There are many interpretations and many ways of punctuating the words “unto jealous envy” or “with jealousy.” We may not tarry over them. Probably the idea is that the Holy Spirit covets our souls. He does not wish the devil to have us. Usually this word for jealous envy has a bad sense, but the context here makes it clear. God is a jealous God. He can brook no rival in our hearts. God wishes the whole of our heart’s love, not just a part. He claims the rights of a loving husband to all our heart’s devotion. In our hours of doubt and weakness “the Spirit himself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered” (Rom. 8:26). We may thank God that he is a jealous God for his people Israel. He broods over his children with a mother’s love, longing for their growth and development. “But he giveth more grace” (literally, “greater grace”), “yet he gives grace more and more” (Moffatt). The words “giveth grace” come from the quotation following (Prov. 3:34). The effect of this jealous affection on God’s part is not to abandon us but to heap more and richer favors upon us. God demands of us wholehearted surrender and service, but he pours out the wealth of his love upon us. “God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble.” This Septuagint quotation (see also 1 Peter 5:5) is a free translation of the idea in the Hebrew text. It is the striking figure of God standing in the way, across the path of the proud man who carries his head so high above others. He will in due time be brought low. Pride goes before a fall, for God is to be met along that road (cf. Acts 18:6; Rom. 13:2). The man of the world feels no need of God and feels secure and serene. But he reckons without his Host. God shows favor to the humble (cf. the contrast in 1:10). The proud men think themselves the monopolists (Hort) of divine favor, but they find out sooner or later that they are passed by in favor of the man with lowliness of spirit and nobility of life, who makes God, not the world, the Lord of his life. This man God honors with far more grace than the world can offer. He will have trouble (“with persecutions”), no doubt, “but he shall receive a hundredfold now in this time,” while “in the world to come eternal life” (Mark 10:29 f.). The prince in God’s kingdom and at his court is not the man who wears the trappings of earthly rank and station but the one who caught the spirit of Jesus and sought to do good to all as he found opportunity. Plummer wonders if James had not heard his mother recite the Magnificat. Certainly he here echoes the same beautiful spirit. Choice Between God and the Devil (4:7-8a)