Draw near to God and he will draw near to you

St. James' Universal Letter 4:7-17; 5:1-9

BRETHREN, submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will
flee from you. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Cleanse
your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you men of double
mind. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to
mourning and your joy to dejection. Humble yourselves before the Lord and
he will exalt you. Do not speak evil against one another, brethren.
He that speaks evil against a brother or judges his brother, speaks
evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you
are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is one lawgiver and
judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you that you
judge your neighbor? Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will
go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and
get gain"; whereas you do not know about tomorrow. What is your life?
For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.
Instead you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we shall live and we shall
do this or that." As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such
boasting is evil. Whoever knows what is right to do and fails to do it,
for him it is sin. Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries
that are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments
are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have rusted, and their rust will
be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have
laid up treasure for the last days. Behold the wages of the laborers
who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the
cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You
have lived on the earth in luxury and in pleasure; you have fattened
your hearts in a day of slaughter. You have condemned, you have killed
the righteous man; he does not resist you. Be patient, therefore,
brethren, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer waits for the
precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it until it receives the
early and the late rain. You also be patient. Establish your hearts,
for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Do not grumble, brethren,
against one another, that you may not be judged; behold, the Judge is
standing at the doors.