[podcast]http://www.revkwon.com/podcast/discriminating.mp3[/podcast] Last week I ended with the statement: we need to look after the orphans and widows in our lives by loving them at their worst, just how Jesus loves you and me. The idea was that the evidence of our spiritual wholeness will then be apparent to the world at large and we would really be markers as followers of Jesus Christ. Today I want to share with all of you what happens when the integrity of that spiritual wholeness comes into question because of favoritism or discrimination. Let me explain what I mean by those two words because Im going to use them interchangeably and hopefully by the end of the sermon, all of you in this room and those listening online will understand that both words are really one in the same. Both words describe partiality. One is just the positive side of describing partiality; the other is just the destructive/negative side. Let me give you an example: I like corn and dislike cauliflower because it tastes sweeter in my mouth when I eat the kernels. Thats showing favoritism. Or I can be like, corn is better than cauliflower thats discrimination. Maybe that was too abstract for you. Sure, in the secular world, the only distinction between the two sentences was that I added a because and gave merit to my discrimination of cauliflower, but in the eyes of God, merit does not abscond you from the obligation you have to either. Obviously, Im not talking about corn and cauliflower anymore. With that being said, Im not even going to entertain the idea that all of us are not partial. In fact, Im not going to say that it is even possible for us to live in such a way that we do not show favoritism and/or discriminate against others. I know some of us like to believe we are such types of people, but were not. The reason Im pressing upon this right this moment, is not to burst your bubbles and cut down your self-esteem. Im telling you this because our acts of favoritism or discrimination directly correlates with what we believe and how we believe our beliefs affect our lives. Lets open our Bibles to James 2 and were going to look at the first 13 verses today.
1My brothers,?show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ,?the Lord of glory.?2?For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in,?3?and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, You sit here in a good place, while you say to the poor man, You stand over there, or, Sit down at my feet,?4?have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become?judges with evil thoughts??5?Listen, my beloved brothers,?has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be?rich in faith and heirs of?the kingdom,?which he has promised to those who love him??6?But you?have dishonored the poor man. Are not the rich the ones who oppress you, and the ones who?drag you?into court??7?Are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable?name by which you were called? 8?If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture,?You shall love your neighbor as yourself, you are doing well.?9?But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors.?10?For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point?has become accountable for all of it.?11?For he who said,?Do not commit adultery, also said,?Do not murder. If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.?12?So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty.?13?For?judgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment. (James 2:1-13 ESV)
I want to break this message into two parts. The first part is the argument that favoritism or discrimination, I dont care what you call it, contradicts faith. The second part of the sermon will explore what James calls the royal law and the content, status, and results of the royal law. Like Ive been saying the last few weeks, if youre not keeping notes, you need to start doing so right now. The reason were in the book of James is because I want you to see what happens to peoples lives when they put faith and action together, the results are mindboggling and I want all of us in the room to experience it to the fullest in 2016. 2016 will be a sweet 16 for all of us. I know you like that. Lets look at the first seven verses now. I want you to see what James says right upfront in verse 1. Show no partiality as you hold the faith Faith is what we have. I want you to write that down. The reason I tell you to write it down is because faith doesnt require anything except belief. You believe and so you cannot play favorites nor can you discriminate because what you believe is that God is not showing partiality or discrimination due to the fact that you believe He will not. Faith is what we have. We have nothing else. Thats what we believe. In chapter 1, verse 22, James says do what the word says. Jesus is the word and we do what the word of God says because Jesus is the Christ, the Lord of glory. I want to break that down for you because we have 1 verse and its totally loaded with meaning. Heres what being pitted against in this one sentence alone: partiality has no place because we believe our Christ does not show partiality by accepting us and He is the Lord of glory. Let me share with you why Im so geeked out about this statement, it is because when James says it, he is saying that there is nothing more valuable than Christ himself, and that value, that most valuable thing was given up because we would believe that God gave up that which is most valuable for somebody whom God had no partiality towards. After all, we were all condemned to death because of our forefathers, for sins we never committed. It was our lot to be created and made of dust. Lets look at verse 2-7 really quickly because James is just giving us a good example of how silly it would be for us to have