"Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourself before the Lord, and will lift you up."
- James 4:7-10
In the NIV chapter four in the book of James is entitled, Submit Yourselves to God. The footnotes for verses 7-10 state, "These verses contain ten commands, each of which is so stated in Greek that it calls for immediate action in rooting out the sinful attitude of pride."
If we count the ten commands we have: submit, resist the devil, come near to God, purify yourselves, grieve, mourn, wail, change laughter into mourning, change joy into gloom and humble yourself.
Some of these sound much easier then others. Submitting, resisting the devil, drawing near to God, purifying yourself and humbling yourself are commands I think we are all pretty familiar with hearing. But the others: grieve, mourn, wail, laughter into mourning and change joy into gloom. These sound pretty depressing.
The point James is trying to make here is not that God wants us to be depressed, said and crying all the time. That would be a horrible life. But what he is trying to say is we need to be willing to do anything it takes in order to live the life God wants us to live. It will be difficult and sometimes painful to change our ways but in the end it is all worth it. James shows that by also stating in this verse what when we come near to God he will come near to us and when we humble ourselves, God will lift us up. That is good news, God cares and wants us to have joyful lives but we have to rid ourselves of all the garbage in order to really enjoy all he has for us.
Thought for the Day: Are you willing to do whatever necessary in order to experience God fully and discover his plan for you?
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