CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES
James 4:5.—The precise rendering is doubtful. There is no passage either in the Canonical or Apocryphal Scriptures that is here referred to. The Revised Version gives in the text, “Doth the spirit which He made to dwell in us long unto envying? But He giveth more grace.” And in the margin two renderings: “The spirit which He made to dwell in us He yearneth for even unto jealousy”; “That spirit which He made to dwell in us yearneth for us even unto jealous envy.” In Ellicott’s Commentary Punchard gives two possible renderings: “Suppose ye that the Scripture saith in vain, The [Holy] Spirit that dwelleth in us jealously regards us as His own?” “Suppose ye that the Scripture speaketh in vain? Doth the Spirit, which took up His abode in you, lust to envy?” Fausset suggests, “Does the [Holy] Spirit that God hath placed in us lust to [towards] envy?” (viz. as ye do in your worldly “wars and fightings”). Alford makes “to envy” mean “jealously”: “The Spirit jealously desires us for His own.” Plumptre suggests, “The Spirit which He implanted yearns tenderly over us.” Enviously may be used in a good sense. “The strongest human affection shows itself in a jealousy which is scarcely distinguishable from envy. We grudge the transfer to another of the affection which we claim as ours.”
James 4:6. Giveth more grace.—The ordered thought of this and the previous verse has been given thus: “God loves us with a feeling analogous to the strongest form of jealousy, or even envy, but that jealousy does not lead Him, as it leads men, to be grudging in His gifts; rather does He bestow, as its result, a greater measure of His grace than before, or than He would do, were His attitude towards us one of strict unimpassioned justice.” R.V. margin, “greater,” i.e. than if He did not desire us jealously.
James 4:7. The devil.—This is one of the texts used as proof of the personality of the devil. Illustrate by Matthew 4:1-11.
James 4:10. Lift you up.—Exalt (Isaiah 57:15).
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— James 4:5-10
Self-humbling a Secret of Right Living.—Self-assurance nourishes all sorts of evil in us, and gives its chance to every kind of temptation that assails us. Take off our allegiance from God, fix it on self, and in St. James’s language we become spiritual adulterers and adulteresses. (The prophet Hosea uses similar figures: see chap. 2) Then if that over-magnifying of the self is the cause of wrong relations with God, and wrong relations with our fellow-men, clearly what is necessary, and what for ourselves may be the duty of the hour, is humbling the self, “mortifying our members which are upon the earth”; or as St. Peter puts it, “Humbling ourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt us in due time.”
I. Humbling self may be our present duty.—In a general sense it is the Christian’s duty at all times; but it also becomes a special duty at particular times and seasons, such as
(1) accession of power to our bodily passions;
(2) opportunity of self-aggrandisement;
(3) prevailing sentiments unduly exalting man;
(4) influence of public teachings that tend to nourish man’s pride;
(5) circumstances specially exciting unworthy and perilous feelings. It is said that “a man’s self is his greatest enemy.” He who has conquered himself need fear no other foe. But this humbling the self is precisely the duty which men shrink from recognising, and which, when they recognise, they fail to fulfil. Even those who call themselves Christians are often singularly weak in this respect. Getting the self to take and keep its right place has never come to them as a first demand made by Him whom they call Lord and Master.
II. In humbling self we have a most serious work to do.—St. James gives us some idea of the things which it may involve, and so impresses its seriousness.
1. It may require a resolute mastery of our wills, a forcible compelling ourselves to yield to God’s ordering of life for us. That seems to be suggested by the expression, “Be subject therefore unto God.”
2. It may include determinedly putting aside self-interests in order to secure time for communion with God and soul-culture. This seems to be indicated in the counsel, “Draw nigh to God.”
3. It is almost certain to require some resolute dealing with our conduct in life. There may be self-seeking things in the actual doing which must at once be given up, or changed in their characters. This seems to be suggested by the strong demand, “Cleanse your hands, ye sinners.” And—
4. It may very possibly be necessary to secure outward and bodily helps to self-humbling, self-mortification. Because men have gone to extremes of abusing themselves in misdirected efforts to secure self-abasement, we need not fear to look at the reasonable and practical demand of St. James. Through the body, and well-ordered discipline of the body, we can get at, and wisely influence, the self of passion and lust and temper and habit. If we are to purify our hearts from their self-trustings, it may greatly help us to “be afflicted, and mourn, and weep; to let our laughter be turned to mourning, and our joy to heaviness.”
