Daily Reading: 6-9-16
James 4:1-7 New Living Translations (NLT)
I am grateful for every day God gives me breath (ruach or spirit) in my lungs to live in His created world! I believe God is the Giver of all Life. As recipients, humans are given the freedom to choose how we will live that life before the Giver. As Creator, God asks humanity to humbly draw close to Him and choose to live for a God-centric purpose. Scripture teaches how we are to live in God’s Love; we need Jesus and the work of the Holy Spirit. God wants only good for humanity, so when we draw near to Him, we are actually opening the Door to our greatest and most fulfilling purpose. The world (now infiltrated by evil) seeks to draw us away from God in order to live and fulfill an egocentric purpose which always leaves a person unsatisfied and misdirected. A focus on self alone will always produce poor choices.
James 4:1-7 Drawing Close to God
4 What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don’t they come from the evil desires at war within you? 2 You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it. 3 And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong-you want only what will give you pleasure.
4 You adulterers![a] Don’t you realize that friendship with the world makes you an enemy of God? I say it again: If you want to be a friend of the world, you make yourself an enemy of God. 5 Do you think the Scriptures have no meaning? They say that God is passionate that the spirit he has placed within us should be faithful to him.[b] 6 And he gives grace generously. As the Scriptures say,
“God opposes the proud
but gives grace to the humble.”[c]
7 So humble yourselves before God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Prayer: Lord, help me to humbly draw close to You, today. I choose to reject the spirit of pride and selfishness for the greater purpose of living in Your Love. In Jesus’ name. Amen.