James 5:12

And there is another thing that I want to say, my friends, and it is very important. Whenever you promise something, don’t say, “God is the boss over heaven and earth, and if I don’t do what I promise, he will punish me.” Don’t say anything like that. You see, if you say that, and then don’t do what you promised, then God will say that you are guilty. So just tell the true story. Say yes when that is true, or no when that is true, and don’t say anything more.

Plain English Version

In The King James Version

But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath: but let your yea be yea; and your nay, nay; lest ye fall into condemnation.

In Context

11They didn’t give up, so now we respect them, and we say they were good people. Remember the story about Job. He was a good man, but he got a lot of trouble. But he kept on following God, and in the end, God made everything good for him. So we know that God always feels sorry for his people when they get trouble, and he will be very good to them.

13Have any of you got trouble? You have to keep on praying about it. Or are any of you happy? You can sing to God to say thank you to him and to tell everybody that God is really good.

Read all of James 5

Cross References

Matthew 5:33Jesus said to the people, “You know, sometimes people promise something to somebody, and to get people to believe them, they say, ‘by God’. That shows that they want God to punish them if they don’t do it. And the law teachers tell you that God said, ‘If you say, “by God”, then you have to do what you promised.’

1 Corinthians 11:34And don’t come to that meeting hungry. If you are hungry, eat something at home before you come to the meeting, so when you meet together, you will not do something wrong, and God will not punish you. That’s all I want to say about this matter right now. There are some other things that I want to talk to you about, but I will wait until I come and visit you, and then we can sort them out.

James 3:1My Christian friends, don’t all of you try to be teachers of God’s word. Only the right people can do that. You see, God will judge us all, and if you teach people something that is wrong, God might punish you a lot. It is like this, all of us make mistakes, and we get trouble from those mistakes. But if we teach people, and if we make a mistake so that we teach them something that is wrong, we will get really big trouble from that. It is hard for us to control our tongues so that we say everything properly. If you can control your tongue, you are properly good, and you can control all of your body.

3 John 1:2My friend, I know that God has made your spirit healthy inside you. I pray that everything in your life will be good, and I pray that your body will be healthy, just like your spirit is healthy.

Matthew Henry on James 5:2-12

Warnings to the Rich; Motives to Patience under Affliction. ( a. d. 61.) 1 Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. 2 Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten. 3 Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days. 4 Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and… Read the whole commentary →

This Verse In Other Editions

Study James 5:12