III. In humbling self we have a great foe to resist.—It is as if there was a spirit in this self. As if it was not ourself that we had to fight, but a separate and outward foe. Whatever view may be taken of the personality of the evil spirit, the evil self is personified, thought of as active, and as a foe to be resisted. Compare St. Paul’s expression, “the motions of sins in our members.” The devil may also be taken as personifying all those conditions and relationships of life which appeal to, influence, and strengthen the self. Then St. James’s advice, “Resist the devil,” will be seen to mean this—Do not mistake by assuming that the struggle with self is to be carried on only in the range of feeling and thought, the sphere of the inner life. There is also an outward sphere, a conflict with forces of evil that are ever at work strengthening the self. He then who would humble himself must fight against “principalities and powers.”
IV. In humbling self we have a great Helper to rely on.—“But He giveth more grace.” “He will draw nigh to you. “He shall exalt you.” The idea is this—You are trying to exalt yourselves in your self-confidence. Better “humble yourselves,” and let God exalt you, make you stand, in the strength of His grace. He can. He does. He will. What you win in God’s exalting you is altogether better than anything you can win by exalting the self.
SUGGESTIVE NOTES AND SERMON SKETCHES
James 4:5. Thinking Enviously.—“Doth the spirit which He made to dwell in us long unto envying?” There is a remarkable difference in the rendering of this passage given in the R.V. margin—“The spirit which He made to dwell in us He yearneth for even unto jealous envy.” This rendering connects the passage with the previous reference to the marriage tie. The two ideas suggested by the different renderings are:
1. There is grave danger to the soul when it longs for worldly pleasures even unto envying those who are allowed to enjoy them.
2. God, regarding the soul of man as bound to Him with the closest ties, is profoundly jealous of the relation—“yearneth for us even unto jealous envy,” lest any one, or anything, should take our love from Him. For the Old Testament figures, see Jeremiah 3:1-11; Ezekiel 16; Hosea 2:3. The spirit is the spirit in man, not the Holy Spirit.
James 4:6. Grace unto Sufficiency.—“But He giveth more grace”—greater grace. Dean Plumptre brings out effectively the point of this sentence: “Following the explanation already given, the sequence of thought seems to run thus: God loves us with a feeling analogous to the strongest form of jealousy, or even envy, but that jealousy does not lead Him, as it leads men, to be grudging in His gifts; rather does He bestow, as its result, a greater measure of His grace than before, or than He would do, were His attitude towards us one of strict, impassioned justice.” The term “more grace” suggests how inexhaustible the stores of grace are, so that we never can lack any good thing. There is always more available. And it further suggests that no limitations are put upon the supply of the grace by God. He never wearies of giving. He is always ready to bestow more; “to make all grace abound unto all sufficiency.”
Humility.
I. Humility has been well termed “the cradle of all other graces.”—In humility they are born. All attainment has been achieved by the acknowledgment that we have not yet attained. The sense of need is the mother of discovery. Nothing is so barren as self-satisfaction. Our Lord’s teaching is full of the need of humility. In various terms He insists upon it, as the elementary stage in the life of Christian experience. God giveth grace to the humble, because the humble are a receptacle for His presence.
II. Some considerations which ought to excite humility.—
1. The fact that we are God’s creatures, that all we possess is from Him, and held by us only for a time.—Riches, intellect, bodily strength, social status, are God’s gifts. May be soon taken from us. Only benefit us if rightly used.
2. The fact that we are sinful. Whatsoever good qualities we may possess, by the bounty of God, are more than counterbalanced by the evil which is our own.
3. The exceeding foolishness of pride, and the serious consequences which may result from it. How often, because of some fancied slight, or severe remark, will people nurture in their hearts feelings which must eventually cut them off from intercourse with God.
III. The more prevalent forms of sin which are opposed to humility are—
1. A refusal to accept a rebuke when we are perfectly conscious that we have deserved it. If honestly seeking to grow in grace, we ought to welcome rebuke if it has the effect of checking some fault of which we are guilty.
2. Exaggerated estimate of our own powers. This is seen in the scornful look, the contemptuous expression, the constant talking about oneself, in the apparent belief in the infallibility of one’s own opinion. How does God view such pride?
3. A habit of judging the character and conduct of others. The secret motive of this habit is a craving after praise and flattery. It hinders spiritual progress.
IV. In cultivating humility beware of false humility and undue self-depreciation.—It is not humility to profess not to be what we are, or not to possess that which we know that we do possess. Humility does not consist in refusing to acknowledge that we have talents, but in refusing to boast of such talents as if they were self-derived.
V. Consider the blessings which accompany humility.—
1. Through humility comes exaltation, real and abiding—exaltation by the mighty hand of God. “In due time.” The depth of our Lord’s humiliation was the measure of the height to which He was exalted.
2. It is through humility that we find strength in God. “Casting all care upon Him.”
3. If humility be the cradle of the graces, it is also their preservation. The more we grow in grace, the more humble we shall become, because the more we shall feel that all things are of God.
