Merciful Hope
Notes
Transcript
Go ahead and find James chapter 2. I want to open us up on prayer this morning as we dive into God’s word.
Prayer.
Last week, one of our key verses was James 1:22 “22 But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.” I would challenge you to put that verse to memory because it is one that is life changing.
What we should remember though is that we are always doing. You are either doing what God wants you to, or you are doing the things that God doesn’t want you to do, or maybe you are just doing nothing. But you are still doing.
There is this idea of commission and omission. You can be sinful because of something you are doing, or you can be sinful because you aren’t doing something you should be doing. This is what neglect is.
Just this week, we don’t really know what happened, but I got home from church on Wednesday night and one of my dogs was limping really bad and couldn’t put any weight on her back leg. We waited until morning and I took her to the vet. Thankfully, it wasn’t anything major and he prescribed pain pills and time. But if I didn’t take her to the vet, I know that there are some bleeding hearts out there that would accuse me of neglect, a sin of omission.
When we take that idea and transfer it over to our human interactions and how we treat others, it turns into discrimination. Let’s get it straight what discrimination is. It is treating others differently or taking away their rights or privileges because of their status. Many of you remember the severity of racial discrimination prior to the civil rights movement. They had rights taken from them because of their status.
James here is dealing with church people in this letter. (Sarcasm) - Now, there is no way possible that church people can be discriminating. No churches would ever treat people wrongly because of their status.
Did you know that statistically, the most segregated time in all of America is at 11 am on Sunday mornings? See, you got the white churches, the black churches, the Hmong churches, and they are all doing their own things. It is like we are serving different kingdoms.
The local church should be a reflection of the kingdom of God. Think about our neighborhood around us. It is a very diverse neighborhood. We have whites, blacks, asians, we have single moms, single dads, grandparents, young couples, there is just this plethora of distinctions between everyone. Isn’t the kingdom of God going to be like that? If you think that when you get to heaven, that everyone is going to be a middle class, white American, then buddy I got something to tell you.
No, the kingdom of God should be reflected in the church through diversity. We should reflect our neighborhood around us. If we aren’t beginning to look like the neighborhood by race, age, social status, then are we truly reaching our neighbors with the hope of Jesus Christ.
God has put us here to be a home for hope for ALL. Who is all? The white, black, rich, poor, healthy, sick, republican, democrat, the addict, the incarcerated, heterosexual, homosexual, the homeless, the diseased. It doesn’t matter what label has been put on them, we want them to come here and encounter the hope of Jesus Christ which is the only hope that is everlasting and can save.
That is the church that God wants us to be. James, in his letter to the churches, is pointing them to be the same kind of church.
1 My 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 guilty of 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.
God wants us to embody what it means to have merciful hope. We pray for God to show us grace and mercy and we expect him to show that to us. Are we showing that to others?
I think we all need to be asking ourselves this question. Because our lives should be a reflection of what God is doing in us. And I know that God is showing all of us mercy because you are here today. He has not struck you dead. He has given you an opportunity to continue to be a witness to him in this world. So, if he is showing us mercy, how are we showing mercy to others.
Are we being compassionate to others? Are we forgiving those who have hurt us? Are we learning other peoples stories so that we can better understand them and in turn, love them better.
I think the biggest way to show mercy to others is to tell them about the hope that is found only in Jesus. We believe that the local church is a primary place for people to encounter hope. So, I ask you…
Who are you inviting into our home for hope for all? Who is your “one more” that you are praying for God to bring into his kingdom?
What mercy is not is us experiencing the hope of Jesus Christ and keeping it to ourselves. That isn’t mercy at all. We must be sharing with others and inviting them in so that they can experience the same hope that you have experienced. Who is the one person that you have on your mind right now that needs hope? Would you bring them next Sunday? We aren’t trying to be some megachurch, but we want to reach one more for the hope of Jesus Christ. So, this week, invite your one more to come to church with you next Sunday.
Times may have changed but there is much that is still the same. As I read our text, you likely thought to yourself that you know that church that he is talking about and maybe even were part of that church at some point. As long as I am the pastor here, we will not stand for it. We cannot be a Home for Hope for All if we treat people differently than what scripture tells us to.
I want to take this passage and make 2 points in it that I see James make.
Hope Doesn’t Discriminate
Hope Doesn’t Discriminate
Think back to elementary school and being on the playground and the class is getting a game of basketball or baseball up. There is a standard, universal procedure that you must follow when you are doing this. You first have 2 captains, usually chosen by the teacher. And then the captains take turns picking teams. What inevitably happens is the captains pick based off of popularity with a little crossover scale with ability. I want to speak up for all of the ones who never got picked first and say that this is discrimination.
