James 4:4-6 (NKJV) 4Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. 5Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”? 6But He gives more grace. Therefore He says:“God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.”
Over the last number of weeks, we have looked at James 4:7-10 in which the apostle exhorts us to submit to God and resist the devil. Our main focus has been on the first part of his statement which tells us we can only successfully resist the devil if we are in a state of true submission to God. We found that to accomplish that; we must draw near to him which will cause him to draw near to us. James then gives us some difficult things we must face about ourselves. These are the things we must deal with if we want to draw near to him.
James 4:7 (NKJV) says, “Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.”
Both statements in this verse are commands. Submitting to God is not something we can choose to do or not to do. Neither is resisting the devil. According to what comes before verse seven in this chapter, these statements are in the context of dealing with strife in the church. James exhorts us to make sure we are “friends with God” not with the world. So, the first thing we resist is the influence of the world over our behavior.
As I write this I am in the nation of Kenya. We are here ministering to pastors, Leaders and churches, helping to strengthen them so they may live above the controlling influence of the world. Every culture has its good points and bad points. I have been to many different places and experienced many different ways of life. We are all affected by the world in which we grew up and live. The one thing all cultures have in common is that they were created by man.
As we look at the first 6 verses of James, we see that he is not holding back in his admonition to the church of his day. They were also under the influence of an ungodly culture. James was part of the Jerusalem church, yet the culture that had developed at that time in Israel’s history was dominated by the legalistic thinking of the pharisees. There was also the influence of Greek and Roman paganism. Since Israel was at the crossroads of the world at that time, many influences fought against the culture that Jesus preached about and came to bring to the world. It was to this that James is speaking in the first six verses of chapter seven. We see that he is pointing out that this same influence had gotten into the church. That is why he exhorts them to “submit to God and resist the devil.”
Today we live in a time when these influences are even more far reaching and increasingly more ungodly. I am thankful for the good things that are part of the world of my generation. There are things that we can enjoy and have access to, that other generations could never have imagined possible. Yet as the good things have multiplied so have the influences that would draw us away from God. Much of what is taught in schools and accepted in our world seek to remove the influence of God entirely. Man is at the center and whatever man chooses as right and wrong is simply a matter of perspective. Paul described this worldly culture in his second letter to Timothy.
2 Timothy 3:1-5 (NKJV) 1But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: 2For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, 3unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, 4traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!
So much of what Paul warns his son in the faith to avoid, looks a lot like our day. Like Timothy, we need to resist these influences by choosing to live our lives according to God’s Word and the influence of his spirit.
James points out something that can help us understand the danger. He tells his readers that whoever wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. As is usual for James this is a statement that sounds very harsh but is meant to warn not criticize. James’ letter is in the Bible because it was inspired by God. If he is right, and he is, in saying “whoever wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God”, I want to know what characterizes friendship with the world. If I know what it is, I can avoid it, which we must do at all costs.
The Greek word translated friend is the word “filos.” In Strongs dictionary it is defined as “fondness. Vines dictionary says it primarily an adjective, denoting “loved, dear, or friendly.” To be a friend with the world is to cultivate a fondness for the things of the world. It means to be loved by the world as well as loving the world. There is nothing wrong with enjoying the good things the world may have to offer. There is something wrong with becoming so fond of those things that they begin to erode our attachment to the things of God.
I’m not suggesting a strictly legal perspective, but it’s important to recognize that whatever pleasures our flesh experiences, it will tend to crave even more. When that happens, we become more and more friendly with the world from which that pleasure flows. Enjoying life does not make us enemies of God, but accepting the influence of the world as the determiner of our behavior does.
I believe we have all experienced what I am talking about. We find something we enjoy. It could be an activity, food or anything else that brings pleasure to our senses. At first, we have no problem turning away from that thing and giving our attention back to the things of God. However, if we continue to yield to it, we will find that we justify giving more time and attention to that thing than to our relationship with him. We may begin to resent that church, or some other spiritual activity that is taking us away from what we enjoy. Eventually we find that we begin to skip spiritual activities in favor of the one our flesh enjoys so much. That is when we begin to become an enemy of God.
The Greek word translated enemy means to be actively or passively hostile. As we move closer to the world and become more influenced by the things of the world, we make ourselves an adversary to God and his will in our lives. In verse 4 it says whoever will be a friend of the world is an enemy of God. The Greek is very emphatic. The idea is that we have made a decision to follow after the things of the world. Most of us will probably never come to that point, however most of us have traveled some distance down this path.
How do we resist this dangerous trend. We must identify the possibility that we can become “friends with the world” and actively reject the thing that is leading us away from God. We must recognize that all that the world has to offer has ties to the god of this world. I always told my children, “If something seems to be leading you away from God, it is not worth the risk. If it leads you to be closer to God and the things of God you are OK. As soon as we identify the trend away from him, we must stop. Sometimes we can just apply temperance to the thing that is a problem. However, if we cannot resist the drawing away from the Lord, that thing must go. We will need the help of others to be successful.
James ends this section of scripture by quoting Proverbs 3:34. “God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. We must be willing to humble ourselves before God and admit that we are allowing the world to get too close. He then will give us the grace we need to resist the devil in these areas.
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