September 23rd, 2025
This week, I want to share with you some thoughts on doublemindedness and the mandate we have to be completely devoted to God. Now, this isn’t a word we commonly use today, but the Bible has a few things to say about doublemindedness. In the Old Testament, David wrote,
“I hate the double-minded, but I love your law” (Psalm 119:113).
This idea of doublemindedness is not referring to indecisiveness about trivial things, but a consistent failure to completely follow God. It’s about a lack of devotion. See, man-made religion always lacks consecration. The fundamental call to the Israelite people was the call for them to be separate, completely devoted to God. They were to be different from every other people group in the world, marked by circumcision, the Sabbath, and all the laws that God laid down, meant to lead them to intimacy with Him. Their consecration was meant to be a light to all the nations demonstrating God’s goodness and faithfulness. Deuteronomy 6:13 says,
“Fear the Lord your God, serve Him only and take your oaths in His name.”
Jesus echoed this saying,
‘It is written, “You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve”’ (Luke 4:8).
The Israelites failed in this from the moment they created the golden calves to worship in the wilderness (Exodus 32). Generation after generation, they failed, as a people, to be completely devoted. Hundreds of years later, Elijah was dealing with the same divided, idolatrous spirit. He said,
“How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the LORD is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him” (1 Kings 18:21)
Hosea addressed it as well saying,
“Their heart is divided; now shall they be found faulty: he shall break down their altars, he shall spoil their images” (Hosea 10:2).
In the New Testament, James is the only one who used the word doubleminded. James 4:4-8 says,
“You adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever chooses to be a friend of the world renders himself an enemy of God. Or do you think the Scripture says without reason that the Spirit He caused to dwell in us yearns with envy? But He gives us more grace. This is why it says: “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”
I encourage you to read that again. He is addressing an idolatrous spirit, which doesn’t necessarily mean they didn’t serve God, but they were serving Him and loving the world. You cannot love Him with your whole heart and still love the world and the things of it. You can’t serve Him and serve yourself. James urges his doubleminded readers to purify their hearts. See, it’s not an issue of changing your mind, but consecrating your heart. Earlier in the book of James, he connects doubt and doublemindedness, because doubt contaminates our hearts from a pure love and faith in God. The Israelites created the golden calves when Moses was delayed on the mountain, and they began to doubt God’s faithfulness in the wilderness.
For hundreds of years, they cycled between devotion to God and idolatrous failures. Today, it doesn’t look the way it looked then, but idolatry still exists. It may look like going to church on Sunday and sinning throughout the week, using God’s grace as an excuse. It may look like selfish ambition and motivation—loving yourself and your dreams more than Him. Our love for God must be purified in His fire until it consumes every passion of our hearts. It’s only there that we will have freedom. After millennia of watching them try and fail, the Father sent His Son to reconcile His people to Himself, to make them one with Him as He’d always intended. John 3:17 says,
“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
The word for saved in that verse is all-inclusive. It speaks of healing, deliverance, rescue, and salvation, and also means to “make whole.” In Jesus, what is fractured, divided, and polluted is cleansed, healed, and made new. As New Covenant believers, our call is as serious as it was to the Israelites. We are to love and serve Him only, but now we get to live washed in the blood of Jesus and empowered by the Spirit of God Himself. However, we must still take care to guard our hearts. Paul exhorted the Corinthian church saying,
“Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak to reasonable people; judge for yourselves what I say. Is not the cup of blessing that we bless a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the one loaf” (1 Corinthians 10:14-17).
There is only one gospel. There is only one way to the Father and it’s through the blood of Jesus Christ and repentance from all sin. Deliberate sin nullifies the power of His sacrifice in your life. Hebrews 10:26 says,
“For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins…”
To conclude this week, we encourage you to draw near as His Word says. When you draw near to Him, He will draw near to you. As you consecrate your life to Him, refusing to love the world and the things of it, His grace and the power of His Holy Spirit will empower you to live according to the Word. He will empower you to live free—full of the joy, peace, and hope that Jesus died to give you. He is worth everything, and it’s truly not a sacrifice on our part. Jesus gave everything and when we give Him our lives, however imperfect they are, we get everything He has. Our devotion to Him is a choice to lay down every other love and it is worth it. Love Him. Serve Him only. Choose to no longer limp between Him and the world. In Him, there is freedom like you’ve never known! He’s worth all of our trust, our faith, our devotion, our passion and our time. He is worth it.
