“IN ALL FAIRNESS” James 2:1-13.
Dealing with the "otherwise" categories in our hearts.
I was sitting in a Chicago corner
shop and set my wallet on the table. As I was getting up I was quite aware that I was scanning
the room after looking at my wallet on the table to see if I should be cautious
… which I should. But I was also noticeably aware of my own awareness … I saw a
man in the back sitting at a table and I must confess, that just because he was
black I picked up my wallet and put it into my pocket. This is my confession.
I don’t know
why I did it AND it haunts me. It haunts me for two reasons: because I do not
have answer as to WHY I did that; and because I feel like what happened there
inside of me, without my conscious thinking, just reacting, MAY have come from
sin.
I think this goes on a lot; and I
don’t think I am the only one who has had this experience.
I know I
don’t like being in a situation where I feel like I am being treated unfairly. This
can probably be blamed upon my being the youngest in my family, but I HATE
being THE VICTIM OF unfairness; EVEN MORE, I hate seeing others treated
unfairly too, and I know I HATE it when I am the perpetrator of unfairness. I’ve
been bullied, and I have been the bully.
I HATE it when I might be sinning against others and I don’t know it. Let me say that again, I hate it when I might be sinning against others and I don’t know it. I don’t really like to think that is possible.James’ writing gets at the core of this when he writes, “My brothers, show NO partiality as you hold faith in our ‘glorious’ Lord Jesus Christ”… did you hear that NO part?
Show just
a little bit of partiality? Show partiality sometimes, but not at others. Show partiality when you can get away with it?
I served as
a summer intern at Community Church of Greenwood; the family discipleship pastor
that was serving there at the time had come from California, a Yale grad I
believe; he was referred to as the in-house
theologian. While he was in the Hollywood area, he was teaching a young
couple’s class when in walks Tom Cruise and his then girl-friend Nicole Kidman,
and took a seat. This story was shared with me over 20 years ago and still
haunts me because I have no answer to the question, What would I have done?
It is no
different than when we have certain people come into our midst from our
community and sit down with us. The mayor, or the Sheriff, or local
politicians, or school Superintendent, or the star <fill-in the blank with a sport> athlete, or cheerleader, or
choose whichever local celebrity you want to flash up in your mind juxtaposed
with those whom you would consider otherwise.
It is this otherwise category James writes
about; how did we get it, where did it come from? Is it normal, natural, and
therefore OK? As a Christian who loves the Lord and is daily infiltrated with
the holiness of God making the NATURAL into the SPIRITUAL, the temporal into
the eternal, boosting the quality of spiritual character we need to know what our JESUS deserves from us!
What is this
“partiality” we are not to be
showing?
It comes
from two Greek words: one is for face (prosopon) and one means to take or receive
(lambano). To accept a face, to allow into your presence by facial recognition. To approve one face over another. It is the
habit of the pathway created between the eyes and the heart; by habit we have
formed automatic responses that NOW need to be interrupted by the TRUTH of the
Gospel. You might be suffering from prosopo-laympsia!
My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.
What’s
wrong with it? Look at verse 9, if you show partiality, you are committing sin –you are transgressing God’s law—BUSTED!
If I HOLD
FAITH in Jesus while at the same time show partiality I am really seeking to
undo what Christ has done—to reverse the work Jesus has done in the life of the
other person.
When I show
partiality toward another believer and begin BRANDING THEM as generic, hand-me
down, Goodwill, or at yard sale quality I am showing partiality.
Could you
dream with me just for a moment: What would our church look like if it didn’t
show a smidgen of partiality?
In my studies I revisited a word that
I hadn’t given much thought to for a long time: Redeem.
The imagery
of redemption has shown up in songs and stories—from the Chronicles of Narnia
to The
Old Violin and the Touch of the Master’s Hand,
redemption is a powerful illustration and metaphor for what Christ has done for
us.
We were all
slaves to sin, destined for hell and under the powerful scourge of Satan. But
every now and then by the grace of God a soul is brought to the auction block
to stand there and see if a price will be paid for their freedom. You may
resonate with the experience that one day that auction block found you standing
there wretched, undone, beyond miserable, desperate but hopeless. But a man
came forward, perhaps one you’ve heard about, who redeems worthless souls and
redeems their stories and weaves them into his own and makes an even more
glorious story with their wretchedness. He is the Master Redeemer!
And on THIS
day he is in the crowd and when the bidding starts his is the only bid, but it
isn’t a minor bid at all—He offers HIS life in place of your own. BOUGHT by His
blood, you are brought down off the auction block to His side. You are so
grateful you can hardly stand it! You are free at last! You can’t help but hold
on to the man thanking him, kissing his hand, hugging his hand; but this is
where the story of partiality takes place.
You look up
at the block and see your brother or your sister standing there and the
celebration is over as you become desperate for them. You BEG the man to buy
them too, pleading with him hoping he will show mercy, even offering yourself
to go back to take their place and let them be free but he tells you that
cannot be done. But HUZZAH! Your sibling is freed, the offer was set and
accepted and
their chains are gone just as yours were and you meet them and
celebrate their freedom with them.
But then someone else approaches the block. It
is your boss, your enemy, your neighbor who has wronged you and when you see
their face the celebration is once again halted … and so is the desperation. No
more kissing, but also no more begging.
But he price
is set and paid, and this one too is freed and brought to the man’s side right
next to you. You move with your sibling to other side of the man and play the
role, not as the prodigal son any longer but as the older brother.
WHAT IS REALLY HAPPENING WITH THE SUBJECT OF SHOWING PARTIALITY IS THAT THE CHURCH HAS ALLOWED ITSELF TO BE REGULATED BY WORLDLY STANDARDS RATHER THAN KINGDOM PRINCIPLES! Not by preaching but by practice; partiality isn’t something that is taught, it is something that is caught. It is demonstrated in the hidden curriculum of the church.
We have
dumbed down our spiritual fervor for the Lord so much so that we have
adopted filters from our culture to
dictate to us what is acceptable and what isn’t—instead of the heartbeat of
Christ!
It is not that we have transported
idols into the church, just the habits from a lifestyle of idolatry. The formative powers of this culture
are so pervasive, subversive, and devious that unless we come asking GOD for
HIS wisdom to combat the assumed patterns of thinking we have developed while
we were in the world we will operate by them in the Church. We sit in front of
the HD screens absorbing mindlessly the philosophy of our culture in tutorial
style fashion accepting bit by bit the dulling of our spiritual senses what GOD
seeks to TRANSFORM as Romans 12:2 states by the renewing of the mind and by
being as Romans 8:29 states CONFORMED into
the image of his Son and as chapter 2 of 1 Cor 2 states to gain God’s perspective on life.
REPENTANCE
is the only answer for this message today. It isn’t pretty but it is effective.
REPENTANCE first, then LOVING GOD WITH ALL OUR HEARTS AND MINDS and be HIS—we are
bought with a price! Therefore SHOW NO PARTIALITY!
CONCLUSION: IF I could somehow go back to that
diner in Chicago and stand up with my wallet on the table, I would have changed
the scenario to be something like this: I would have put my wallet in my pocket
WITHOUT scanning the room, turned and looked at the man at the table and smiled
… and then looked at what he had and what he didn’t have, prayed while taking
my wallet back out and offered to buy him a cup a coffee—and then take the
adventure the conversation would have taken me.
YOUR STORY
ISN’T COMPLETE. YOU CAN STILL CHANGE.SEEK GOD, TRUST JESUS, GO IN PEACE and in showing NO partiality and PUT A SMILE ON GOD'S FACE today.