James: Favoritism
Notes
Transcript
What does God want them to know? Favoritism is evil
Why? It hurts and divides
What does God want them to do? Do not show favoritism, but have heart for all
Why? It heals and unifies
ME
How many of you have heard the phrase “First impressions are everything”
First impressions are everything
We see this in the restaurant world
A restaurant knows for them to retain a customer they have to lay out a good first impression of the restaurant with their atmosphere, hospitality, service and food
If it is not good are we going to come back?
We see this in the church with first time guests
A first time guest within the first 5 minutes makes an opinion about the church
Did someone say hi to me?
Is this place welcoming?
Was the worship good?
Was the sermon good?
First impressions are not just reserved for THINGS such as RESTAURANTS and CHURCHES…it is to people
Where do we want to make good first impressions? When you meet a new person or starter a new job or when you go on a date
You want people to have a good first impression of you
We want people to think good things about us, right
Before we turn the corner and ask what the SCRIPTURES HAVE TO SAY ABOUT FIRST IMPRESSIONS let’s ask the question
HOW DO THESE FIRST IMPRESSIONS COME ABOUT?
3 ways
SEE
For example, If we see someone who comes in here with with dishevled clothes, shoes that are a little worn, and they have a little bit of the smell to them…the fleshly tendancy is to what greet them? Hang out with them?
If we see someone who is well dressed, drives a nice car, put together....what does the flesh want to do?
2. HEAR
If some comes in hear they do not speak very well, their grammar is not the best, or maybe they have an accent (for some people this is not good)
But if they have smooth speech, good words, eloquent, sound educated. (we like them)
3. KNOW
that person is a Smith and we don’t like Smiths in our town, they are rude, mean, stupid
that person is a Jones, big house, lots of money, dad was the mayor
BUT WHAT IS THE PROBLEM WITH FIRST IMPRESSIONS…though personally we should try to give off a good first impression, not fake impression....or IMPRESSIONS IN GENERAL??
THAT ARE NOT ALWAYS RIGHT WRONG
Talking to Strangers says we are wrong more often than we think
First impressions of Hilter were....Times Person of the Year
Stories of COPS are bad....someone who looks like a GANGSTER is a bed
WE SEE IN THE SCRITPURE OVER AND OVER OUR FIRST IMPRESSIONS OR IMPRESSIONS OF PEOPLE ARE WRONG, DEAD WRONG.
These are the God is going to use, people of who LOOK the PART but unfortunately don’t have the heart.
Our eyes deceive us
Personally us
God can’t use me, because I am too ____ fill in the blank
Sinful, too dumb, too not gifted, too not from a family line
This is what almost all heros of the faith said
Gideon, 12 disciples, Moses
For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.
But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong;
God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are,
so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.
Take for example DAVID
SEE....DAVID
David was too young to be KING, too young to defeat GOLIATH....Saul was chosen king becaue of....What they saw of Saul was deceiving…HE LOOKED LIKE A KING BUT DIDN’T ACT LIKE A KING
But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.”
Then Jesse called Abinadab and made him pass before Samuel. And he said, “Neither has the Lord chosen this one.”
Then Jesse made Shammah pass by. And he said, “Neither has the Lord chosen this one.”
And Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel. And Samuel said to Jesse, “The Lord has not chosen these.”
Then Samuel said to Jesse, “Are all your sons here?” And he said, “There remains yet the youngest, but behold, he is keeping the sheep.” And Samuel said to Jesse, “Send and get him, for we will not sit down till he comes here.”
And he sent and brought him in. Now he was ruddy and had beautiful eyes and was handsome. And the Lord said, “Arise, anoint him, for this is he.”
Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers. And the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward. And Samuel rose up and went to Ramah.
his family did not see it DAVID as king
HEAR…PAUL
Paul was too far gone, he was persecuting Christians, killing them
Then Jesus meets him and Damascus road and says Paul why are you persecuting me? Paul gives his life to Jesus and Jesus puts scales on his eyes for three days
Then God says to Ananias go lay hands on Paul and heal him
How would you feel the, God tells you to go heal the enemy of CHRISTIANS
But Ananias answered, “Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints at Jerusalem.
And here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call on your name.”
But the Lord said to him, “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel.
For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.”
So Ananias departed and entered the house. And laying his hands on him he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.”
And immediately something like scales fell from his eyes, and he regained his sight. Then he rose and was baptized;
and taking food, he was strengthened. For some days he was with the disciples at Damascus.
Paul became the greatest missionary reaching the world for Jesus
The reason we are hear is because of God using Paul
KNOW…What we know can be wrong
Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip said to him, “Come and see.”
You either were on the outside a person who followed God or a sinner…and Godly people did not interact with SINNER....someone forgot to tell Jesus that
And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.”
One of the Pharisees asked him to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee’s house and reclined at table.
And behold, a woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that he was reclining at table in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster flask of ointment,
and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment.
Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner.”
And Jesus answering said to him, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” And he answered, “Say it, Teacher.”
“A certain moneylender had two debtors. One owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty.
When they could not pay, he cancelled the debt of both. Now which of them will love him more?”
Simon answered, “The one, I suppose, for whom he cancelled the larger debt.” And he said to him, “You have judged rightly.”
Then turning toward the woman he said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair.
You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not ceased to kiss my feet.
You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment.
Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little.”
And he said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.”
Then those who were at table with him began to say among themselves, “Who is this, who even forgives sins?”
And he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”
FIRST IMPRESSIONS ARE NOT EVERTYIHNG....they are not the end of your story or a correct story.
Some of us might be feeling we are not called or can be used by the first impressions we do on oursevles
Let me introduce you to David
Sinful woman
The woman at the well
Moses
Maybe God is saying to us also we need to to repent from our first impressions of some else
why repent?
Not only are FIRST IMPRESSIONS WRONG they are are SINFUL...
HOW?
They create catagoires of who’s in and who’s out.
SINFUL
In James day and it came into the church (Corinthin poor vs the rich)
Economic status (you have money or you have little)
Nationality (Jew, Gentile, Greek)
Lived (Jerusalem, Rome, Nazarth)
Male or Female
Religious leader or common believer or sinner
My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.
We are to be a family of unique people.
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?
Gold ring come here!
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 man. 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?
TODAY TOO CELEBRITIES BLASPHEMY
We follow celebrities who do not even like Jesus or the ways of Jesus and put them on a pedestalstool
James says come on you want put them on high regard but they don’t even like God
youth group
JAMES WANTS TO SHOW THE SERIOUSNESS OF IT
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.
CHURCH GOD IS SAYING THERE IS to be no partiality....God wants all to be in the family of God. AM CALLING ALL INTO THE FAMILY ALL APART OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD.
There are to be no categories who who’s better and who’s not
God came for all
All whom He calls He calls priests and our gifted
Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands—
remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility
by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace,
and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.
And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near.
For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father.
So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God,
built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone,
in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord.
JESUS COMES TO DO AWAY WITH THE CATAGORIES and MERCY TRIUMPHS OVER JUDGEMENT
