Biblion Bible Commentary
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Draw Near to God
James 4:7-8
7 Be subject therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. · WEB
A run of imperatives arrives, and each of the first three carries a promise while the last names the disease the letter has been treating throughout.
The commands come in rapid sequence and the first is the foundation: submit therefore to God. The therefore points back to grace given to the humble James 4:6, so submission is the posture grace was just promised to, not a price paid for it.
Then resist the devil, and he will flee from you. The promise is unconditional and the verb is strong — not that he will retreat but that he will run. The letter, having named a source of the tongue's fire from below James 3:6, now says that source is repelled rather than negotiated with.
Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you is the same shape, and the order is worth stating carefully. The letter puts the human movement first, which does not make it the cause — verse 6 has already said grace is given — but does make it the thing being asked for.
The last two commands are physical and priestly. Cleanse the hands, purify the hearts: the outward act and the inner state, and the letter refuses to accept one without the other.
And the address on the final clause is the letter's own diagnosis, used for the second and last time: you double-minded James 1:8. The word opened the letter, describing a man whose prayer was divided, and it closes the letter's central argument here, describing people divided between God and the world. Everything between the two is a description of that split.
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