favorites and be discriminatory. If you want to see something cool, and I suggest you do this at home, but I want you to look of Matthew 7:1-6, and read James 2:1-7, if you read them side by side, you will see that James is just ripping off Jesus sermon. Its incredible. Let me deconstruct what James is saying, it is that we should stop being so foolish as to believe that showing favoritism and or discriminating against a certain type of people will do anything other than prove how wicked we really are and how much we dont deserve Gods love, mercy, and grace but got it anyways. You see what James says is that we only have faith to stand on, so we need to live by it. The reason we live by what we believe about who Jesus is and what He did for you and me is because when we believe it, we are save, but moreover, we didnt deserve it but God gave it to us anyways. Therefore, if we act like morons by doing something like showing partiality when God didnt, then we are tearing down everything that Jesus lived, died, and resurrected for. After all, look at what James says in verse 5. We are brothers, which is inclusive of sisters. He uses verse 5 to serve a reminder to all people who have heard Jesus sermon on the mount, how far people who believe have cometo become equals in the kingdom of heaven. Everybody gets the same thingGods love. It doesnt matter where you come from or what you did, everybody gets God if they believe in Him to rescue them and set them down in love. Favoritism and discrimination, in anyway, contradicts faith. What does that mean for us, as a church? It means we dont care about economics, we dont care about social status, we dont care who you are or where youre from, what you did, or how you live. Obviously if youre a terrorist or wanted for a crime, I will turn you in, so that doesnt apply, but at the end of the day, if you come here, you will get the same word, you will get the same time, the same prayers, and blessings so that you can live the life God imagined you to live before you were created because we were created as a family in Jesus name and we will not discriminate against you and in fact we will invest in you because thats what family does. That is what faith is. That is what Jesus did for us. The reason why were doing that is because of what James calls the royal law. I want us to pick up the passage in verse 8. The reason we dont discriminate or show favoritism toward anybody and just love on everybody, all the time, any time, is because of verse 8the royal law. You and I know the royal law as the golden rule or the greatest commandment. You are all familiar with this. The lawyer asked Jesus, whats the greatest rule in the Bible? Jesus answered, the lawyer, love the lord your God with all your heart, mind and soul, and love your neighbor as yourself. When Jesus said that, he was really saying, you need to love other people exactly how you would love yourself or want yourself loved. But if you dont love other people the way you want to be loved, then youre not really doing what God commanded you to do. Look at what he says in verses 9-13. Hes just reiterating the point that Jesus originally made about the greatest law. The content of the royal law as James sees it requires an openness to friendship with any neighbor, regardless of that neighbors wealth, position, status, influence, race, appearance, attractiveness, dress, abilities or personality. Every Christian operates in some social groupa school, a neighborhood, a workplace. And most social groups have their social misfitsthe ones who are looked down upon, ostracized or neglected. It means if you really believe in what Jesus did for us, then you reach out to those misfits. Thats right the people in your periphery. And truth be told, we suck at that so much. Its why we need to care for the orphan (people with no guides) and widows (people with no support). Whatever these people in the periphery are concerned about, we need to concern ourselves with it. If were not living into this reality, then weve failed. Weve sinned, were actively engaged in exactly what Jesus came to this earth to undo. I want you to see this. Do you know why in 2016 racism is still a big issue? Its because us so called Christians are not being Christ like and are in fact discriminating or straight out showing partiality so diabolically. Its like we forgot that we too were on the wrong side of that discrimination when we first believed in Jesus as our savior. I dont want to make this a social justice sermon, because this is not what it is, but I want to be clear that the standard we have is to love everybody in our lives with the same degree and effort that Jesus loved us. I know thats downright impossible, but this is the imperative that we are receiving here because we are all brothers and sisters, set together as a single family because God was willing to love us as much as He loved Himself in His Son Jesus Christ. The result of not being discriminating and not showing favoritism but loving people is freedom. There is an unparalleled amount of freedom that you receive when youre not worried about other peoples feelings and thinking about politics and offenses. Its straight up love them like you love yourself and you are free to forgive, free to do things that you shouldnt ever have to worry about. It means you can comment on their clothes and not be called bigoted. James concludes this passage by saying mercy triumphs over judgment. We do not earn anything with our faith. We simply believe God has mercy on us because He took up the burden of judgment upon His one and only Son, Jesus, our Christ, our savior. Favoritism contradicts what we believe about Jesus. We need to live and action our lives with this rule of love in Jesus. Lets pray.
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