Jehovah's Witnesses Straight Talk - Forum/Blog

James 4:7 Be subject therefore to God. But resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 4:8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

Is James here stating a self-help endeavor for sinners to cleanse their hands, to purify our hearts? In other words, is James asking these Christian's to meet the rules of law better so they can be clean? No he not at all, so what is James saying?

He saying for us not to have two minds, that is, a double mind, well than, what two minds can a Christian's have? Some religious groups teach a mind for their groups teachings, and a mind of the world against their groups teachings, but of course that is foolish, because their religion did not exist at the time James wrote his letter, there was only one the body of Christ Jesus a true congregation of God.

So what two minds could a body member have that would make them unclean as a sinner? They could have the mind of Christ Jesus, God's own mind, or the mind of the flesh. The minding of the fleshly mind meant death, but it meant more, what? It meant sin, and sin is death to the mind of Christ Jesus. To cleanse oneself we would have to have faith in Christ Jesus only, we could not cleanse ourselves by works of law, which is the fleshly mind for Christian's, its that simple.

1 Peter 3:21 This is a symbol of baptism, which now saves you--not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,

Yes, the fleshly mind is a works of law, from the fleshly mind, because it is a legal mind that justifies itself by works done to prove it is righteous. But according to God, a human cannot make themselves righteous by performing certain acts like meeting rules of a religion or obeying the commandments, no! They must be made righteous by someone else life, what?

Romans 3:20 Because by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified in his sight. For through the law comes the knowledge of sin. Romans 7:5 For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were through the law, worked in our members to bring forth fruit to death.

God's says a person righteousness under the old law for example came from the blood of innocent life; animal in this case, for Christian's, however, their righteousness comes from the blood of Christ Jesus. So one would have to be cleanse by Christ blood to be righteous before God, not by works of law. Subsequently, to cleanse ones heart and hands, one would have to put down laws of the fleshly mind in judging others with it too prove oneself righteous by works of law.

Romans 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who don't walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.{NU omits "who don't walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit"}

See also: nu-truth.com