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You ask, and yet do not receive, because you ask wrongly, so that you may spend it on what gives you pleasure.

Adulterers,[a] don’t you know that friendship with the world means hostility toward God? So whoever wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or, do you think that Scripture has no reason for saying that the Spirit, who lives in us,[b] yearns jealously?[c]

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Footnotes

  1. James 4:4 Some witnesses to the text read Adulterous men and women or Adulterers and adulteresses.
  2. James 4:5 Some witnesses to the text read that he caused to live in us.
  3. James 4:5 Or strongly opposes envy

When you ask, you do not receive,(A) because you ask with wrong motives,(B) that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

You adulterous(C) people,[a] don’t you know that friendship with the world(D) means enmity against God?(E) Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.(F) Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us[b]?(G)

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Footnotes

  1. James 4:4 An allusion to covenant unfaithfulness; see Hosea 3:1.
  2. James 4:5 Or that the spirit he caused to dwell in us envies intensely; or that the Spirit he caused to dwell in us longs jealously