Just do it. To one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.

James 4 from the daily reading in the One Year Bible

What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? ² You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. ³ You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. ⁴ You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. ⁵ Or do you think that the Scripture speaks to no purpose: “He jealously desires the Spirit which He has made to dwell in us”? ⁶ But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, “God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” ⁷ Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. ⁸ Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹ Be miserable and mourn and weep; let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy to gloom. ¹⁰ Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you.

¹¹ Do not speak against one another, brethren. He who speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks against the law and judges the law; but if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge of it. ¹² There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the One who is able to save and to destroy; but who are you who judge your neighbor?

¹³ Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit.” ¹⁴ Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. ¹⁵ Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.” ¹⁶ But as it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. ¹⁷ Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.

In today’s text it says:  You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.    Some will say I follow Christ and His teachings. I love the world because:  God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. (John 3:16)  Because of that I love as Jesus loved.  Jesus though, in John 15:18-25 says:  “If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they kept My word, they will keep yours also. But all these things they will do to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know Him who sent Me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. He who hates Me hates My Father also. If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would have no sin; but now they have seen and also hated both Me and My Father. But this happened that the word might be fulfilled which is written in their law, ‘They hated Me without a cause.’”      There is a differentiation made between loving the people of the world and loving the sinful way of the world. Jesus words agree with the words of James that those who love the ways of the world hate and are enemies of God. Even following what He said in John 3:16, Jesus continues in verses 17-21 saying:    “God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”    So it is a false argument that we should tolerate and embrace sin and the ways of the world to be like Jesus. Look again at what Jesus says:  If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. He who hates Me hates My Father also. If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would have no sin; but now they have seen and also hated both Me and My Father.   If we, unlike Jesus, embrace and tolerate sin, if we are friends of the ways of the world, then how will people know that they have sin? Instead we are to be light in the darkness. Jesus says: If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.   As we love the people of the world we are to make clear that we are not lovers of the ways of the world, but rather we are lovers of God. If the world rejects and hates us for that, we know that they also hate Jesus and the Father.

Today’s text ends saying:  To one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.   The law consisted of many rules and regulations which instructed both what should not be done, and also what should be done. Even though we do not live under the law, our response to God’s grace still means that there are both things we are not to do and things we are to do. Religion often focuses on the things not to do, while the relationship we have with God, Jesus and the indwelling Holy Spirit focuses on what we should do. The simple truth is this:  the best way to avoid the things we should not do is to do the things we should.   Again religion will often cause us to attempt to crucify our flesh, to stop doing the things of the world. John the Baptist had it right. In John 3:30 he said:  “He must increase, but I must decrease.”    The most effective way of removing the fleshly desires from our lives is not to focus on them, but rather to focus on Jesus; to allow Christ in us to increase to the point where there is nothing left of ourselves. James says:  “He jealously desires the Spirit which He has made to dwell in us”? But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, “God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.    There are times that we are required to engage the enemy in spiritual warfare. But first and foremost, before we battle the enemy we should simply resist him. We should submit and draw near to God. In many of the battles we face, if we will submit and draw near to God, the enemy will flee. The enemy knows that he has already been defeated by God and Christ. He will flee from them and try later to engage us apart from them.

God jealously desires the Spirit He has made to dwell in us. Galatians 5:16-25 tells us what the life in the Spirit should look like:   Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. If we will walk in the Spirit we will not need to battle against the flesh.

 Amen.  To one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin. Amen. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. He who hates Me hates My Father also. If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would have no sin; but now they have seen and also hated both Me and My Father. Amen.  He must increase, but I must decrease.   Amen.   Thank You heavenly Father, Lord Jesus Christ and precious Holy Spirit. Amen.