James 1

Greeting

1 From James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.To God’s faithful peoplet who have been scattered.Greetings.

When You Are Tested, Turn to God

2 My brothers and sisters, be very happy when you are tested in different ways.3 You know that such testing of your faith produces endurance.

4 Endure until your testing is over. Then you will be mature and complete, and you won’t need anything.
5 If any of you needs wisdom to know what you should do, you should ask God, and he will give it to you. God is generous to everyone and doesn’t find fault with them.6 When you ask for something, don’t have any doubts. A person who has doubts is like a wave that is blown by the wind and tossed by the sea.7 A person who has doubts shouldn’t expect to receive anything from the Lord.

8 A person who has doubts is thinking about two different things at the same time and can’t make up his mind about anything.
9 Humble believers should be proud because being humble makes them important.10 Rich believers should be proud because being rich should make them humble. Rich people will wither like flowers.

11 The sun rises with its scorching heat and dries up plants. The flowers drop off, and the beauty is gone. The same thing will happen to rich people. While they are busy, they will die.
12 Blessed are those who endure when they are tested. When they pass the test, they will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.13 When someone is tempted, he shouldn’t say that God is tempting him. God can’t be tempted by evil, and God doesn’t tempt anyone.14 Everyone is tempted by his own desires as they lure him away and trap him.

15 Then desire becomes pregnant and gives birth to sin. When sin grows up, it gives birth to death.
16 My dear brothers and sisters, don’t be fooled.

17 Every good present and every perfect gift comes from above, from the Father who made the sun, moon, and stars. The Father doesn’t change like the shifting shadows produced by the sun and the moon.
18 God decided to give us life through the word of truth to make us his most important creatures.19 Remember this, my dear brothers and sisters: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and should not get angry easily.20 An angry person doesn’t do what God approves of.

21 So get rid of all immoral behavior and all the wicked things you do. Humbly accept the word that God has placed in you. This word can save you.
22 Do what God’s word says. Don’t merely listen to it, or you will fool yourselves.23 If someone listens to God’s word but doesn’t do what it says, he is like a person who looks at his face in a mirror,24 studies his features, goes away, and immediately forgets what he looks like.

25 However, the person who continues to study God’s perfect teachings that make people free and who remains committed to them will be blessed. People like that don’t merely listen and forget; they actually do what God’s teachings say.
26 If a person thinks that he is religious but can’t control his tongue, he is fooling himself. That person’s religion is worthless.

27 Pure, unstained religion, according to God our Father, is to take care of orphans and widows when they suffer and to remain uncorrupted by this world.

James 1

1 James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are of the Dispersion, greeting.2 Count it all joy, my brethren, when ye fall into manifold temptations;3 Knowing that the proving of your faith worketh patience.4 And let patience have its perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, lacking in nothing.5 But if any of you lacketh wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all liberally and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.6 But let him ask in faith, nothing doubting: for he that doubteth is like the surge of the sea driven by the wind and tossed.7 For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord;8 a doubleminded man, unstable in all his ways.9 But let the brother of low degree glory in his high estate:10 and the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away.11 For the sun ariseth with the scorching wind, and withereth the grass: and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his goings.12 Blessed is the man that endureth temptation; for when he hath been approved, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to them that love him.13 Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God; for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempteth no man:14 but each man is tempted, when he is drawn away by his own lust, and enticed.15 Then the lust, when it hath conceived, beareth sin: and the sin, when it is fullgrown, bringeth forth death.16 Be not deceived, my beloved brethren.17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning.18 Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.19 Ye know this, my beloved brethren. But let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath:20 for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.21 Wherefore putting away all filthiness and overflowing of wickedness, receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.22 But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deluding your own selves.23 For if any one is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a mirror:24 for he beholdeth himself, and goeth away, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was.25 But he that looketh into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and so continueth, being not a hearer that forgetteth but a doer that worketh, this man shall be blessed in his doing.26 If any man thinketh himself to be religious, while he bridleth not his tongue but deceiveth his heart, this man’s religion is vain.27 Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.