“Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from? Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you? 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. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures” (James 4:1-3).  Once again, Brother James is taking no prisoners!  Cravings at war within us; does that ring true for you?  If this was true for believers in the first century, how much more so for us in our consumer culture?  That is, ours is a culture that assigns value to what we possess over most other values.  Some of the things I want are good and important, but other things not so much.  The test question is this: can we faithfully ask the Lord to supply the things that we want the most?  Talking to Jesus about our desires is the surest way to sort through them and in the process, alleviate a lot of the conflict that we experience.  Furthermore, in speaking with him, we begin to realize that he, himself is the culmination of all our desire because he alone is able to satisfy our deepest need.  I’m going to try to chat with him more consistently.  How about you?  You know, don’t you that he will never let you down. Have a great week!