God's Wisdom

You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. - James 4:4

Believers are tempted to live in two worlds -- God's world and man's. How are we to balance the two different value systems? In today's verse, James, the brother of Jesus, points out that we cannot effectively live in two different worlds, and we can only follow one or the other.

Many of us follow the world's way and live according to worldly wisdom by believing that we must live and provide for ourselves and strive to become successful, affluent, influential, and respectable. Being friends with the world means to imitated worldly ways in our thoughts and actions. God's wisdom calls His people to take a different approach: trust and believe God provides all the good we need, and thus focus on loving God and our neighbors, serving and providing for each other. When your primary focus is on yourself, you cannot genuinely love God and your neighbors.

Dear Church, how is the world influencing you today? Are you "friends with the world?" As God's children, let us, by faith, trust in God and His infinite wisdom as we serve Him.

"No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. - Matthew 6:24