Sun, 20 November, 2005: Today’s Bible readings.
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 is chastizing his readers for the way they are making distinctions between people who come to worship. He tells them it is wrong to warmly greet the rich, while being rude to the poor. Any kind of discrimination based on economic, societal, or racial grounds within the church is sin. He doesn’t sugar coat it at all. Such discrimination is a violation of the royal law: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. As Christians we must not do such things, and if we ever do, we are sinning and should repent.
In telling us to avoid this sin, James goes on to say that whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it.
What do we learn from this?
God’s standard for our obedience is perfection. We are to perfectly obey His law always. Any deviation from His commandments is a violation against God Himself and earns us damnation. Since we have all sinned, we are all guilty before God. We all have violated His law and stand condemned before Him.
If we have found forgiveness for our sins in Jesus Christ, we have no right to treat anyone as inferior. We have found mercy from God for our many sins. Since we have broken God’s law and found His forgiveness, we have no right to look down on anyone else because they are poor, or are from a “lower” social class, or from a different race.
As James puts it, So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty. We expect to be judged with the mercy of God. We should then treat others with kindness and respect. We should treat them as we would want to be treated.
Where is Christ in this passage?
Everyone is guilty of sin before God. Even if we could limit the number of times we have sinned to just one sin in our lifetime, we still would be guilty before God. If in my entire lifetime I managed to only violate God’s law once, and that one time was something “inconsequential” like a little white lie, I still would be guilty of violating the law of God, and I would be subject to God’s punishment. In reality, I am guilty of far more than just one sin in my lifetime, and so are you. And so our guilt before God is enormous.
Our only hope is to come to God, seeking His mercy that is found in Jesus Christ. It is through Jesus Christ that we find forgiveness for our sins, and are made right with God. It is through faith in Jesus Christ that we are made acceptable in God’s presence and are greeted with God’s favor. It is only through Jesus Christ that we can find forgiveness for the way we have become accountable for all the law.
