Friendship with the World

"You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God." [James 4:4]


God's church is filled with two timing, unfaithful, spiritual adulterating church members. There is no easy way to say this. You can make a list of sins and find church going people engaged in many of those sinful behaviors. There is lying, gossip, back stabbing, adultery, fornication, profane speech, cheating,  un-forgiveness, drunkenness, and the list goes on. What is worse is there is not shame or remorse for such behavior by many who sit in the pews on Sunday but live for the Devil the rest of the week.

I am not speaking to the pagans outside in the church engaged in this type of behavior. Neither is James. We are both addressing Christians. Christians who have embraced compromise along the way. It did not seem a big deal at the time. A corner was cut, a forbidden fruit was nibbled, caution was thrown to the wind for a few moments of fun and pleasure. What started out as a little compromise for some has now become unashamed friendship with the world.

Christians drink the world's brew, laugh at their crude jokes, embrace profane language in the form of movie and television entertainment, dress in the world's fashions, wear our hair like the glamorous people of Hollywood, all the while, shunning words like holiness, consecration, and righteousness.

The church is stained. The church has become chummy companions with the world. When is the last time you heard a good biblical message on holy living? That is not a felt need by the world. It is a need just the same for people who have made the world an associate and become friendly with in lifestyles while rejecting, ignoring, and rebelling against God.

Church do you not get this? GOD IS OFFENDED BY SIN! HE HATES SIN! I did not say He hates the sinner. I said He hates sin. When sinful pagan lifestyles are embraced by God's own people we make ourselves odious in His sight. That is what the world "enemy" means in [James 4:4] Go read your old testament and see how God treated His own covenant people when they rejected Him. Read in Acts 5:1-11 how God dealt with the sin of Annanias and Sapphira for the sin of lying. Read what God had to say to many of the seven churches in Revelation chapters two and three. REPENT! A message sorely needed in the church today. REPENT does go over well with the television and radio audience. REPENT does not make the top ten best selling book list at the store. REPENT does not draw the crowds on Sunday mornings in fact it often repels the crowds.

How can Christian people sit around in front of the latest sitcoms laughing and embracing things like; Happily Divorced, The Modern Family, Bates Motel, Mad Men, Cougar Town and others. In these shows homosexuality is flaunted, adultery is embraced, sexual promiscuity is showcased as normal, divorced is mocked as a preferred lifestyle, and fathers are often spineless or unfaithful to their spouse and children. All of these things are clearly spoken against in the scriptures. The only way children of God can watch these things is with a closed Bible and a closed heart to the Spirit of God.

Blessed is the pure in heart for they shall see God. [Matt 5:8]

But examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good; abstain from every form of evil.         [ I Thess 5:21-22]

As obedient children do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance, but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves in all your behavior because it is written, 'You shall be holy for I am holy." [I Pet 1:14-16]

Church do you examine the music you listen to carefully? Parents do you even know what is playing behind those headphones constantly plugged to your children's ears? Do you closely examine what you watch in your home or at the movie theater seeking to abstain from every form of evil? Horror movies out. Movies with profanity off limits. Sexually implicit pictures out of bounds. You will find very little entertainment God honoring you can watch.

Because the church has made the world a close companion hearts are hard to the things of God. They have become calloused. God still moves and works as He has always done. People who have become friendly with the world are no longer sensitive to the things of God's Spirit. They are no longer sensitive to the scriptures, the conviction of the Holy Spirit, nor God's chastisement. They prefer a life of rebellion making themselves enemies of God rather than yielding and submitting to Him.

It is time for the people of God to take an honest look at how friendly we have become with the world in our behavior. It is time to open our eyes, our hearts, our Bibles and spirits asking God to search our hearts to see if He finds any wicked way in us. It is time for judgement to begin in the house of God. It is time to make a break from friendship with the world to cultivate communion with Christ. It is time to embrace holiness and shun hypocrisy. What will it be church? Friendship with the world or friendship with God? It is time to decide.