James 4:1-3

What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? 2 You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. 3 When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.- James 4:1-3

Dear Jesus,

During this time of "social distancing" I find the "social nearing" with family to be challenging.   When is was easier to walk or drive away I could avoid facing certain issues with them.  But now we're stuck at home.  It's like I'm forced to deal with them in order to survive.  Pettiness has reared it's ugly head too.  Here in this passage your brother cleared the air of all confusion.  The reasons I would get into a spat with anyone center around my desires and ill placed feelings within me.  They make me competitive for attention, for advantage, for relaxation and for being right.  I'm tempted to think that if it is to be it is all up to me.  That's when I push for them to change or defend myself without repentance. James says it plainly, "You do not have because you do not ask God."  Oh Lord, teach me to pray to you about what I am otherwise prone to complain about to my family.  I will put your Word to the test.  I will pray to you for what I think needs to change and I will make sure I practice unconditional love while I wait for you to change my loved one and me.  I will wrestle with you (and become an Israel) instead of wrestle with them.  Then when the fruits of your Holy Spirit take over and I see the changes in both of us, I will grow in faith instead of sit and sulk in frustration.  Come and be my God and change what's in us that makes us struggle to be happy, because you promise to answer prayers more than you promise to bless human manipulation and arguing. 

AMEN

Pastor Don Patterson 

Prayer to God and arguing with people will not coexist long in a believers heart.