James 4 explained: Where Our Fights Really Come From

The root of quarrels (vv. 1-3)

James says the fights in the community start with wanting things for yourself and being frustrated when you can't get them; interpreters differ on whether 'kill' is literal or means hatred that wishes someone gone. People either don't ask God at all, or ask only so they can spend it on their own pleasures.

Unfaithful to God (vv. 4-5)

Calling them adulterous borrows the old prophets' picture of God as a husband to his people, so living by the world's grasping, status-hungry values is like being unfaithful to him. Verse 5 is unclear and matches no known passage of Scripture; it may mean God jealously longs for us, or that the human spirit leans toward envy.

Turning back humbly (vv. 6-10)

Quoting Proverbs 3:34, James says God keeps giving grace, opposing the proud but helping the humble. Washing hands, purifying hearts and mourning picture a real, sorrowful turning back by people pulled two ways between God and their own wants.

Stop running each other down (vv. 11-12)

God's law already says to love your neighbor, so tearing someone down acts as if you stood above that law as its judge. Only God both gives the law and has the power to save or destroy, so final judgment belongs to him.

Plans and a fragile life (vv. 13-17)

James turns to traders confidently mapping out a profitable year, reminding them that life is like a mist that appears briefly and vanishes, so admitting their plans depend on the Lord's will is simply honest. He closes by saying that knowing the good you should do and not doing it is also wrong.

Key verse: James 4:6

Where Christians differ

Christians differ on how far to take 'friendship with the world,' some reading it as a call to keep apart from the wider culture and others as a warning only against greed, envy and status-seeking.

Something to think about

When you think back on a conflict you were part of, how much of it grew from something you wanted and couldn't get?