Daily Bible Reading – 10.21.2021
James 4:1-3, What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? 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. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.
James expands upon the anger issue as he said it led to fights and quarrels among the believers to whom he was writing. Imagine that, fights in church! I must say from where I sit, we have had very few major quarrels in our fellowship. There will always be conflict because of our differing views and opinions, but this seems to take it to a whole new level.
This inappropriate expression of anger in the Body of Christ originates from the desires that are battling within them. James spoke of these evil desires in our battle with temptation. Here, those desires include coveting what others have. They were frustrated they did not have what others had. So, the theme of materialism returns as well. Was it out of their poverty that they were fighting? Or was it the wealthy who wanted more?
James uses the strong language of “killing” to describe what they were doing to each other. Surely, this is not to be taken, literally, because murder does not fit the context. James would have had so much more to say about it than one passing comment.
James appears to use Jesus’ language in the Sermon on the Mount where hateful speech and attitudes are equated with the sin of murder. Though it may not be a literal killing, the spiritual act results in the same kind of sin.
James made it clear that it was not the fault of others or unjust situations which were causing the quarrels within the fellowship. It was the evil desires in their own hearts. So, he challenged them to look within themselves for the cause of the strife around them. A covetous heart can bring out a response of inappropriate anger in “killing” one another.
Questions to Consider:
How have you seen covetousness or other evil desires expressed inappropriately through anger in others? In your own life? Have you had it directed toward you?
Weekly Memory Verse:
James 1:19-20, My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.