James 4:3

ye ask, and ye receive not, because evilly ye ask, that in your pleasures ye may spend [it].

Young's Literal Translation

In The King James Version

Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.

In Context

2ye desire, and ye have not; ye murder, and are zealous, and are not able to attain; ye fight and war, and ye have not, because of your not asking;

4Adulterers and adulteresses! have ye not known that friendship of the world is enmity with God? whoever, then, may counsel to be a friend of the world, an enemy of God he is set.

Read all of James 4

Cross References

Job 27:8For what [is] the hope of the profane, When He doth cut off? When God doth cast off his soul?

Psalms 18:41They cry, and there is no saviour, On Jehovah, and He doth not answer them.

Proverbs 1:28Then they call me, and I do not answer, They seek me earnestly, and find me not.

Proverbs 21:13Whoso is shutting his ear from the cry of the poor, He also doth cry, and is not answered.

Isaiah 1:15And in your spreading forth your hands, I hide mine eyes from you, Also when ye increase prayer, I do not hear, Your hands of blood have been full.

Jeremiah 11:14And thou, thou dost not pray for this people, Nor dost thou lift up for them cry and prayer, For I do not hearken in the time of their calling unto Me for their vexation.

Matthew Henry on James 4:2-11

Origin of War and Contention; Against Pride; Submission to God. ( a. d. 61.) 1 From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members? 2 Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not. 3 Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts. 4 Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever… Read the whole commentary →

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