VI. As a practical lesson learn to be humble.—Receive with cheerfulness and readiness, even if not with joy, the humiliations which come to you in every-day life. Cease to resent injuries, to stand upon your rights, to obtrude yourself. Let the cross unite you to the Crucified.—Canon Vernon Hutton.
James 4:7. The Foe, the Fight, and the Flight.—“Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” The soul is a citadel which no enemy can storm, a stronghold which cannot be entered but by its own consent. Through the tremendous power of volition it can waive even incarnate Deity from its threshold, and spurn the salvation which He brings. Christian life is a contest, a fight.
I. The foe.—“The devil.” My conception of the devil is a great, unconscienced intellect under the sway of a moral nature thoroughly unholy. He was once an archangel, but fell, and from the beginning has been the deadly foe of our race.
1. He is a personal foe. We must not allow the audacious cavillings of scepticism to neutralise the solemn asseverations of inspiration upon this point. The devil “tempted” Jesus Christ; the devil “entered into” Judas; the devil “desired to have” Peter; the devil “hindered” Paul. Not only Jesus Christ and His apostles, but all the noble and heroic spirits of the past, who have done most to elevate and bless the world, have been firm believers in the personality of the devil. And it is a singular fact that the Churches which most firmly believe and teach that doctrine are not only the most prosperous and aggressive, but the only ones that are doing anything worth speaking of for the evangelisation of the world. The fact is, you cannot run a gospel Church without a devil, and the bad place to which the old fellow belongs. Show me a man who does not believe in the devil, and I will show you a man who has but little knowledge of God so far as saving faith and the blessings of salvation are concerned.
2. He is a powerful foe. Indicated in Scripture:
(1) By his names. He is called “Apollyon,” “Prince of this world,” “Beelzebub,” “Prince of the power of the air,” “God of this world.”
(2) By the creatures used to represent him. The serpent, whose deadly fangs poison, and whose dreadful coil means death. The roaring lion, the terror and king of the forest. The old dragon, which, to the Oriental mind, was an incarnation of almost superhuman strength.
(3) By the works attributed to him. He early accomplished the moral ruin of the race, brought death into the world with all our woe, bound man helplessly to his degrading service, blotting out every ray of light and hope of self-recovery. He is the arch-rebel in God’s kingdom—the leader of the hosts of sin, in earth and hell.
(4) By the Divine intervention which was necessary to break his power and rescue man from his grasp, etc. His power is all the more dreadful and dangerous because of His vast experience. He is an old foe. He was here before man came, and here, perhaps, because he saw him coming. His malice and deception. He secretes the sorrow and fetters he carries for his victims under the winsome drapery of some pleasure or profit. He uses “wiles,” “depths,” “darts,” “snares,” “all deceivableness of unrighteousness,” frequently putting on the dissembling gloss of an angel of light.
II. The fight.—“Resist the devil.” You may plead with man, you may “reason” with God, but you must “resist the devil.” Jesus Christ, our elder Brother, has fought and conquered this foe; and in clearing the way for our fight, Jesus tells him, “Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther.” “No farther.” That is, “those that fight under My banner shall whip you too.” But in order to triumph in this great conflict, we must fight according to the prize rules of our great Captain.
1. Negative. Quit the enemy’s service. The fight cannot even begin until you reach this point.
2. Positive. Enlist in God’s service. God’s veterans are all volunteers. No conscript ever drew blood on this foe; nor was any man ever scolded into this fight, or thrown into it on the horns of a dilemma. The pressure of consciousness and environment through Divine grace must make us willing.
3. Preparative. “Put on the whole armour of God.” God’s veterans not only enlist, they also get ready for battle. Spiritual cripples are never pitted against this foe. All who face him stand and dress for the fight. “Put on.” “And having done all” (that is, completely routed the foe, they are not even weary enough to sit down, but prefer), “to stand.” They are “more than conquerors.”
III. The flight.—He will flee from you.
1. When will he “flee”? When he sees you ready for battle and full of fight. The devil laughs in his sleeve when he sees the livery of heaven on a coward, or on a person who professes to “resist” him, but who at heart is in sympathy with him and his work. But nothing so completely routs him as heroic resistance. “He will flee from you.” Attack a courageous foe, and “he will flee” at you, not “from you.” Herein is seen the devil’s cowardice. Only cowards run. Manly resistance routs the old deceiver so quickly that he is obliged to drop some of the fetters wherewith he had hoped to bind his victim, until finally in his approaches he will leave his fetters behind; and though he may still continue to annoy us, he will have little hope of bringing usinto serious bondage.
