February 21, 2012, Reading

The Letter of Saint James   4: 1-10

4:1 Where do wars and contentions among you come from? Is it not from this: from your own desires, which battle within your members?
4:2 You desire, and you do not have. You envy and you kill, and you are unable to obtain. You argue and you fight, and you do not have, because you do not ask.
4:3 You ask and you do not receive, because you ask badly, so that you may use it toward your own desires.
4:4 You adulterers! Do you not know that the friendship of this world is hostile to God? Therefore, whoever has chosen to be a friend of this world has been made into an enemy of God.
4:5 Or do you think that Scripture says in vain: “The spirit which lives within you desires unto envy?”
4:6 But he gives a greater grace. Therefore he says: “God resists the arrogant, but he gives grace to the humble.”
4:7 Therefore, be subject to God. But resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
4:8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners! And purify your hearts, you duplicitous souls!
4:9 Be afflicted: mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned into mourning, and your gladness into sorrow.
4:10 Be humbled in the sight of the Lord, and he will exalt you.

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