Focus
To identify and avoid worldliness and live humbly before God.

Central Truth
Christians avoid worldliness by living humbly before God.

Key Verse:
James 4:10 “Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.”

Temptations to sin are all around us.

Whether we consider those temptations big or small, we face them every day.
Keeping ourselves unspotted from the world is a constant battle
(James 1:27 “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”)

Yet, it is a battle we must win.

1. BY CONTROLLING DESIRES

a. Watch Your Motives

James 4:1–3 “What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? (2) 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. (3) When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.”

b. In chapter 3, James described the worldly philosophy that characterizes the mind of the natural man in contrast to the mind of the believer.

i. In chapter 4, he examined some specific aspects of that philosophy and why worldly attitudes have no place in the life of the believer.

ii. More specifically, he confronted the source of constant quarrels and fighting

(James 4:1–3 “What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? (2) 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. (3) When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.”)

c. The fights named in verse 1 are from evil desires.

i. The word “desires” is meaning that pleasure is the first goal of life.

ii. When our desires for pleasure and possessions get too strong, we become upset if they go unfulfilled.

iii. Eventually, these desires get so strong that we envy and hate, attempting to control others to satisfy them (verse 2).

d. It’s hard to imagine Christians actually killing to fulfill their desires, but in Matthew 5:21-22, Jesus compared hatred to murder.

2. SUBMIT TO GOD

James 4:4-7 “You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. (5) Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us? (6) But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: "God opposes the proud but shows favour to the humble and oppressed." (7) Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.”

a. After revealing that believers’ fights were often caused by evil desires, James says the actions of the people could be compared to adultery (James 4:4 “You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.”)

b. Why is following worldly desire compared to adultery?

c. “In what sense is it ‘adultery’ for Christians to follow worldly desires?”

i. We belong to the Lord (Jeremiah 31:32)

ii. We are the bride of Christ (Ephesians 5:23–32).

iii. God demands all of our affection

iv. We cannot pursue a love for the world while loving God (James 4:4).

3. DRAWING CLOSE TO GOD IS THE ANSWER

a. Humble Yourself

James 4:8–10 “Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. (9) Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. (10) Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.”

b. There are times when God desires to makes changes in our lives, and those changes cause us to examine ourselves.

i. This is what James called on his readers to do.


c. James laid out a series of challenges to the people because they had drifted from God

i. James’s first call was to purity (James 4:8 “Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded).

ii. In verse James 4:9 the focus turned to repentance of and grief over sin (“Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom.”)

iii. In James 4:10 James calls for humility (“Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.”)

1. We humble ourselves by being obedient.

How does God respond when believers repent?

The answer is in James 4: 7, 10

“Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. (10) Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.”