2. How often will he “flee”? Every time he is manfully “resisted.” He knows we are creatures of varying moods, and that his defeat to-day may end in ours to-morrow. The promise, “He will flee,” has two glorious meanings:
1. Temporary flight. “He will flee,” to return again, to annoy, vex, trouble. But in spite of his return the Christian may still retain the victory, and every time force him to “flee.”
2. Eternal flight. This takes place in the valley of the shadow of death, and, blessed be God! involves a double flight. The enemy will “flee” from the departing spirit as a hopeless case, and the emancipated soul shall soar and mount upward to the society of the redeemed and the mansions of the blessed, “and so shall ever be with the Lord.”—Thomas Kelly, D.D.
James 4:8. On the Reality of Man’s Intercourse with his Maker.—There is one sense in which God cannot draw more “nigh” to any man than He is already. The fact of the omnipresence of Deity lies at the foundation of all religion. It is impossible to express by language the closeness of the relation existing between the Creator and the creation. His power gives energy to every cause, to every force. Yet how remarkable is the unbroken silence in which God the Lord dwells among men. In the sphere of sense there is no personal revelation—not to the wicked, not even to the good. Neither in the world, nor in the sanctuary, nor in solitude is the silence ever broken to the suppliant. How then can we “draw nigh to God,” so that He will “draw nigh to us”?
I. In the study and belief of His revelation.—
1. The condition of God’s spiritual action in the souls of men is honest attention to truth. The causes which render it difficult to attend earnestly to the study of the word of God are such as, earthly interests, the cares of business, love of pleasure, love of excitement, pleasures of the imagination, idle reading, moral repulsion. Much of God’s providence has for its object to produce the attention necessary for salvation.
2. To bring the mind into earnest contact with those writings which express His mind is to “draw nigh to God.” It is not, however, essential to master the whole breadth of the revelation in order to attain the assurance that in the Bible we are conversing with the living God.
II. In prayer and thanksgiving.—God can communicate without words. A quiet secrecy marks God’s revelations to men. He diffuses over the soul a spiritual sense of His presence. There is no intercourse so real as that of mind with mind, and heart with heart.
III. In the practice of obedience.—When the soul has received the blessing of acceptance with God in Christ, it also receives into itself the principle of a loving and healthful obedience which brings it into conscious union with the Most High.—Edward White.
James 4:10. Humility before God.—The expression used here, and also in 1 Peter 5:6, is “Humble yourselves,” and not merely “Be humble.” It is in harmony with the passage that the meaning should be—Deal resolutely with yourselves, so as to keep down all risings of pride and self-confidence. The suggestion is—Be watchful and determined in all necessary self-discipline. But it is the resolute effort to keep ourselves in right attitudes before God, and right relations with Him, which secures a humility which is not humiliation, and which puts us into right relations with our fellow-men. “Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord.” Two things may be illustrated and enforced:
1. The effect of an attitude of humility before God on our daily life. Humility before men too easily degenerates into weakness. It may became such humility as is caricatured in Uriah Heep. But humility before God is found to put a gracious tone upon the relationships of life. It prevents our manifesting the restlessness and self-assertion which so greatly disturb ordinary relations. It gives us a principle for life-guidance; it keeps near us the sense of a Presence; and it provides us with a consciousness of a strength and efficiency, which make us master of circumstances. The humble man before God is the strong, wise man before life’s duties and claims.
2. The influence of humility before God in securing Divine benedictions. “He shall exalt you.” It is not merely that God rewards the trustfulness of humility with actual blessings; it is also that to the humble soul God gives Himself, and the man is no longer mere man, but exalted to be, what Christ was (yet within human limitations), man and God with him.
God’s Ways with Humble Souls.—God protects the humble and delivers him; He loves and consoles him; He inclines Himself towards the humble man, He bestows on him exceeding grace, and after his humiliation he lifts him up to glory; He reveals His secrets to the humble, and sweetly draws and leads him to Himself.—Thomas à Kempis.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 4
James 4:7. Temptation.—When the devil tempts a man to commit any wickedness, he does, as it were, lay a long train of sins; and if the first temptation take, they give fire one to another. Let us, then, resist the beginning of sin; because then we have the most power, and sin hath the least.—Tillotson.
Two Great Proverbs.—There are two great proverbs, one among the Turks, and the other among the Spaniards, both of which contain much that is true. “A busy man is troubled with but one devil; but the idle man with a thousand.” “Men are usually tempted by the devil; but the idle man positively tempts the devil.” How much corrupting company, how many temptations to do wrong, how many seasons of danger to your character, and danger to the peace of your friends, may you escape by regarding the admonition, “Resist the devil, and he shall flee from you.”