James 4:1-3
Many years ago our church had a couples night out, and Jan
and I volunteered along with others to keep children at the church; Jan and I
were assigned to keep two and three year olds for the night. In that we taught many of these
couples, we had been around some of the children and as they dropped them off
most of these sweet little children acted as if they were at home, and most
went to some object that they had played with or on many times before. If my memory serves me right, we had 15
precious little boys and girls, and I was sure that four hours would pass
quickly.
To my amazement these sweet precious little boys and girls
began to quarrel, it seemed that many of them were very passionate about what
they wanted, and what they wanted was precisely what the other sweet precious
child had. In what seemed as
minutes, we had battles going on all over this very large room, and these
precious children were yelling at each other “it’s mine” and they would try
force to back up their claim. In a
matter of minutes, Jan and I went from caretakers to a two person swat-team, we
tried to be negotiators, only to end up wondering how so much upheaval,
turbulence, unrest, trouble, chaos, and mayhem could have taken place in a matter
of 15 minutes. It was at this
point I knew we needed Devine intervention, how could the two of us holdout for
3 hours and 45 minutes against such forces as these?
I remember asking Jan what happened, where did they learn
how to be so selfish and just plain mean to each other, most are only two years
old. At first, I was sure that
their parents had not taught them such mean-spirited actions, but as the night
went forward I was sure they had.
It was at this point that fear filled my mind and heart, and I just knew
the parents of these kids would never return! If they were mine, I would have been looking for any
escape. That brings me to a
question that James asks in chapter 4:1, “What
causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? That’s precisely what I was wondering while
keeping those children; what, where, how did they go from sweet and precious to
little demons?
If only I would have looked past verse one, James gives us
the answer in verses two and three.
“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. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to
spend it on your passions.” Before
you say that is not true we do not murder, let me return to the longest four
hours of my life, while watching, not controlling 15 two and three year
olds. In that room was a large
slide, I helped the children up the latter and Jan made sure they came down
safely. A sweet, precious little
girl, one I had been around often, was waiting her turn; she was standing at
the top of the latter waiting, while the little guy in front of her had his
turn, but he was somewhat fearful and was not in any hurry. This is what my unbelieving eyes saw;
that sweet little girl had waited long enough, she took her foot and put it in
the middle of his back and slammed him down the slide. It was at this point, she turned and
smiled at me as if to say, he is no longer a problem, and she slid down the
slide. No, she did not murder him
outwardly, but she had no concern for his feelings, his welfare; she just
wanted the object removed so she could slide.
So James, speaking as the Spirit of the living God moves
him, tells us we have two problems; first we do not ask, and second, we ask
wrongly. Are we not more like
those two and three year olds than we care to admit?
From the Back Porch,
Bob Rice
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