"Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.
Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.
Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up."
James 4:7-10
It's hard to submit. We want to do things our way, and for the universe to bend to our will, rather than the other way around... however unlikely. :) In this set of verses though, we learn that if we can learn that submission and humility towards God that he will lift us up. I think the point here being that God is trying to help us... if we go before him thinking we know best, then we're never going to be able to accept that help, and we're never going to reach our potential.
God explains that if we draw close to him, that he can come closer to us... likely because we're aware, and listening for his voice. He asks us to have clean hands and pure hearts, which relates to Psalms 24:3-4: "Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his holy place? / He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart...." He's teaching us how to ascend. :)
I think the next verse is similar, though it seems sort of depressing. I think what God is asking us here is part of the submission and humbling thing... we need to accept the afflictions and sorrows that come into our lives, and learn mourning and weeping and heaviness, because it is part of the deal. He definitely doesn't mean for us to be that way all the time or he wouldn't talk about happiness being one of the things that gets translated over at the judgement day (Mormon 9:14). He definitely wants us to learn happiness, but I think that afflictions are part of that, aren't they? We don't know how to choose happiness in the midst of struggles unless we have faced them in the past and learned that skill.
Today, let's be willing to learn and submit to the full range of God's earthly lessons, whether we get to do what we want or not, whether we are happy or not, and whether it is hard or not. Let's humble ourselves before God and admit that we still have a lot to learn. Let's accept afflictions and sorrow, and trust that God will lift us and deliver us to knowledge and joy.
Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.
Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.
Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up."
James 4:7-10
It's hard to submit. We want to do things our way, and for the universe to bend to our will, rather than the other way around... however unlikely. :) In this set of verses though, we learn that if we can learn that submission and humility towards God that he will lift us up. I think the point here being that God is trying to help us... if we go before him thinking we know best, then we're never going to be able to accept that help, and we're never going to reach our potential.
God explains that if we draw close to him, that he can come closer to us... likely because we're aware, and listening for his voice. He asks us to have clean hands and pure hearts, which relates to Psalms 24:3-4: "Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his holy place? / He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart...." He's teaching us how to ascend. :)
I think the next verse is similar, though it seems sort of depressing. I think what God is asking us here is part of the submission and humbling thing... we need to accept the afflictions and sorrows that come into our lives, and learn mourning and weeping and heaviness, because it is part of the deal. He definitely doesn't mean for us to be that way all the time or he wouldn't talk about happiness being one of the things that gets translated over at the judgement day (Mormon 9:14). He definitely wants us to learn happiness, but I think that afflictions are part of that, aren't they? We don't know how to choose happiness in the midst of struggles unless we have faced them in the past and learned that skill.
Today, let's be willing to learn and submit to the full range of God's earthly lessons, whether we get to do what we want or not, whether we are happy or not, and whether it is hard or not. Let's humble ourselves before God and admit that we still have a lot to learn. Let's accept afflictions and sorrow, and trust that God will lift us and deliver us to knowledge and joy.
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