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You would likely be hard-pressed to find someone who hasn’t heard of “the blame game.”  The ‘game’ is ‘played’ in a variety of contexts but is perhaps most prevalent when two people get into a fight (quarrel, tiff, spat, et c.). Whether physical or verbal (“verbicuffs” as the new Pastor Danny-ism says), phrases like “he started it” or “if you hadn’t fill in the blank” are often quick to fly from both sides of the argument.

James, however, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, swats that mentality right out of the air!

“What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?” (James 4:1). While we can be tempted to quickly default to the blame game when tensions run hot, James places the onus squarely back on his readers to consider their own fleshly desires that they have given too much leash. James has also already made reference to this internal desire in 1:14 as the primary source for both sin and temptation in us.

Translation: you and I have no legitimate right to the blame game!

If we do an honest assessment of ourselves, what blame game tendencies do we need to identify and repent from? Are you one who makes the James 1:13 mistake saying, ‘I am being tempted by God’?  Do you give into the temptation I find myself caving to, in blaming the other person I’m arguing with?  Are you tempted to give the devil too much credit and make him the scapegoat rather than seeing your sin and its source for what they truly are?  The blame game is a worldly game, if we are a player in the game, then we are a friend of the world and an enemy of God.

By God’s grace and by the power of His Spirit, we can actually assess our passions, identify them for what they truly are, and implement practical steps of repentance to grow further up and away from the blame game. Would it be so with us and would we hold each other up in prayer and encouragement to win this battle against the flesh.