“I hate the double-minded, but I love your law” (Psalm 119:113).
This idea of doublemindedness is not referring to indecisiveness about trivial things, but a consistent failure to completely follow God. It’s about a lack of devotion. See, man-made religion always lacks consecration. The fundamental call to the Israelite people was the call for them to be separate, completely devoted to God. They were to be different from every other people group in the world, marked by circumcision, the Sabbath, and all the laws that God laid down, meant to lead them to intimacy with Him. Their consecration was meant to be a light to all the nations demonstrating God’s goodness and faithfulness. Deuteronomy 6:13 says,
“Fear the Lord your God, serve Him only and take your oaths in His name.”
Jesus echoed this saying,
‘It is written, “You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve”’ (Luke 4:8).
The Israelites failed in this from the moment they created the golden calves to worship in the wilderness (Exodus 32). Generation after generation, they failed, as a people, to be completely devoted. Hundreds of years later, Elijah was dealing with the same divided, idolatrous spirit. He said,
“How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the LORD is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him” (1 Kings 18:21)
Hosea addressed it as well saying,
“Their heart is divided; now shall they be found faulty: he shall break down their altars, he shall spoil their images” (Hosea 10:2).
In the New Testament, James is the only one who used the word doubleminded. James 4:4-8 says,
“You adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever chooses to be a friend of the world renders himself an enemy of God. Or do you think the Scripture says without reason that the Spirit He caused to dwell in us yearns with envy? But He gives us more grace. This is why it says: “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”
I encourage you to read that again. He is addressing an idolatrous spirit, which doesn’t necessarily mean they didn’t serve God, but they were serving Him and loving the world. You cannot love Him with your whole heart and still love the world and the things of it. You can’t serve Him and serve yourself. James urges his doubleminded readers to purify their hearts. See, it’s not an issue of changing your mind, but consecrating your heart. Earlier in the book of James, he connects doubt and doublemindedness, because doubt contaminates our hearts from a pure love and faith in God. The Israelites created the golden calves when Moses was delayed on the mountain, and they began to doubt God’s faithfulness in the wilderness.
For hundreds of years, they cycled between devotion to God and idolatrous failures. Today, it doesn’t look the way it looked then, but idolatry still exists. It may look like going to church on Sunday and sinning throughout the week, using God’s grace as an excuse. It may look like selfish ambition and motivation—loving yourself and your dreams more than Him. Our love for God must be purified in His fire until it consumes every passion of our hearts. It’s only there that we will have freedom. After millennia of watching them try and fail, the Father sent His Son to reconcile His people to Himself, to make them one with Him as He’d always intended. John 3:17 says,
“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
The word for saved in that verse is all-inclusive. It speaks of healing, deliverance, rescue, and salvation, and also means to “make whole.” In Jesus, what is fractured, divided, and polluted is cleansed, healed, and made new. As New Covenant believers, our call is as serious as it was to the Israelites. We are to love and serve Him only, but now we get to live washed in the blood of Jesus and empowered by the Spirit of God Himself. However, we must still take care to guard our hearts. Paul exhorted the Corinthian church saying,
“Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak to reasonable people; judge for yourselves what I say. Is not the cup of blessing that we bless a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the one loaf” (1 Corinthians 10:14-17).
There is only one gospel. There is only one way to the Father and it’s through the blood of Jesus Christ and repentance from all sin. Deliberate sin nullifies the power of His sacrifice in your life. Hebrews 10:26 says,
“For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins…”
To conclude this week, we encourage you to draw near as His Word says. When you draw near to Him, He will draw near to you. As you consecrate your life to Him, refusing to love the world and the things of it, His grace and the power of His Holy Spirit will empower you to live according to the Word. He will empower you to live free—full of the joy, peace, and hope that Jesus died to give you. He is worth everything, and it’s truly not a sacrifice on our part. Jesus gave everything and when we give Him our lives, however imperfect they are, we get everything He has. Our devotion to Him is a choice to lay down every other love and it is worth it. Love Him. Serve Him only. Choose to no longer limp between Him and the world. In Him, there is freedom like you’ve never known! He’s worth all of our trust, our faith, our devotion, our passion and our time. He is worth it.
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