All jokes aside, the church often turns into a popularity contest. You want the people who can help you out in the positions that are best suited for personal interests. That is what James is talking about here.
1 My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.
He is clear. Show no, zero, none. Show no partiality. Absolutely do not have favorites within the body of Christ. Who is this for? For everyone who holds the faith of Jesus. So, if you are a Christian, you are to show no favorites in the body of Christ.
This doesn’t mean that you can’t find a best friend at church or a discipleship partner or have a favorite preacher. This means that you should never look at or treat anyone differently that is part of the body of Christ. We should welcome people into the assembly, no matter the background.
I think James makes a great case here for actually coming to church and having an organized church. People try to argue that scripture never commands that we should have church services or local church bodies. Verse 2 is clear to me. He talks about people coming into the assembly, not just the family of God. This separates people that visit a church from church members.
If you are here today and you are a guest, I am so glad that you came. We want to be a home for hope for all and I pray that you find that hope in Jesus today. What we don’t want to do is treat you differently because we think you have something special to offer us like James is talking about here. Please know that we love you and pray you experience the hope of Jesus here.
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?
So let’s say someone comes in the doors here and we see them and they are in a nice 3 piece Armani suit, wearing some nice alligator shoes, got their Rolex on, and then right behind them comes in someone who is not well manicured, their clothes are not in good shape, their hair is nasty, they smell bad, and you know for a fact that they were sleeping on the park bench as you were coming into town.
What then happens is you take the clean guy and put him in a place of honor for the congregation and you take the poor man and make sure that no one is put off by him by putting him maybe in an overflow room by himself.
James says when you do this, you become a judge with evil thoughts. You have now discriminated against someone that Jesus loves and died for.
I have said before that none of us are beyond struggle. We are all at most 3 decisions away from being the poorest of the poor. It can happen to all of us. That rich man is of no greater value to the kingdom of God than the poor man.
Our brains try to think in terms of value here on Earth. When someone makes more money or they have more assets, they are more valuable. Maybe they have a nice 401K or savings account, they drive a brand new car or wear expensive clothes. But none of those things have value in the kingdom of God.
I heard a pastor this week say that “faith is the currency of heaven”. It isn’t going to matter how much money you made, how much you saved, or how many cars you have. What matters is your faith in Jesus Christ. So when someone walks in the doors of our assembly here, we cannot change how we treat them by how they look.
James takes it even deeper.
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?
James refers to the sermon on the mount that Jesus preached. Jesus began this sermon with what we call the beatitudes. And one of the beatitudes says that blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. This is the essence of the gospel and James is saying the same thing.
This isn’t a financial statement, this is a heart posture. If you are poor in spirit then you are rich in the kingdom. To be poor in spirit means that you know that you are spiritually bankrupt. That there is nothing that you can do to earn your way to God. This isn’t something that you can throw money at to fix or hire someone to fix. So, when you come to the end of yourself and know that you cannot do this on your own, then you have found the riches that are only found in Jesus and that results in us being heirs to the kingdom of heaven.
I can promise you that according to scripture, there has never been one person to make it to God on their own. It just isn’t possible. They have got to come to the end of themselves and realize that Jesus is the one who has bought their way to God. That is salvation. But if you have not done this, then what?
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?
If you aren’t poor in sprit, then you act like the rich people. And for the churches that James is writing this to, the rich people are the ones oppressing the Christians. They are the ones who are doing everything in their power to stop the movement of God that they are apart of.
They are taking them to court and blaspheming the name of Jesus. The point here is that you are either one or the other. You are the ones who are being oppressed or you are the oppressors. You are either the poor in spirit or you are the rich in self. Which one is it? Unless you are fully committed to Christ and you are full of the hope of Jesus, then you are not part of the family of God.
But even if right now in this moment, you are on the wrong side, I believe that there is hope for you. The hope of Jesus Christ is available for you if you just run to him. At the end of the sermon today, I am going to give you an opportunity to put that stake in the ground because I believe wholeheartedly that hope doesn’t discriminate.
Hope Avoids Judgment
Hope Avoids Judgment
I know that judgment is a word that gets misused a lot. But how our culture uses the word judgment often has nothing to do with true judgment. So let’s see what James has to say.
8 If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well.
James uses a term here that is generally not heard often. He says that “royal law”. Now, we don’t live in a monarchy regardless if people want to argue that we do. We don’t. But we, as followers of Jesus, we belong to an eternal monarchy. To describe something as a royal law is to say that it is the highest law you can imagine. It rises above all of the other laws. It trumps everything else. So what law is he referring to.
The command to love your neighbor as yourself is found in Deut 6. But Jesus then takes it and repeats it as well. We find it in the NT in Mark 12. This is what we call the great commandment and it is 1 command with 2 different arms to it.
