No Pulling Punches!
‘You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”’
James 4:4-6
James can never be accused of pulling punches or downplaying things! The people who tried to use God for their own selfish pleasure have been thoroughly rebuked. He’s not through yet. He calls them adulterous people. Literally, he calls them adulteresses. This makes perfect sense. As believers we are the Bride of Christ (cf. Eph 5:22-33). We have been united with Christ and we are to lovingly submit to Christ in all things as his bride.
Earthly marriage is patterned after our spiritual relationship with God. “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish” (Eph 5:25-27). God is in process of conforming us to the image of Christ. Christ is in the process of sanctifying us (making us holy) and he is cleansing us so that we might be his spotless bride.
This makes what the believers are doing in James even more reprehensible. They are not merely sinning and rebelling, they are committing spiritual adultery through their sin. In the Old Testament spiritual adultery was often directly tied to idolatry. Idolatry is having any false god take the place of the One True God. “Surely, as a treacherous wife leaves her husband, so have you been treacherous to me, O house of Israel, declares the LORD’” (Jer 3:20). “How sick is your heart, declares the Lord GOD, because you did all these things, the deeds of a brazen prostitute… adulterous wife, who receives strangers instead of her husband!” (Ezk 16:30, 32)
We err if we think that idolatry was only an Old Testament sin. We may not have wood or stone idols, but our hearts can be equally idolatrous. “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world” (1 John 2:15-16). Anything we pursue or love more than we love God is an idol in our lives. This mean even good things, even things that are not sinful in themselves, can become an idol to us.
The remedy for this is humble repentance to God and renewed faith. Repentance is the attitude of our hearts and confession is declaring the wrongness of our sin to God. What keeps us from repentance is our pride. We don’t want to admit we are sinful or acknowledge the depth of our sin. This is why humility is so important. If we don’t address the pride in our hearts, we are cut off from restoring grace.
God has a desire to be central and preeminent in our lives. “Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, ‘He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us’” (James 4:5)? Our God is a jealous God who will tolerate no rivals. Not because he is petty but because he is good and the only one worthy of worship. God loves you and desires to be central in each of our lives. If you find rivals to your relationship with God, will you humbly go to him and receive his restoring grace?
