James 4:1-10 (NIV); “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 cannot 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. You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who choses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. Or do you think Scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely? But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. 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. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.”
The other night I was at a 12 Step Meeting and the topic was resentment. Most people in recovery know that one of the primary reasons we drink, drug or act out is because of resentments. Some people drink their entire life because of something that happened to them when they were 5 years old. There are “normal” people who carry resentments for a lifetime also and they don’t drink but you can tell who they are because they are angry and miserable and always find a way to blame others for their lot in life.
Resentments are from the devil and as long as we give into them bad things will happen and the devil will be happy.
When you look at the scripture from James above, the 2nd verse (3rd sentence) kind of hits the nail on the head. We want something and don’t get it or we get something we don’t want. Wanting what others have or wanting more or less than what we already have and/or comparing ourselves to others is a sure fire way for jealousy and resentment to creep in and it usually manifests itself through an angry spirit where we “quarrel and fight” with the world and/or between our ears. This is suicide for an alcoholic or addict and plain misery for the “normal” person.
James tells us that the genesis of anger and resentment is our “friendship with the world.” He also tells us “You do not have because you do not ask God.” What he is saying is we are seeking our happiness from the world instead of God and that is a no-win proposition.
At the end of these verses from James, he gives us a solution and it is pretty simple;
1. “Submit yourself to God” (not the world).
2. “Resist the devil and he will flee from you” (tell the devil to take a hike…I often use stronger words than that)
3. “Come near to God and he will come near to you” (let go of the world and grab onto God).
4. “Wash your hands, you sinners and purify your hearts you double-minded” (repent your shortcomings to God).
5. “Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and joy to gloom” (turn ALL your anger over to God).
6. “Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will lift you up” (by doing the 5 steps above, we put ourselves in a mental and spiritual state i.e. humble/humility, where God can work with us and lift us up no matter what the circumstance).If you want to be relatively happy, joyous and free the majority of the time do the above steps early and often throughout your day (these are steps 10 and 11 from the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous). You will slowly find yourself being lifted up and above your worldly tendencies.
P.E.A.C.E.
