James: Partiality Inverts the Gospel (2:1-13)

Hello, I'm Pastor Creighton, and thank you for tuning in to New Sun Churches Podcast.

We're a gospel centered church in Port Perry, Ontario, proclaiming the true and life-giving word of Jesus as we love and serve our neighbors.

May God bless you today through his life-giving word.

The second reading is from the book of James, chapter 2, verses 1 through 13.

James 2:1–13

My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.

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, 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.

Have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?

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?

But you have dishonored the poor men.

Are not the rich the ones who oppress you and the ones who drag you into court?

Are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable name by which you were called?

If you really fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, you shall love your neighbor as yourself, you are doing well.

But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors.

For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it.

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.

So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty.

For judgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy.

Mercy triumphs over judgment.

The word of the Lord.

Brothers and sisters, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.

Let's pray.

Gracious Lord Jesus, you call us to yourself by your love and mercy.

Fill us with your love such that we cannot but turn to our neighbors and overflow with that love that you have so generously showed us through the cross, through the resurrection.

Fill us with hope and speak to us by your word.

We give you thanks to your servant James, who writes this word.

Father, we pray that it would take root in our hearts.

Give us instruction and give us hope and give us assurance.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

Please be seated.

Well, sometimes you're wrestling through a passage.

Well, I'm, I guess I'm wrestling through a passage, like James chapter 2, and then something happens during the midweek that just starts to make it make sense.

James 2 · chapter mention

And this is what happened that started to make it make sense.

If you consider this a plug for the Wednesday night Bible study, it kind of is.

We're looking at John 13 on Wednesday.

John 13 is Jesus speaking to his disciples on the night of his betrayal on the night before the cross, and he gives his disciples a very specific instruction.

They're to love one another.

And he says, John 13, 35, by this, by this, everyone will know that you are my disciples.

If you attend church every Sunday.

If you have a degree in theology.

Fill in the blank, right?

That's not what he says.

How are we meant to be known as Jesus' disciples if you love me?

Love one another, pardon me.

Love Jesus, love one another.

You're right.

Failure to love one another is a failure to be Jesus' disciple.

Failure to love one another on a corporate level is a failure to be the church, his body, his bride that he has given himself to completely in love.

Love is the beating heart of our Christian life.

Without that, what do we have?

James has taken that to heart.

James knows that it takes wisdom.

Pardon me, James is calling us to put God's wisdom into action, not just to be a hearer of the word, but a doer of the word only.

And he knows that performing the word of God looks like love for one another.

And anything that could compromise that love compromises our witness to the gospel.

It compromises our life as the church.

And James recognizes something that maybe we, well, let me speak for myself, wouldn't be the first thing that comes to mind when I think about what could compromise, what could completely undo our life as a church.

James says, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.

You know, as you hold to your Christian faith, as you cling to the gospel, allow no room for partiality, for favoritism, for favoring one group or one person over another because of their status, because of their wealth, because of their influence, because of their worldly standing.

Show no partiality is like the inverse of loving one another.

It's like the inverse of the gospel.

Here's what one Bible commentator writes.

He writes of partiality, it is treating people in different ways according to their outward appearance or their worldly advantages.

And he wants us to understand the significance of that.

He says to do so is not simply to conform to a desired religious pattern of behavior, it is to deny our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

The stakes are high, right?

James is not just saying this partiality results in a sociological problem in the church, such that relationships become a little stickier and more difficult.

He's saying this is an existential threat to the church.

If we show partiality, we invert the gospel.

We flip it upside down and wrong side up.

Partiality inverts the gospel.

That's what James wants us to understand.

Partiality makes Christians judgmental, hypocritical, and guilty.

Judgmental, hypocritical, and guilty.

Partiality inverts the gospel, but I want us to see good news here.

I think James wants us to see good news here.

Because there is good news to be found, and that's this.

The gospel, the good news of Jesus and his love and mercy can overcome our partiality.

The gospel can assure and empower us to love others as we ourselves have been loved by Jesus.

Isn't that the gospel?

Isn't that the gospel we want to stand firmly on?

Isn't that the gospel that we want to carry into our neighborhood and into our community?

We can go deeper into the gospel today, and that's what James wants for us.

Let's look at the inverse of the gospel.

Partiality inverts the gospel.

Turn with me, if you will, to James chapter 2.

James 2 · chapter mention

And we're going to look at verses 1 to 13, our reading today.

