In every walk of life to become what you want to become then you must decide first what you will stop doing. It is not about doing something new as much as not doing what you are doing now. The examples are endless: but if you are really trying to get out of debt but still carry and use your credit card and do not change your spending then you will remain in debt. If you are wanting to be healthy but are still feeding on the wrong foods then you will remain unhealthy. We have to carry around in our lives the important two words, DO NOT.
James has these two words at the forefront of his mind in this next verse:
“You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.” (James 4 v 4)
The consecrated heart has a commitment towards God which carries a Do Not towards the world.
James says, ‘DO NOT be a friend of this world because if you do you will become an enemy of God.’
He is warning the people about the battle that is ever present. The battle of friendship with the world v friendship with the Spirit. To be honest, they were facing the same struggles as we face today. They were making the same mistakes that we make today.
And James doesn’t mince his words, he makes it very clear how he feels. He calls them an ‘adulterous people.’ He’s saying you can’t have it both ways.
Friendship with the world, which basically means, assessing things by human standards, or by dedicating oneself to material things, cannot be your master. It’s not meaning a contempt for the world, but James is saying you can’t let it control you, you must use the things of the world and allow it to help you serve others, not be it’s servant.
Obviously when James says to the people they’re ‘adulterous’ he isn’t meaning literally. When we are being mastered by the world we are committing spiritual adultery because our relationship with God is likened throughout the Bible to one of a husband and his bride.
In the OT it is Israel as the bride and in the NT we see the Christian thought of the Church as the bride.
God’s heart breaks when we serve the things of the world, when we follow the world’s systems and wisdoms over God’s, the covenant is broken.
The problem has always been that the people of God do not completely reject God but they compromise their walk with Him.
Is the Holy Spirit happy living in me? Is He comfortable alongside me? Is He in charge or do I use Him? How much time do I spend thinking about the Spirit in me? When I speak is He speaking? When I write my statuses on social media is He writing them? When I accuse is it Him who is accusing?
The consecrated heart carries a DO NOT in order to remain consecrated. The consecrated heart is not a friend with ego; it yearns but not through eyes filled with ambition which desire more and work hard to be noticed; it does not reach out for the poisonous fruit to become someone. The consecrated heart makes choices in what it sees; what it desires; who it walks with; how it speaks; these are big choices and in order to make them it has to decide that friendship with God is more important than friendship with the world.
When I joined Elim as a Pastor there were 2 national names, one had an amazing children’s ministry, the other was a sought after Pastor.
Yesterday I was talking to a couple who had attended the funeral sadly of the sought after Pastor. It wasn’t really a Christian funeral, in fact one of the eulogies came from a work colleague who said “when he started at work he told us he was a Pentecostal Pastor but then he became one of us” he then quoted something that he was well known for which wasn’t fitting for any Christian.
At the same funeral my friends met the amazing children’s minister that was. He was not the man that he once was. He was no longer national, nor a minister, nor working with children.
What makes man and woman move from such places in God to become shadows of who they were? What do they think about when they’ve walked away? Do they still pray? Do they rubbish their experience of God? Did they have anything to walk away from?
The consecrated heart means these questions will never be asked of us.
Missions Paul 