Daily Bible Reading and Prayer 2, ESV, Hebrews 7-, Psalm 62-, Nov 10, 2018-

Dec 4, James 4

My youth group is memorizing this chapter! I've memorized up to verse 6.

1 What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?

2 You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask.

3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.
Some people pray for things and then ask why God doesn't give them what they want. It's simple, if you ask in true faith, and if what you ask for will bring much glory to God, He will give it. The thing is, we don't know what will give God the most glory, we might think this or that would, but God knows what will bring Him the most glory. It might seem daunting to ask God for things not knowing if He will grant them or not, but He loves hearing what we want just as a parent likes it when their child asks for things. The parent knows better than the child.

4 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.
We are God's bride, we must be faithful to Him and not commit adultery with other gods. 

5 Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, "He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us"?

6 But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble."
He gives more grace, what a comfort.

7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
The devil is so much weaker than Christ it is almost laughable. Resist him with Jesus and he will go running for the hills with his tail between his feet!

8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
Seek God and you will find Him.

9 Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.

10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.

11 Do not speak evil against one another, brothers. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge.

12 There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?

13 Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit"-

14 yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.

15 Instead you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that."
I often make plans and don't think about if it is the Lord's will or not, we must always be concerned with doing His will.

16 As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.

17 So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin. - James 4

My dad is doing a little bit better, hopefully he continues to get better. He talked on the phone with our pastor for a while about one of my brothers, and I don't know exactly why. I hope all is well. My arms and legs are still pretty sore from rock climbing, idk if I'll do it again.

I am a little concerned with my own health, I've had chest pain on and off for a little while now, like a week. I haven't told my parents cause I don't want them to worry. It's happened before and I ended up fine. I'm pretty sure it just a combination of the weather not making up its mind, and stress.

Dear Heavenly Father, thank you so much for everything You have done for us, thank you especially for health that we so easily take for granted. Thank you for healing my dad so far, please continue to heal him. Father thank you that my family belongs to a church that truly cares about You. Thank you that our pastor and elders are great Christians who we can talk to if we have any problems. Please let whatever it was that happened with my brother not be serious. Father please be near everyone in my prayer journal, especially those overwhelmed with school. This I ask in Jesus's name, Amen