Partiality inverts the gospel in at least three ways.

It makes Christians judgmental, hypocritical, and guilty.

Partiality makes Christians judgmental.

Let's look at verse 2.

The imperative, of course, is show no partiality.

Well, why would we show no partiality?

James has says this.

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, and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, Well, you sit here in a good place, while you say to the poor man, you stand over there or sit down at my feet, have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?

So isn't that a real scenario?

Like sometimes you read the Bible and you're a little like, yeah, that context just doesn't make sense to me.

A little bit you can see this playing out in church today, presumably, if we're not careful, right?

I mean, there's plenty of examples that come to mind, and some of the worst examples maybe might be certain churches that come to mind that make a point of promoting celebrities or politicians or folks with influences to something like a VIP status, or giving them even special seats or something like that.

And we've got to be so careful, because that's that's more again than just a sociological threat, it's an existential threat to the gospel.

We've got to look for evidence of how the church loves one another.

But I think before we point the finger and say, yeah, the problem's over there, we gotta be mindful, can it happen here too?

And there is no church, I'm convinced, including our own, that is immune from making distinctions and showing partiality.

Maybe that's even in subtle ways.

Maybe that's leadership that is hesitant to show discipline or maybe give special attention to folks they know are particularly wealthy or big donors.

Maybe that's partiality shown to one ministry that gets favored over another as if we're not all sharing one common goal of ministering the gospel.

It's a real scenario for the church, isn't it?

Favoring one over the other.

And James is trying to make a point here.

He says distinctions like this make us judges with evil thoughts.

They leave us judgmental.

And isn't that one of the principal objections to Christianity?

Christians can be so judgmental.

And here's what James is saying.

When we make distinctions of this sort, when we take actions that make distinctions, or even if our motives are evil thoughts, he says what we're doing here is we're evaluating others, not on the basis of the gospel, but on worldly values.

We're evaluating others on the basis of what they can do for me rather than what God has done for us.

Does that make sense?

What do you have that can be useful or beneficial to me?

Well, if you've got something that I think will be beneficial to me, come and have a good seat.

If not, maybe sit at the back.

Isn't that human nature?

Isn't that fallen human nature?

Something like that?

So easy to slip into that mode of thinking.

So easy to let that take deep root.

You know, earlier this week I was listening to uh an interview uh by from John Lennox.

John Lennox was being interviewed.

John Lennox was one of the authors that Rachel recommended we read uh last Sunday, and I love John Lennox, and he's a mathematician from Oxford and just an incredible Christian apologist.

And he's being interviewed about his own life story and his journey of the faith, and he's talking about his uh early years being raised as a young Christian boy in Ireland, Northern Ireland, and he was raised in the midst of the troubles.

If you don't know the troubles, you can talk to Brad after the service and he'll tell you what the troubles were like.

Here you had society divided right down the lines of Catholic and Protestant, both violently opposing one another, acting violently towards one another in the streets.

He says, in the midst of this, his dad, a committed Christian, ran a like a kind of a corner store type of thing.

And his dad made a point of employing both Protestants and Catholics at the store, whoever it is needed a job.

And he was bombed for it.

And his brother was nearly killed.

And so John Lennox says, I asked my dad one time, he says, Dad, why do you do this?

It's far too risky.

And he says, My dad said to me, son, Scripture teaches us that every man and woman, irrespective of worldview, is made in the image of God, and I intend to treat them like that.

For John Lennox, that left us such an impression of the power of the gospel.

In fact, Lennox says, now that made a deep impression on me.

He says, this evaluation of people.

Not on the basis of their worldly value, their status, their allegiance, their political loyalties, rather evaluating on the basis of the gospel, which is to say you are created in God's image.

And God loves you, and he has died for you, and he calls you to himself in Christ.

That is a completely different way of valuing others, isn't it?

That's a completely different worldview.

And so James wants us to understand partiality is more than just a sociological threat, more than just dividing up or hierarchicalizing the church or something like that.

He says this is an existential threat.

We have to refuse to evaluate one another or others on the basis of worldly status, whether that's wealth or influence or position or standing, instead, to see each other through the eyes of the gospel, created in God's image.

What greater, what greater category, what greater evaluation could there be?

And to see one another as those whom Christ is calling to Himself.

Partiality makes Christians judgmental.

But the gospel, the fact that God has given himself to us in love, makes us gracious, because there is no one to whom God does not extend his grace.

