He shall exalt you.
11 Brothers, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it. And if you judge the law, you are not a practitioner of the law, but a judge of it.
Speak not one against another, brethren; he who is speaking against a brother, and is judging his brother, doth speak against law, and doth judge law, and if law thou dost judge, thou art not a doer of law but a judge;
12 There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the One who is able to save and destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?
one is the lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy; thou — who art thou that dost judge the other?
13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business, and make a profit.”
Go, now, ye who are saying, 'To-day and to-morrow we will go on to such a city, and will pass there one year, and traffic, and make gain;'
14 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.
who do not know the thing of the morrow; for what is your life? for it is a vapour that is appearing for a little, and then is vanishing;
15 Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that.”
instead of your saying, 'If the Lord may will, we shall live, and do this or that;'
16 As it is, you boast in your proud intentions. All such boasting is evil.
and now ye glory in your pride; all such glorying is evil;
17 Anyone, then, who knows the right thing to do, yet fails to do it, is guilty of sin.
to him, then, knowing to do good, and not doing, sin it is to him.
