What Are We Living For? - What are we supposed to do when our ambitions seem at cross-purposes, when our desires for this or that kind of life bump into each other and fall off the track? William James distinguishes three kinds of ambitions . . . material self-seeking, social self-seeking, and spiritual self-seeking . . . in all its forms, such ambition tends to cause people ‘to entrench their Me,’ . . . [1]

A New Perception -Turning to Christ is thought to be the final answer. Everything in a person’s life before that turning is seen as darkness, and everything after it must, therefore, be cast in light . . . But James sees that conversion is never complete. There is always double-mindedness, even among those who truly want to be friends of God. The wisdom from below is not easy to abandon or avoid, precisely because it is the "way of the world," inscribed not only in the language and literature of our surrounding culture but also in our very hearts. [2]

Commitment to Simplicity - Kierkegaard, who was a lover of this letter, declared that purity of heart means to will one thing. James’s analysis shows how hard that is, and how necessary it is to approach God if humans are to avoid that demonic wisdom that makes even prayer a means of manipulating God (4:3). Perhaps that is why the Shaker hymn says, "’Tis a gift to be simple, a gift to be free." [3]

Who deserves the "wisdom of Solomon Award" in your family? How do recognize a wise person? What behaviors indicate a lack of wisdom? Any examples?

What qualities in verse 17 do you most need to develop in your life?

When disagreements arise between people, what needs to happen? What "desires" seem to drive the world around us?

Begin with several selected examples of the not-coveted Darwin Award recipients (volumes one and two) whose lack of wisdom results in their ignoble, pathetic end-thus ridding the world of such defective genes. (Barnes and Noble, Walden’s carries the books).

Shift to people in your life whom you have valued because of the wisdom and demeanor.

Shift to James 3 and the comparison of two types of wisdom, just like Psalm 1 and the two paths that one can choose.

Hold up positive characteristics and current personal or communal examples of that quality of wisdom in action.

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[1] Brian J. Mahan, Forgetting Ourselves on Purpose: Vocation and the Ethics of Ambition (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2002), page 46.
[2] The New Interpreter Bible XII (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1998), page 212.
[3] Ibid, page 213.