Partiality makes Christians judgmental, partiality makes Christians hypocritical, James wants us to understand.

Verse 5, he says, Listen, my beloved brothers and sisters, has not God chosen those who are poor in this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which he has promised to those who love him?

But you've dishonored the poor man.

Are not the rich the ones who oppress you?

Are they not the ones who drag you into court?

Are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable name by which you were called?

James wants us to understand that partiality ends up in two different kinds of hypocrisy: a vertical kind of hypocrisy and a horizontal kind of hypocrisy.

It's a hypocrisy that's vertical.

It's a hypocrisy before God.

This is not to say that James is in some way anti-wealth, or let's say if you got to a certain tax bracket, you're disqualified from the kingdom or something like that.

James isn't trying to make that kind of a statement.

But James is cautioning us against the love of money, which is the root of all evil, right?

And he's seeing this partiality towards the wealthy play itself out in this congregation.

We can bear in mind that some of the great heroes of the faith, whether it's Abraham or Esther or Job, all had considerable positions of wealth and status, but God isn't interested in our worldly status for his gain.

He is interested in calling those that he loves to himself.

And it's interesting, I think James is trying to say in a in a general way, how it often is the poor who are far closer to the kingdom because they don't live with the illusion of their own self-sufficiency, can't money and wealth be an illusion to us?

Make us feel like I've got everything I need.

And you know, God can handle the rest, but really I think I got this.

Whether consciously or not, I think wealth can be a temptation to rely on that illusion of security and self-sufficiency.

But those who are poor, whether that's materially poor or whether those uh are poor, those who are poor in spirit, like Matthew chapter 5 says, the kingdom of heaven belongs to such.

Matthew 5 · chapter mention

Why?

Because there's far less of an illusion that we're self-sufficient, and we're far more likely to acknowledge the reality that only God can provide our daily bread.

Only God can provide the things that we need.

So as we proclaim a gospel where God sovereignly chooses those who are needy to himself, we deny it with partiality.

As we proclaim salvation to the needy, we end up dishonoring those that God calls to himself.

We are hypocritical before God.

But we also end up being hypocritical before others.

Are not the rich the ones who oppress you?

James asks.

Aren't they the ones who drag you into the court?

Aren't they the ones who blaspheme the honorable name Jesus by which you have been called?

Are not the rich the ones giving you such a hard time, James says?

It's almost as though James can is hearing these conversations happening at coffee time after service about all of the difficult issues that this congregation is dealing with.

I'm being sued by so-and-so, I'm being exploited by so-and-so, and yet the second they show up at church the next Sunday, they go, right this way, sir.

Why?

Because they stand to gain a material benefit, don't they?

I mean, they're hoping that whatever it is that this rich person might have might trickle down to themselves.

We end up denying the gospel not just before God, but before others through partiality.

We can proclaim the salvation of the soul while prioritizing material wealth.

And isn't that the essence of something like the prosperity gospel?

One of my favorite uh stories from church history is the story of St.

Lawrence, and there's a lot of episodes in St.

Lawrence's life that I love, but one that I particularly love is a story about uh so St.

Lawrence lived in the early centuries of the church and he ministered in Rome.

And he lived and ministered in a time where uh the Roman authorities were quite hostile to the church, and opposition and political pressure and all these sorts of things were quite common.

The thing that the Roman authorities knew is that the church took up a collection.

They didn't really care what that collection was for, you know, it was giving to the poor, but they just knew that the church was collecting lots of money.

So presumably the church has lots of money sitting around somewhere.

So corrupt Roman officials go to Lawrence and they say, Lawrence, we're coming by the church tomorrow, and we expect you to hand over the treasures of the church.

And so the next day, when they show up at the appointed hour, Lawrence is there to meet them.

And he ushers them into the church and he opens up the door and he says, Behold, the treasures of the church.

Now, the first time I'm hearing the story, I know some of you know this story, but the first time I'm hearing this story, I'm going, boy, how much money was that?

But here's what the Roman officials see as the church doors open.

They see the city's collection of the destitute, of the poor, of the needy, lining the walls, lying down in the pews, whatever it is.

They see the neediest folks in their community, and Lawrence says, Behold the treasures of the church.

Now I think St.

Lawrence is doing something more than just being subversive or uncooperative in that moment.

I think he's making a sincerely held theological point.

He knows what God truly treasures.

He treasures the souls that he calls to himself.

