James 4

James 4 Submit yourselves to God.

James 4:1

What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you?

Nobody really wants to admit it but it's reality. If we are having issues within ourselves we are more likely to lash out quicker. Be defensive. Ready to attack. Sometimes we look for a fight to make our self feel better. I can not tell you how many times I have a bad day and came home from working looking for the smallest thing to complain about so I had an *excuse* to start a fight. Petty? Yes. Childish? Yes.
There are better ways for me to handle my issues. Reaching out to God is step one.

James 4:2-3

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 the wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

Sounds like a lecture given to children/teenagers does’t it? It comes off as such a simple concept. Yet, we have to remind ourselves of this over and over again.

Just ask God with pure intentions on your heart.

*James mentioned the most common problems in prayer: not asking, asking for the wrong reasons. Do you ask only to satisfy your desires? Do you seek Gods approval for what you already plan to do? Your prayers will become powerful when you allow God to change your desires so that they perfectly correspond to his will for you.*


You know what is so cool about God (one of the MILLION cool things)? He is always there. Always.

I am currently working on my prayer life. I am one of those people who (once) thought “If you are not praying about something substantial then you shouldn’t even bother. It's a waste of Gods time.” Since I thought this; every time I would go to pray I would question the validity of what I was praying for. Turns out NOTHING was important enough to pray about. I never prayed for myself.

One day I had hit rock bottom with my emotions. I had the radio on in the van and was listening to worship music. I was singing,feeling the power of the words.



Then the song was over and I just talked to God. I let it all out. I talked to him as if he were my best friend. My husband. My father.

I started to do this every day on my way to work. The sun would be rising. I would start with listening to music and that would lead me to spilling out my heart.

I prayed about EVERYTHING. I was building up my trust just like I would in any other relationship. At first, relationships are all on the surface. You talk about weather, general common interest things. Never getting too deep. You feel each other out. As your trust grows and strengthens you start getting into the deeper stuff eventually weeding out the surface *safe* topics.

After weeks of this routine I found myself being led to more *quiet-time*. Times of complete stillness in the dark. I started setting my alarm in the morning a half an hour earlier to ensure my time.

I now wake up when it is still dark. The house is completely still. There are no distractions. It is time for me and God. Before my feet hit the floor in the morning I have my time with the Lord. Bringing it all to him.

As my prayer life has grown my desires have changed. My prayers are heard. Every single one of them in one way or the other. Even the ones that seem to be unanswered have been touched by God in some way. I have learned to stop and listen for God’s answer and not always expect the quick fix.

It takes time and I still have moments of praying for something that I later recognize as being selfish.

James 4:10

Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will lift you up.

*Humbling ourselves means recognizing that our worth comes from God alone. *

Humbling (adj)
Marked by meekness or modesty in behavior, attitude, or spirit; not arrogant or prideful. Showing deferential or submissive respect, low in rank, quality or station. Unpretentious or lowly.

James 4:15

Instead, you ought to say “If it is the Lords will, we will live and do this or that.

*Plan ahead, but hold your plans loosely. Put Gods desires at the center of your planning, he will never disappoint you.*

I am NOT the planner of our family. I like to have a daily schedule so normal days (with three kids in several different activities) run smoothly. It is is almost essential to have a schedule. But a planner- I am NOT. In fact, I am so much not a planner, that it has sometimes caused a little tension in our household. .
My husband is a big-time to the extreme planner. For example: For every vacation no matter, a 2 day weekend event or a 2 week long vacation out of the country, there always has to be a *Binder* prepared. The binder will include everything from reservation confirmations, daily itinerary, where we will eat, maps etc. On our trip to Disney there were even maps to all the bathrooms in every park.
P.L.A.N.N.E.R!

Recently, my husband and I booked a mini get away to San Francisco. I asked my husband to please compromise with me and give me one- unplanned day on the trip. A day we could just go with the flow and see what happened. I was granted my request however; I do believe hubby had the day secretly planned just in case.

We set off on our trip and immediately things did not go as planned. The night before we left, hubby’s eye was bothering him. He has bad allergies and this happens often so neither one of us thought much of it. By the time we arrived at the California airport it was quite obvious hubby’s eye issue were not just allergies. We headed to a clinic for what I thought would be an easy visit. I was pretty sure it was pink-eye. The Dr. at the clinic was not sure it was pink eye so referred my husband to an eye specialist. Well, hubby wanted no part of this. We had a schedule and he did not want to waste time going to Dr’s. So, we stuck to the rest of the days schedule as hubby suffered with a bad eye.

The following day was our *unplanned* day. We woke up, had breakfast and then talked about some possibilities for the day. Once we were in the car driving we decided to drive up to the Muir Woods. It was one of the best times I have ever had with my husband. We walked through the woods. Experienced Gods great work. It was absolutely beautiful. Breath taking. God was surrounding us. He was working on our hearts. On our marriage.
We enjoyed each others company. Took Pictures. We took our time. After our time in the woods we did some more sight-seeing downtown and then asked a local for a restaurant recommendation and had an amazing meal.


We planned to have an unplanned day and it turned out to be one of the best days. There were several other great planned and unplanned events during the trip.I won't bore you with all the details. This was just an example about planning loosely and putting Gods desires in front.I believe God's desire was to strengthen our marriage that day.