Verse: James 4: 4-5
You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. Or do you think Scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely?
Devotion
Some scripture is encouraging, some is flowery, and some is blunt and challenging. This one falls in the latter category. James is writing to the early Jewish Christians and we can see that they were struggling with the same issues that we do. We are like the dog that sees a squirrel. We feel compelled to chase after it, disregarding everything else.
The world is our squirrel. We chase after money, acceptance, comfort, love, excitement, recognition. And the world promises us that we will be deeply fulfilled by these. And while we are chasing these, we are also going to church on Sundays, singing praises to God.
But James is saying that we can’t love two “Gods”. If we truly love God, we cannot love the world and what it has for us. We can’t even be friends with the world or we are adulterous, cheating on God. We become his enemy! Wow! Stern words.
Consider this: God loves us with such a passion that he cannot bear any other love within the hearts of men (Barclay). We grieve God when we turn to our jobs for fulfillment or Netflix for comfort. He wants to be our fulfillment and comfort because he loves us so much. The Holy Spirit in us intensely wants us to draw near to God for all our needs.
And don’t we really know that what the world has to offer is ultimately fleeting and unsatisfying?
So how do we respond to this scripture today? We can be condemned or overwhelmed by the scope of its reach into our lives. Or we can ask God to reveal one area that we have been “too good of friends” with the world and that he wants returned to him. For me, the list is long and it is easy to slip back to chasing that squirrel. Fortunately, we have the Holy Spirit to help us, as a daily practice, turn from the world and love our God wholeheartedly. So pray this prayer with me today and let’s help each other grow in our Christian faith.
Prayer
Thank you, God, for loving us with an all-consuming love. Help us today to know where we are loving the world for something that we should find in you. We trust your gentle, loving ways to change us to be more like your son, Jesus.
Author: Brad Dunn
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