I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on James 1-5.

    Today’s passage is the entire letter from James. I love this book of the Bible, perhaps in part because it has been so often misunderstood. I do not think I am going to be able to write about all of the things that James has to say that I think we need to hear. (I am sure there are a few of you saying, “So, why are you wasting time and space to tell us that? Get to it already.”) There are two points upon which all of the rest hang. First, James insists that if you have faith, it will be demonstrated in your actions. Second, if we have faith which is reflected in our actions, if we need anything all that we need do is ask God and He will provide for those needs.

    The one thing we can be sure that we need is wisdom and James promises us that all we need do to obtain wisdom is ask God. God will never hold it against us for asking for more wisdom. However, in this as in all things, we need to truly believe that God is the only source of wisdom. God will not answer our prayers for wisdom, if at the same time we are asking Him for wisdom we are seeking wisdom from the ungodly that we are going to balance against the wisdom we receive from God. James even tells us how to tell if the advice we have received is truly wise or not. In order to save space to comment on other things I am not going to rephrase chapter 3 verses 13 through 19. You can read them for yourself.

    James tells us that the key to lining our actions up with our professions of faith is to start by controlling what we say and how we say it. If we learn to control our tongues we can learn to control all of our other actions. However, if we refuse to control our tongues we will fail to control ourselves in any other way as well. The key to gaining control of our tongues is controlling our desires. If we allow ourselves to desire the things of this world over the things of Heaven, evil things will come out of our mouths sooner or later. Those earthly desires will lead us to be jealous and bitter because we will never be able to fill them, no matter how much stuff we gather. On the other hand, if we focus on the things of Heaven and on wanting those things which will allow us to serve God, all we need do is ask God for them and we will have them in more abundance than we can imagine.