Oh Those Missing Verses: Adulterers!

This Sunday's reading from James 3:13-4:3,7-8 cleverly cuts out the uncomfortable words James has for all of us by deleting verses 4-6.

First let's read the version most Episcoplians will hear in the pews today,

13 Who is wise and understanding among you? Show by your good life that your works are done with gentleness born of wisdom. 14 But if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not be boastful and false to the truth. 15 Such wisdom does not come down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, devilish. 16 For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind. 17 But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. 18 And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for* those who make peace.1 Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from? Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you? 2 You want something and do not have it; so you commit murder. And you covet* something and cannot obtain it; so you engage in disputes and conflicts. You do not have, because you do not ask. 3  You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures.7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

Missing are three important verses of warning,

 4 Adulterers! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. 5 Or do you suppose that it is for nothing that the scripture says, ‘God* (He) yearns jealously for the spirit that he has made to dwell in us’? 6 But he gives all the more grace; therefore it says,‘God opposes the proud,   but gives grace to the humble.’ 

Typically, the Revised Common Lectionary (RCL) cuts out language that warns us of God's potential to regard us in a negative light. The impression the RCL  editors create is that we can do no wrong, that God is never angry with us, and that we do not have to fear the Lord.

But,

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom" - Proverbs 9:10.

Imagine the lack of wisdom in a generation that is not taught the fear of the Lord.

Imagine the doom facing a generation that embraces friendship with the world over fear of the Lord.

I am afraid that is the unintended consequence of following an expurgated version of the Bible as heard every Sunday in Episcopal parishes that follow the Revised Common Lectionary.