The Need to Ask Rightly

Having explained the nature of the “wisdom from above” and its role in securing peace and righteousness (James 3:13–18), the Apostle in today’s passage turns to address the lack of peace and righteousness in his audience. As we will see, James’ original readers struggled to maintain peace and righteousness because they were not asking for God’s assistance rightly or even at all.

James begins by noting that warring passions within the audience were causing quarrels and fights among them (4:1–2). Here the words translated as “passions,” “desire,” and “covet” all refer to what one commentator calls “a strong and unhealthy craving to secure something not currently one’s own.” Human passions and desires are not always evil; they become sinful when we long for what is inherently sinful, desire that which cannot rightfully be ours, or allow the strength of our cravings to control us. These passions were at war “within” the audience, which refers to the conflict of desires within the souls of individuals, to passionate arguments between people, or likely to both. Individual passions, desires, and covetousness was boiling over into communal strife in the churches that James addresses. Moreover, this strife was heated. These were not minor disagreements but “war” (v. 1). James even says that desires were leading to “murder” (v. 2). It is unlikely that the Apostle refers to actual taking of human life, though it is not impossible that some violence had occurred, especially if some in the audience once belonged to the party of the Zealots, Jews who sought the overthrow of Rome. In any case, “murder” is an appropriate metaphor to describe the ferocity of the conflicts, for the destructive use of the tongue can kill relationships and reputations, and anger violates the commandment against murder, which is also the inevitable result of unconstrained anger (see Prov. 18:21; Matt. 5:21–26).

Why did so many in James’ audience lack the wisdom from above that leads to peace and righteousness? First, multiple individuals had failed to ask for it (James 4:2). The present tense of the verb “ask” in the Greek indicates that the problem may have been that readers were not persevering in asking but giving up after the Lord did not provide right away. Additionally, many men and women were asking for wisdom not to use it for peace and righteousness but solely to benefit themselves (v. 3). We cannot count on God to give us what we ask for if we do not ask with the right motives.