JAMES SPEAKS INITIALLY of the conflict between peoples in this passage in his letter. But there is an underlying theme, and it deals specifically with the internal struggles of the individual. “Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you?” (James 4:1b) These issues are inevitably made manifest in those external disagreements, wherever and whenever they may happen. Paul, speaking to this same theme, says “Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.” (Col. 3:2) This is very difficult for us at first, for we have spent a lifetime in the world below. Everything that we are has been shaped by the world below, for that has been our total experience, until we have been reborn, and given a new Spirit. Jesus, the master of all teachers, says “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’” (John 3:5-7) And James warns us that the Giver of “the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely?” (James 4:5)
The gift of that spirit, the one from above, has always been viewed by God as a covenantal relationship. It is a covenant that he has made eternally with the nation of Israel; it is a covenant in which he included the Church of Jesus Christ, likened as unto a body; it is a covenant that he makes with each individual who receives that same spirit, and does so in reverent submission to Jesus as Lord. It is a covenant that Paul speaks of in the context of a marriage between husband and wife. He speaks of the covenant duties of each in the marriage relationship, likens Christ to the church as husband to wife, and says “the two will become one flesh. This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.” (Eph. 5:31-32) Paul is also talking about Christ and each individual. It is with this same knowledge that James, the earthen brother of the Heavenly Lord, teaches “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.” (James 4:4)
Immediately as we first receive the new Spirit, internal tension begins between the old world of below and the new world from above. The lifetime journey of spiritual formation begins, and the warfare to establish dominion of the soul becomes a constant battle, with daily defeats and victories. Slowly, we begin to more fully understand the powers and the principalities that swirl in conflict in the realm of the Spirit. God and the forces of good and Satan and the forces of evil are working out an ages-old cosmological battle for the rule over creation. This is happening both on the macro scale of all of human history, and the micro scale of your life and mine.
Paul desires us to be equipped in the armor necessary to do battle. “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.” (Eph. 6:10-11) And, he wants us to understand how to do battle. “For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. They have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” (2 Cor. 10:3-5) James, like Paul, teaches us that the battle is internal. “Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.” (James 4:7-8, 10)
What does it mean, ‘he will lift you up?’ It is clear that James is talking about a paradigm shift, a new prototype, of worldview. To no longer think as though we are one from the world below “darkened in our understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in us due to the hardening of our hearts.” (Eph. 4:18) Instead, we should believe, think, and act as one from the world above, “transformed by the renewing of our mind, able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” (Rom. 12:2) Only then will the “the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus.” (Phil. 4:7) And then the internal tensions will increasingly diminish, as we become, more and more, Christ-followers who place Spirit rightfully and righteously in dominion over our own souls. And only then will the conflicts with others diminish, even disappear, as we no longer desire or need to win a battle in a war that should never have been initiated in the first place.
After all, says James, remember “you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.’” (James 4:14-15)
Q. Are my spiritual boundaries firmly established and intentionally kept?
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