Contextualizing This Passage
This short passage takes place at the beginning of a long discourse about the rich and the poor. James, like Solomon, leveraged the use of opposites in his proverbs.
Good vs Evil
Dark vs Light
Foolish vs Wise
Rich vs Poor
He likely noticed a disturbing trend where people in his community were taking advantage of the poor and he wanted to put a stop to it.
In the ancient Roman Empire, people made money in one of two ways — they were either landowners or merchants.
The first category were landowners. They were from a wealthy family that gave them the benefit of land ownership, access to credit, and a high social status. These people often acquired their wealth by taking advantage of poor people through indentured servitude or slavery.
On the flip side, there were the merchants. These people collected their wealth without any social status attached to it. They simply hustled their hardest to create a product, grow a crop, or provide a service.
This world was similar to the turn of the 19th century in the united states. Wealth was becoming widely accessible, which meant that people were allowing greed to control their lives.
When we examine the message of James, he seems to be on the side of the poor — like most of scripture. This is not because wealth was bad, but because people in this era often worshipped wealth while doing whatever it took to gain more.
This often meant they would take advantage of people in order to make some extra money. Representing the voice of God, James reprimanded this behavior in chapters four and five.
I know that you aren’t a wealthy merchant or landowner in the Roman Empire. That doesn’t mean you get to mentally check out for this message.
This passage isn’t reserved for money. James chapter four packs a powerful punch for all of us, because it shows the origin of our sin.
Their wealth wasn’t bad, it was their obsession with it that caused trouble.
The same is true for us.
Bad behavior doesn’t just happen in an instant. It starts as thoughts.
Then the thoughts become patterns. Then the thought patterns become behaviors.
As the Apostle James concludes his collection of proverbs, he ties a bow on the previous four sections by proposing a filter for everything we do. Yes, every single thing.
James shifts his focus from our specific behaviors to our overall lifestyles.
Throughout the letter, James discusses words, wealth, arguments, and arrogance.
His church was probably asking questions like "is it sinful to do this, even if it doesn't hurt anyone?" What's his answer?
He writes, "if you know the right thing to do and don’t do it, that, for you, is evil" (4:17; MSG).
This short passage gives us an integrity test.
