James 4:1

Where do wars and contentions among you come from? Is it not from this: from your own desires, which battle within your members?

Catholic Public Domain Version

In The King James Version

From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?

In Context

2You desire, and you do not have. You envy and you kill, and you are unable to obtain. You argue and you fight, and you do not have, because you do not ask.

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Cross References

Jeremiah 17:9The heart is depraved above all things, and it is unsearchable, who can know it?

Mark 7:21For from within, from the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders,

Romans 7:5For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sins, which were under the law, operated within our bodies, so as to bear fruit unto death.

Romans 8:7And the wisdom of the flesh is inimical to God. For it is not subject to the law of God, nor can it be.

Colossians 3:5Therefore, mortify your body, while it is upon the earth. For because of fornication, impurity, lust, evil desires, and avarice, which are a kind of service to idols,

Titus 3:3For, in times past, we ourselves were also unwise, unbelieving, erring, servants of various desires and pleasures, acting with malice and envy, being hateful and hating one another.

Matthew Henry on James 4:1

In this chapter we are directed to consider, I. Some causes of contention, besides those mentioned in the foregoing chapter, and to watch against them, ver. 1-5 . II. We are taught to abandon the friendship of this world, so as to submit and subject ourselves entirely to God, ver. 4-10 . III. All detraction and rash judgment of others are to be carefully avoided, ver. 11, 12 . IV. We must preserve a constant regard, and pay the utmost deference to the disposals of divine Providence, ver. 13, to the end . Read the whole commentary →

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