The poor in spirit.

Theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

And St.

Lawrence is willing to lay down his life on that principle.

And I gotta say, I was convicted when I heard that story for the first time, because you know the question I was asking, right?

I wonder how much money that was.

That probably says something about where my priorities are at.

See, the invitation here, against partiality, which invites hypocrisy, prioritizing material wealth when we're called to proclaim the salvation of souls, the invitation here is to practice something like sincerity.

Not saying one thing and doing another, not saying this is what's important to the life of church, but really acting like this is important.

Sincerity is like integrity.

It brings these things together.

What we say and what we do agree with one another.

And what we say and what we do before God and what we say and do before others agree with one another.

It's sincerity.

St.

Lawrence had sincerity.

He had integrity.

And the invitation here is to practice a sincere priority of the gospel.

And that might be a weird thing to hear because in our age of authenticity, sincerity generally means something like, you know, I'm being true to myself, I'm being true to my feelings.

Now, I'm not trying to say there's something wrong with your feelings, something wrong with being yourself, but the thing we know about ourselves is so often we are formed by our environment and by our habits.

And the gospel invites us into an environment of the church that is formed by the gospel such that more and more we desire, sincerely desire, to be those who don't just stand to gain from others, but those who gen who genuinely want to give of our means for the sake of others.

So sincerity be a thing that's practiced.

And it's practiced both ways.

And we can practice sincerity when we prioritize the gospel such that, like St.

Lawrence, we train ourselves to treasure the poor in spirit and to treasure the gospel even over our material substance.

We can practice that kind of sincerity.

See, partiality makes Christians hypocritical.

We say this is important to us, but really we act like we know what's really important to us.

But the gospel, the gospel makes us sincere.

It gives us integrity.

The gospel makes Christians judgmental, hypocritical, but finally James wants us to understand partiality makes Christians guilty.

Verse 8 If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, you shall love your neighbor as yourself, you're doing well, James says.

But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors.

So what's James saying here?

He's saying, love fulfills God's law.

Isn't that the law that we had read at the beginning of the service?

Love the Lord your God, love your neighbor as yourself.

That's what Paul agrees in Romans 13, fulfills the law.

Every Old Testament command or every commandment we read in Scripture is just pointing us to that greater law that says, love God and love your neighbor.

Love is the beating heart of God's requirements of us.

And partiality is fundamentally a failure to love one's neighbor.

It's to elevate one over the other, which is to say, it's to reject our neighbor, even the neighbor that God calls to himself.

Partiality breaks God's royal law, his kingdom law, what it is that's meant to govern our Christian living.

And this is serious business, James wants us to understand.

It's almost as though he can hear his congregation raising an objection.

Well, what's the big deal?

It's just showing a guy to VIP seats.

What's the big deal with that, James?

James wants us to understand we don't get to pick and choose and select what commandments of God we'll submit to and which ones we don't, right?

If we commit adultery but we don't murder, what are we going to say?

I'm not guilty of adultery because I didn't murder?

That's James' point.

If we have committed the sin of partiality, we have denied love to our neighbor, we have broken God's law.

That's serious business.

No doubt James has Jesus' teachings in mind.

He's meditated very, very deeply on the Gospel of Matthew in particular, and in Matthew 18, we see an extraordinary illustration of this principle.

Matthew 18, Jesus gives a story, he gives a parable.

He gives a parable, having been asked the question, how many times should I forgive my brother or sister?

Up to seven times?

That seems pretty generous, right?

And that was Jesus say, right?

Not seven times, but seventy times seven, something like that.

In other words, just keep forgiving.

God's forgiveness is unlimited, so should yours be.

And he goes on to tell the story about a master who forgives a servant an incredible debt, like a crippling lifetime worth of debt, and sends the servant on his way.

And what does that servant do?

He goes and finds a guy who owes him 20 bucks and chokes him out because he wants his money.

And so what does the master do?

He calls the servant back in and he goes, You didn't think because I showed you mercy you shouldn't show mercy to others?

Let me quote the scriptures here.

You wicked servant, he said, I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to.

Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had had mercy on you?

Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

So James' invitation here is to show a love and a mercy that fulfills God's law.

Partiality breaks God's law and leaves us guilty, but mercy, mercy fulfills God's law.

It is showing love, willing the good of the other in an undeserved way.

Why?

Because that's the kind of love that we've been shown.

Haven't we been shown that kind of love?

