1 This letter is from James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. Greetings to the twelve tribes that are scattered.

2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you encounter various trials.

3 Know that the testing of your faith produces patience endurance.

4 Let patience have its perfect work, that you may be mature, complete, and lacking in nothing.

5 If any of you lacks wisdom let him ask of God. He gives to all generously and without reproach and it will be given to him.

6 However he must ask in faith, not doubting: for he who doubts is like a surging wave of the sea driven by the wind and tossed.

7 Do not let that man think that he will receive anything from God.

8 A double-minded man is unstable inconsistent in all his ways.

9 Let the brother of humble circumstances glory in his high position exaltation.

10 But the rich must be glad when God humbles them. This is because they will wither like wildflowers and pass away.

11 The sun rises with scorching heat and withers the grass. The flower falls off and its beauty perishes. So also the rich man will fade away in his pursuits.

12 The man who endures under trial is blessed. For when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life that God promised to those who love him.

13 Let no man say when he is tempted: "God tempts me." God cannot be tempted with evil, and he tempts enticesteststrys no one.

14 Each man is tempted when he is drawn away by his evil desire lust. He is enticed allured.

15 Then evil desires, when conceived, give birth to sin: and the sin, when it is full grown, brings forth death.

16 Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers.

17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above. It comes down from the Father of lights truth and spiritual purity, with whom there is no variation. He does not change like shifting shadows.

18 Using his own will, he gave us birth through the word of truth. This way we would be a kind of first fruits of his creatures.

19 You know this, my beloved brothers. But let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger.

20 The anger of man does not promote the righteousness of God.

21 Therefore get rid of all filthiness and wickedness. Receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save you.

22 Be doers of the word, and not hearers only, who deceive themselves.

23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man looking at his natural face in a mirror.

24 He sees himself, and goes away, and immediately forgets what manner of man he was.

25 But he who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and so continues, being not a hearer who forgets but a doer who works, this man will be blessed in what he does.

26 If any man thinks he is religious, while he does not control his tongue but deceives his heart, this man's religion is vain worthlessuseless.

27 Pure and undefiled religion before our God and Father is this: to care for the fatherless persons and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself without spot from the world.