“What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that
battle within you? You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you
can not have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do
not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives,
that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. (James 4: 1-
Because of
the fall of Adam and humankind's sinful nature, people are unbalanced: They want
what they want—at any cost. This is the very essence of selfishness and therefore
at the root of the disturbances to which James is referring. When people are determined
to fulfill the desires of their minds and the passions of their bodies, every sort
of evil is bound to result.
Certainly conflicts within the church do stem from such
root causes as jealousy, envy, self-
However, in a broader sense, the same kind of character defects and sins
that work among church members work among groups and nations as well. Wars may not,
in every case at least, be the mere result of the sum total of individual conflicts.
Yet personal sins, such as jealousy, greed, and the like, do infect society and produce
a climate in which war becomes almost inevitable. Covetousness, rivalries, the unbridled
quest for gain—these evils not only wreck homes and blight lives, but may well seize
whole peoples.
It is interesting to note that James says, “You cannot have what you
want.” This is almost a universal principle of human psychology: rapacious desire
to possess or “have” anything often leads to poverty, loss, and destitution. Greed
and coveting are self-
Our very desires affect our prayer lives, James says. We
do not have because we do not ask, and when we do ask, we ask with wrong motives
and so don't receive what we want. Here is an answer to those who say that it is
really unbelief to preface our prayers with “If it be Thy will....” We are not to
presume that we necessarily know God's will or even want it. Our mere strong desire
for something is not necessarily evidence that God gave us that desire and that we
should pray in faith for its fulfilment. We must look to our “motives” as James says.
Perhaps
it is just characteristic of the times in which we live, where it has become necessary
to have two-
Prayers for genuine needs are answered, but
can you see how we can perhaps be “innocently” carried away by our own desires? The
word translated “desires” in the NIV is the same Greek word from which we get “hedonism,”
a term often used of the self-
One's goals should glorify God.
“Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of
God”
Michael W. Cochran
Christian Writer/Freelance Writer
www.mikecochran.org
Unbridled Quest