1. Relationship

James 4:1-3
1 What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you?
2 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.
3 When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

This is a passage addressed to the Christians and it speaks of the problems which occur in out relationships as Christians. Write down on a piece of paper 5 names of people to whom you are very close to. You can talk to them anything at all.

If there are troubles in finding 5 names than there is a battle within you. Sometimes we do not openly quarrel and fight we may do it unnoticeably. In our relationship we may be very self focused. We may think that our discipler needs to serve us and meet our needs and we may get upset if our discipler does not quench our selfish desires.

We do not initiate to help our family group leader or to help pick up studies because of our desires which battle within ourselves and therefore our relationship also becomes strained. Are your relationships self serving or truly serving others God glorifying.

2. The World And Its Desires

James 4:4-5
4 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.
5 Or do you think Scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely?

Here the Bible says that when we leave God for worldly things or when we start putting God 2nd, 3rd, 4th in our lives it is as if we committed adultery? It is like when the man or woman breaks the sacred bond of marriage.

Imagine for a minute that your spouse has committed adultery on you? How do you feel towards your spouse? You hate them, you despise them, never to want to see them again.

Just like in a marriage it would really hurt you if your spouse was immoral. So also when we sin we hurt God. We break his heart. God has allowed his heart to be open to us. But sometimes we do not care about how much we are hurting God with our sins. Do you have a deep love for God.

What are some worldly things we tend to hurt God with? Start putting our job before God. We miss a lot of meetings because of our job.

Imagine if a husband did not come home till late at night. He never had dinner with his wife and children. He would continuously do this. Will the wife's and children be close? Will the children feel loved. [No] They feel like the father does not care. In the same way God wants that we should love and he also wants to love us back as well. When we miss meetings we are being just like the husband and father who does not have a relationship anymore.

Sometimes we want to be with our worldly friends more than disciples. This us unspiritual and it does appreciate the spirituality in the disciples. It means that we do not appreciate the Spirit of God. We spend more time talking about worldly things like our jobs, the latest cricket news etc. rather than talking about Quiet times, our contacts, there is a lack of respect for the spiritual. We see that only the friends we make at Church are friends like us.

3. Always Be Humble

James 4:6-10
6 But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble."
7 Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
8 Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
9 Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom.
10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.

Humility is very crucial for us to receive the grace of God in our lives. Sometimes God himself the Bible says will oppose us if we are proud. What is the character of a proud person? [Share : They know it all, superior complex, don't take advice, independent, don't take help. Does that describe you?]

What is the character of a humble person? [Listen, willing to do anything, serve other people.] Our humility is measured by how much we rely and depend on God in our hearts.

Sometimes we are proud with God. We don't read our Bible deeply. We pray only for 2-3 mins or may be 10 mins a day. We think that we can fight the Satan and the worldly desires with our own strength. In order for our Christian life to be a life where the blessings of God flow into our life where we experience the grace of God we must be humble.

Do you look forward to being with God in the morning or is t a ritual in your life. Are you confessing your sins to God and opening up to the brothers and sisters. Do you feel that you need God and that you need your brothers and sisters or do you think that you are the tough one. We will not stay faithful or make it to heaven if we are proud. We need to be humble about where we are at so that we can get where we need to be, Vs 7 says, submit yourself to God and Vs 10 says, humble ourselves to God.

Humility does not just come like that. As if we will somehow become humble. No the Bible says we must deny ourselves. When we want to be defensive we decide to keep quiet and listen, when we don't want to pray we pray, when we sin we do not want to tell anyone but we need to confess our sins. When our disciplers get changed do we get humble to our new discipler.

It is actually a process where we actively choose to do the right thing and God will give us the strength to be humble. Let's make a decision to be humble before God and to humble before man. We have to work at keeping our hearts soft before God.

4. Sins Of Slander

James 4:11-12
11 Brothers, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it. When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it.
12 There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you--who are you to judge your neighbor?

In the church there are many different types of people. One person is from Punjab, another from south India, another from Assam etc. There are also some people from so many different backgrounds. Some people had a very good upbringing where their parents were very loving and kind and gentle. And may be spoiled them a bit. Other people have been raped, there are also other parents or some relatives always made them afraid all the time. Some people in the Church are educated they have degrees, others are not, their lives are simple.

When we become Christians we are brought into a spiritual family and in this spiritual family are different people who think differently and they are at different levels in their relationship with God as well. We all struggle with things which God challenges us to do.

Some are fighting with God, others are submitting to God and are victorious. Let us be more compassionate with our spiritual family. It is when we do not take time to get to know one another and see from where they are coming from that we become slanderous. Slander hurts relationships deeply. We need to love and trust each other.

If we are hurt because of something that was said, try to mend the relationship and ask your leader for help. At all times we must trust the hearts of the person who has hurt us and be compassionate.

5. What Are You Living For?

James 4:13-17
13 Now listen, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money."
14 Why, 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.
15 Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that."
16 As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil.
17 Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins.

Are you living to please God or are you living to please yourself?

Sometimes we make plans for our lives that do not please God. What are some selfish plans that we can make? [Going to gulf, going out of town frequently because of family or job, constantly busy and not give time to other disciples, making plans that we know will make us less committed to God]

When you look at your day, your life, your future plans is it done with what's best for the kingdom of God or is it done to make things more convenient for self?

Mathew 6:33 says that we need to seek first God's kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.

If you are asked to move, do think about not doing it because it is too inconvenient or do you make a decision to trust God and do things for God?

When you make plans for your day do you make sure that you have made time to evangelize, study the Bible with someone, sit in on a study, follow up on contacts or do you go home watch T.V or go to sleep thinking only about your life and your problems ?

As disciples God wants us to make Him the center of our lives. The decisions that we make must be God centered not self centered.

Conclusion

Let us decide to be humble and look towards having a great relationship with God and decide to grow in our Christian life.