Charles Ellicott Commentary James 1:6

"But let him ask in faith, nothing doubting: for he that doubteth is like the surge of the sea driven by the wind and tossed." — James 1:6 (ASV)

But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering.—Surely this verse alone would redeem the Apostle from the charge of slighting the claims of faith. It is here put in the very forefront of necessity; without it all prayer is useless. And mark the addition—

Nothing wavering.—Or, doubting nothing: reechoing the words of our Saviour to the wondering disciples, as they gazed at the withered fig-tree on the road to Bethany (Matthew 21:21). This “doubting” is the halting between belief and unbelief, with an inclination towards the latter.

But someone may ask, from where and how is an unhesitating faith to be gained? The reply to this will solve all similar questions: faith, in its first sense, is the direct gift of God; but it must be tended and used with love and zeal, or its precious faculties will soon be gone. In the hour of some besetting thought of unbelief, the shield of faith will quench all the fiery darts of the wicked (Ephesians 6:16), but that shield must be lifted up, as it were, in an act of faith.

“There is no God—at least, to care for me,” may be the hopeless cry, responsive to a cruel wound of the enemy. Let the battle-hymn of the Christian make quick answer, “I believe in God;” and often, with that very effort, the assault will cease for a while.

Further, let us take comfort in the thought that intellectual is not moral doubt: the unorthodox are not as the adulterous. Nevertheless, intellectual doubt may spring from an evil habit of carping criticism and self-opinion, for the foundation of which, insofar as a man himself has been either the wilful or the careless cause, he must bear the curse of its results.

For he that wavereth (or, doubteth) is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.—Doubteth is preferable to “wavereth”; there is no play on the Greek words, as in the English text—“wavereth” and “wave.”

Like storm-beaten sailors, the doubtful are carried up to heaven and down again to the deep; their soul melts away because of the trouble (Psalms 107:26). And who can describe the terror, even of the faithful, in those hours of darkness when the face of the Lord is hidden; when, as with the disciples of old, the ship is in the midst of the sea, tossed with the bitter waves.

Nevertheless, the raging wind will soon clear the heavens from clouds, and by the radiance of the peaceful moon we too may behold our Helper near—the Lord Jesus walking on the sea—and if He comes into the ship, the storm must cease.