30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’
31 The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
I know you have heard me says over and over again that we are to be a home for hope for all. This is the direction that we are headed in as a church. But how do we get there? We get there by doing this. This is building the kingdom and impacting our community. Love God, love your neighbors. Build the kingdom, impact our community. Love God with everything in yourself, and love your neighbors as you would love yourself.
And if we do this, we are doing what we need to do. That is what James is telling us. If you want to do well, then you have to love others as yourself. But what if we don’t. What if we shut those that aren’t like us out, what if we turn them away and tell them that they don’t need or deserve the hope that is only found in Jesus?
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 guilty of all of it.
To show partiality is sinful. And if you commit 1 sin, then you are guilty of the entire law. This is heavy. This should be scary for all of us. This shows the severity of sin. 1 sin and you receive condemnation.
Back several years ago, there was a street evangelist named Ray Comfort. Some people have criticized his technique but I believe it was extremely effective to point out the difference between how we feel about ourselves and the true condition of our hearts. He would begin by asking people how they knew they would go to heaven, and the answer would generally consist of them saying that they are a good person.
He would then take the 10 commandments and have the people walk through them and people would usually say that they are not adulterers or murderers and such. He would take them to the teachings of Jesus in the gospels and point out that Jesus says if you have hate in your heart, you are a murderer and if you look at someone with lust, then you are an adulterer. He would then take what James says here to point them to the fact that because of 1 sin, they are condemned.
But we are guilty of more than 1 moral sin. We are guilty of probably all of them.
All it takes is 1 sin to separate us from God. And we are born with that sin. We have inherited the sin of Adam. So to wipe away the sin of Adam, we must be covered by the blood of Jesus. It all goes back to “blessed are the poor in spirit”. Unless you are poor in spirit, understanding that you are spiritually bankrupt and need Jesus, then you will be guilty.
But if you have been bought by the blood of Jesus, and if you follow him and live your life for him, you have to be different.
Change is a byproduct of being chosen. Be different, but keep a watch on yourself.
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.
Live your life in such a manner that you are going to get judged for your words and actions. Be above reproach. Kill sin or it will be killing you. James is pointing to how serious it is that we treat people with dignity and with love. Favoritism is such a harsh sin within the assembly, the body, the church, that James takes part of his letter to address it. So we must know how important this is.
Our words and our actions are completely tied together. Even in the earlier verses, James tied in treating the rich man and poor man with words, saying what we are doing for them. “Here, you sit here in this good place”. They are tied together. And Jesus tells us that we are going to have to account for all of our words.
36 I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak,
37 for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.”
If we couldn’t have gotten any heavier, now we bring up the fact that our words will be judged. You may not think that your words mean anything, but you will when you stand before Jesus. Every single word you say. The tearing down, the cursing of others, the nasty comments, the sexual comments, the gossip. It is all an overflow of the heart.
Well what does this have to do with favoritism or discrimination?
Everything. Our thoughts and our words and our actions are intrinsically linked together. They are linked together with our heart. Judgment and discrimination are not ours but are the Lords.
Conclusion
The key to all of this is our heart. The heart we were born with, it is no good. Scripture tells us that the heart is deceitfully wicked, who can trust it. So how do we fix this?
We need a new heart. And that will only ever come from Jesus. He offers us his heart. His heart that is brand new, that cares for others, that cleanses our thoughts and our mouth. How do we get that? We do what Jesus commanded us to do when he said to “repent and believe the gospel”.
This means that you turn from sin and turn towards Jesus. You leave your old self behind and run to him. You put off your sinful nature and Jesus puts his righteousness on you. And when that happens, things start to happen. You begin to realize how much sin effects you and you begin to fight it. The things you once loved, you will begin to despise. The things you used to think were ridiculous about Christianity, you will begin to love.
The very first thing that must happen is salvation. I don’t have a magical prayer for you to pray that saves you. Just say in your own words to God that you know you are a sinner and you are surrendering your life to him. You make that commitment today to do that.
Then what? Then you tell people what God has done for you. You do that with words by going and telling others. But you also do that through a public proclamation in baptism. I think we are going to be having a baptism soon so if you are ready to do that, you need to let me know.
Then what? Then we grow as disciples. You find a more experienced Christian or group to get together with and you all open the word of God together and grow together. And you live out what scripture tells you to do.
We try to complicate the Christian life and it really isn’t. There may be certain things that are different about your life than others. Certain struggles or maybe even particular callings. But what is the same across the board is that we treat everyone with the mercy that God has shown us. Let us open our lives and our doors to all. Let us be a home for hope for all, and all means everyone.
