James 1

James 1:1

To the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting.

To all the believing Jews, that are dispersed among the nations in any part of the world.

James 1:2

My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations;

Be ye so far, my brethren, from being dejected and disheartened with the afflictions which ye suffer for Christ, as that ye do account this a great and just cause, above all others, of your joy and exultation, that ye are thought worthy, and made able, to undergo these sharp trials for his sake;

James 1:3

Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience.

Knowing that these sufferings whereby your faith is tried, do both exercise, and, through the goodness of God, work patience in you.

James 1:4

But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.

Let not your patience shrink and fail, but let it hold firm and constant to the end; and let it produce in you those good and gracious effects, which are proper thereunto; that so ye may be entire and perfect in goodness, wanting no virtue or grace fit for Christians.

James 1:8

A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.

An unbelieving man, that hath one heart for God, another for the world; one while inclining to a confident reliance upon God, another while distrusting him; is utterly uncertain and unstable in all his actions and purposes.

James 1:9

Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted:

Let a Christian, who is taken from a mean condition and advanced to any height of honour, be thankful to God for his exaltation, and acknowledge his promotion to be a favour from God:

James 1:10

But the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away.

And let the rich contentedly rest in the hand of God, if he have thought fit to humble him with want; because, if he be in never so prosperous an estate, here is no continuance for him, but even as the flower of the field he shall wither away and vanish.

James 1:12

Blessed is the man that endureth temptation.

Blessed is the man, that patiently endureth afflictions and persecutions for the Name of Christ.

James 1:13

Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:

Let no man, when he is tempted and drawn to sin, cast the fault hereof upon God; for God, as he is most pure and holy, so he can neither be solicited or moved to evil, neither can he move or solicit any man to evil; which is contrary to his most pure and perfect nature and will:

James 1:14

But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.

But every man, when he is tempted, must acknowledge, next to the suggestion of Satan, the fault to be his own; in that he is drawn aside by his own sinful concupiscence, and enticed to do evil thereby.

James 1:15

Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.

VOL IV. L I It is with sin, as it is in our natural birth: in every one of us, there is originally a corrupt disposition, and proneness to sin: from hence are our evil lusts and desires; those vicious lusts and desires bring forth sinful actions; and sin, when it is grown to a consummation and perfect course, bringeth forth eternal death.

James 1:17

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of Lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.

Every good gift proceeds from that God, who is the author and original of all light; whom we may not measure by these created lights of the moon or sun, in which there are interchanges of brightness and obscurity, by night and day, by clouds and clearness, some while shining and some while shadowed; but must conceive of him, to be ever constant in his most just decrees, in his rich mercies to us, without all variableness, without all suspicion or possibility of changing.

James 1:18

Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first-fruits of his creatures.

And that infinite and unchangeable mercy of his hath approved itself to us in this, that, of his own free will, without any merit of ours, without any of our inclination towards him, he hath regenerated us to himself; not by the mortal and corrupt seed which we derived from Adam, but by the immortal and incorruptible seed of the word of truth; that we should be singled out as the noblest and happiest of his creatures.

James 1:20

For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.

For the mind of that man, who is taken up with wrath, cannot, for the time, be capable of doing the will of God, or bringing forth any good work.

James 1:21

Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engraffed word, which is able to save your souls.

Wherefore, that ye may be fit, as good ground, to receive this divine seed, do ye rid your hearts of all that natural uncleanness and those sinful dispositions and affections, which, as so many superfluous and hurtful weeds, take up the soil of your hearts, and make it unprofitable and noisome; and, with meekness and purity of heart, receive ye that holy word of God, which, by the hands of his Apostles, is cast into the furrows of your souls, or is engraffed in your hearts by their gracious plantation, as that which is only able to save your souls.

James 1:25

But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, &c.

But whosoever looketh throughly into the perfect glass of Christian doctrine, and vieweth himself and his actions therein

James 1:27

Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

That religion, which shall pass for pure and undefiled, in the account and censure of God our Heavenly Father, is not that, which consists in good words, and glorious shews and holy professions; but that, which approves itself in action; in visiting the fatherless and widows in their affliction, in relieving the distressed, and in keeping ourselves free from all the defilements of the world, from the lusts of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.