James 4

1 What is the cause of the fighting and quarreling that goes on among you? Isn’t it to be found in the desires which are always at war within you?

What causes wars and contentions among you? Is it not the cravings which are ever at war within you for various pleasures?

2 You crave, yet do not have, so you commit murder, so You covet, yet cannot gain your end. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask.

You covet things and yet cannot get them; you commit murder; you have passionate desires and yet cannot gain your end; you begin to fight and make war. You have not, because you do not pray;

3 You ask, yet do not receive, because you ask for a wrong purpose – to spend what you get on your pleasures.

or you pray and yet do not receive, because you pray wrongly, your object being to waste what you get on some pleasure or another.

4 Unfaithful people! Don’t you know that to be friends with the world means to be at enmity with God? Therefore whoever chooses to be friends with the world makes himself an enemy to God.

You unfaithful women, do you not know that friendship with the world means enmity to God? Therefore whoever is bent on being friendly with the world makes himself an enemy to God.

5 Do you suppose scripture means nothing when it says, ‘Envy results from the longings of the spirit which God has implanted within you?’

Or do you suppose that it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, "The Spirit which He has caused to dwell in our hearts yearns jealously over us"?

6 But he gives us greater grace; and that is why it says, – ‘God opposes the haughty, but gives grace to the humble.’

But He gives more abundant grace, as is implied in His saying, "God sets Himself against the haughty, but to the lowly He gives grace."

7 Therefore submit to God. Stand up to the devil, and he will flee from you.

Submit therefore to God: resist the Devil, and he will flee from you.

8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Make your hands clean, you sinners; and your hearts pure, you vacillators!

Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and make your hearts pure, you who are half-hearted towards God.

9 Grieve, mourn, and lament! Let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your happiness to gloom!

Afflict yourselves and mourn and weep aloud; let your laughter be turned into grief, and your gladness into shame.

10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.

Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you.

11 Do not disparage one another, friends. The person who disparages others, or passes judgment on them, disparages the Law and passes judgment on the Law. But, if you pass judgment on the Law, you are not obeying it, but judging it.

Do not speak evil of one another, brethren. The man who speaks evil of a brother-man or judges his brother-man speaks evil of the Law and judges the Law. But if you judge the Law, you are no longer one who obeys the Law, but one who judges it.

12 There is only one lawgiver and judge – he who has the power both to save and to destroy. So then who are you to pass judgment on your neighbor?

The only real Lawgiver and Judge is He who is able to save or to destroy. Who are you to sit in judgement on your fellow man?

13 Listen to me, you who say ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a town and spend a year there, doing business and making money,’

Come, you who say, "To-day or to-morrow we will go to this or that city, and spend a year there and carry on a successful business,"

14 yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow! For you are but a puff of smoke that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

when, all the while, you do not even know what will happen to-morrow. For what is the nature of your life? Why, it is but a mist, which appears for a short time and then is seen no more.

15 Instead you should say ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.’

Instead of that you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we shall live and do this or that."

16 But as it is, you are boasting presumptuously! All such boasting is wicked.

But, as the case stands, it is in mere self-confidence that you boast: all such boasting is evil.

17 The person, then, who knows what is right but fails to do it – that is sin in them.

If, however, a man knows what it is right to do and yet does not do it, he commits a sin.