Welcome to day 38 of our James Bible Study! Today, let’s take a look at verses 9-10.
Let there be tears for the wrong things you have done. Let there be sorrow and sincere grief. Let there be sadness instead of laughter, and gloom instead of joy. 10 Then when you realize your worthlessness before the Lord, he will lift you up, encourage and help you. (TLB)
I looked up the NIV verses and then read The Living Bible version. Take a look at the different versions of these verses. It should help them make better sense and often unfolds something you didn’t expect.
Have you ever mourned a wrong doing? Especially when you realize how much your actions went against the God you love? It’s tough work. And very humbling and we all need a little humbling now and then. We humans easily get caught up in our flesh and can sometimes think we’ve got it together.
But we don’t. We never really have it all together. Maybe when we realize we’ll never be perfect (until heaven of course) we can give ourselves permission to calm down and stop being so tense. Trying to be perfect winds us up on the insides and can make us a big bummer to be around. Let your hair down. Relax. And accept that you’re going to mess up and God will still love you.
How do these verses impact your heart today? Journal about that. And then grab your memory verses and write them out from memory. How’d you do?
Blessings,