Has not Christ gone to the cross?

Has not Christ given us the gospel of his resurrection so that we have hope for new life?

There is no length to which God's love and mercy, there is no end to his love and mercy towards us in Christ.

Therefore, there is no end to the love and mercy we ought to show to our neighbors in Christ.

James is inviting us to live into the kind of mercy that fulfills God's law.

And so he says in verses 12 to 13, to live presently with God's final judgment in mind.

Verse 12, so speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty, James says, for judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy.

Mercy triumphs over judgment.

Be doers of the word, in other words, be doers of the word with the goal in mind.

We will stand before the Lord and we will answer for the love and mercy that we failed to show.

Live with that in mind, James says.

Commit that to your core so that when you have those opportunities to practice forgiveness, to practice love, to practice mercy, we will live into the purpose of God's law and not be rendered guilty because we've broken God's law.

Show mercy as one who has been shown mercy.

Now I could end the sermon right here, couldn't I?

Some of you are going, please do.

But if I ended the sermon right here, it would be a so go get them kind of sermon, wouldn't it?

Let's try harder, let's be more loving, let's be more merciful.

And there's no power to that.

Because guaranteed, none of us want to be less kind, less loving, less merciful.

We strive for that every day and we fall short of our own goal, let alone God's goal, God's standard, right?

We need more than just a go get them sermon.

We need the gospel.

And James wants us to see the gospel.

Mercy triumphs over judgment.

Repent and look at Jesus.

We will not find assurance inside ourselves or in our own actions of obedience.

We will only find assurance of God's mercy and love and forgiveness in Christ's obedience, in his cross, his grace, his sincerity, his love, and his mercy, which he shows to us.

So we start every service with a summary of the law.

Love God, love your neighbor as yourself.

What's very interesting to me is how that gets mirrored later into the service.

I wonder if you've noticed this.

Shortly we will do what's called the confession of sin.

And we'll acknowledge that we have fallen short of God's law in so many ways.

And these words will summarize the ways in which we've fallen short, but we will acknowledge that we have not loved God with our whole heart, and we have not loved our neighbors at ourselves.

Let's have no pretense here.

None of us have nailed Christianity this week.

We have all of us fallen short.

We have all of us failed to love our neighbor.

We have all of us committed some kind of partiality, and we need not to try harder, we need mercy that triumphs over judgment.

So one Bible commentator writes, the believer in himself or herself will always deserve God's judgment.

Conformity to the royal law is never perfect as it must be, but our merciful attitude and actions will count as evidence of the presence of Christ within us.

And it is on the basis of this union with Christ, who perfectly fulfilled the law for us, that we can have confidence of our vindication at the judgment.

We come not as those who have nailed it this week, we come to those who desperately need God's mercy.

And He is eager, eager to show us His love and mercy and forgiveness and goodness.

So what does that make us?

Could it make us eager to show love and mercy to our neighbors?

Partiality makes Christians guilty before God's perfect law, but the gospel, the gospel infuses us with Christ's love and mercy and therefore empowers us to show the same to others.

If we struggle, if we struggle to show love and mercy to others, if we haphazardly fall into partiality time and time and time again, the solution is not to try harder, it is to go deeper into the gospel, to center ourselves in Christ's heart for us, which is love and mercy.

How will they know we're his disciples?

Because we love one another.

We love one another with the love with which we are loved.

And we begin to invert this partiality, this partiality that results in judgmental, hypocritical, and guilty actions before God, it begins to invert this partiality into the gospel itself, which makes us gracious and sincere and loving and merciful.

New song, we can bear this kind of witness to our neighbors.

We can bear this kind of witness to each and every person who walks through our door.

There is no one in our wider community, in our community right here, who should ever be made to feel lesser than.

Why?

Because they are treasured by the God who calls them to himself.

And you are treasured, and I am treasured, and so we treat one another as the treasures that we are in God's eyes.

Brothers and sisters, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Amen.

We hope that you've been blessed by God's Word today.

If you live in the Port Perry area, we hope that you'll come and worship with us in person on Sunday at 10 a.m.

If you'd like to learn more about Newsong Church, we'd love to connect with you.

Please find our contact information at newsongportperry.ca and reach out to us.

Newsong's ministry is entirely funded by the generous giving of those who worship and journey with us.

If you feel called to support our ministry with a financial gift, please go to newsongportperry.ca slash giving to make your contribution.

Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.