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Subject Yourselves to God

¹ From where are conflicts and from where are quarrels among you? Is it not from this, from your pleasures that wage war among your members? ² You desire and do not have; you murder and are filled with envy, and are not able to obtain; you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. ³ You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, in order that you may spend it on your pleasures.

⁴ Adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. ⁵ Or do you think that in vain the scripture says, "The spirit which he caused to dwell in us desires jealously"?^{[a] 6} But he gives greater grace. Therefore it says,

⁷ Therefore subject yourselves to God. But resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸ Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded! ⁹ Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your^[c] joy to gloominess. ¹⁰ Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.

¹¹ Do not speak evil of one another, brothers. The one who speaks evil of a brother or judges his brother speaks evil of the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge of the law.^{[d] 12} There is one lawgiver and judge who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your^[e] neighbor?

Arrogant Boasting About the Future

¹³ Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will travel to such and such a city and spend a year there, and carry on business and make a profit," ¹⁴ you who do not know what will happen tomorrow^[f], what your life will be like^[g]. For you are a smoky vapor that appears for a short time and then disappears. ¹⁵ Instead you should say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that." ¹⁶ But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. ¹⁷ Therefore, to the one who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.