God Doesn’t Want to Be One of Your Options

James 1:5-8 says, “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do.”

Joshua Jagelman taught me something new about these well-known verses.

I had always thought of the phrase “you must believe and not doubt” as meaning, “you must have faith that God will give you wisdom, and not be uncertain about it, not question it.”

I (mistakenly) equated this to a similar statement to Matthew 14:31: “Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. ‘You of little faith,’ he said, ‘why did you doubt?’”

Or Matthew 28:17: “When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted.”

Those verses use the Greek distazo, to waver in opinion. That’s not the word in James.

Nor is it “doubt” as when Paul wrote to the Galatians: “I desire to be present with you now, and to change my voice; for I stand in doubt of you” (Galatians 4:20 KJV). There Paul used the Greek aporeo, to be perplexed, to be at a loss. That, too, is not the word in James.

When James said, “you must believe and not doubt,” he used the Greek word diakrino. Dia means “passing through,” with the sense of “a division of two or more parts,” and “krino” means “judgments.” Two options, two opinions.

Joshua Jagelman said, “God does not like being one of your options. And if you come to God so that you can add one more option to your strategies, you probably will not receive much from him. If I have a good strategy, but I ask God and he says something different, I’m going to have to do what he says.”

When we ask, we don’t add God’s wisdom to the list.

“The one who doubts is like the wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded.”

“Double-minded” is “dipsychos,” or “twice” (dis) and “souled” (psyche).

The double-minded person has a heart for God, and a heart for the world. In the Greek it’s really clear: double, double, double.

If we want God’s wisdom, we need to not add him to our list of options, and not long for the things of the world.

If we do, we should not expect to receive anything from him.

Lord God, thank you that you give wisdom as we need it.

Remind us, Lord, to seek your kingdom first and only. Let us see your faithfulness so that we believe that all these things will be added as well.

Keep us from a heart for the world. Let us turn our hearts to you fully.

Thank you for sending Jesus as our example, that he set his face like flint towards Jerusalem and his death, and that, through his death and resurrection, we have life abundantly.

To the only wise God be glory forever through Jesus Christ,

Amy Joy

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