Nanny, Nanny,...

Anyway, the belief was that God had somehow set them off separate and it was their job to reveal this “new” truth to everyone else, because now they were special. I know you’re saying, we don’t have that going on, that’s not what happening today.

Well, I think it comes in different ways. For some it comes with the conviction that they now have a “new” insight and a conviction that they are now right and everyone else is missing the boat and we all want everyone on the boat. They could get there if they would only listen, and more importantly listen to us.

I don’t know how many people have come to me as a result of an experience at Alpha, Disciple Bible Study, or something else in their life and say, “Now, I see! Boy, how dumb could everyone else be that they don’t see it too!”

Now, I am not saying that what God has revealed to you is not the truth. Nor is James or Paul saying that either. But what is so important here is that we sort out what is the truth and what is not the truth. James in his passage gives us a number of “tests” to us to help develop an answer to that question. I want this morning to focus on three of those tests he uses.

First, is this truth that has been revealed to you, impartial?

The meaning of impartial is the same in Greek as it is in English, it means not to divide. It doesn’t part one from another, or individuals from each other, or you from others. Paul makes it clear that we are all needed to be part of the body of Christ, and it one is missing then the body is not whole. Impartial, does not separate, does not divide.

The last year I attended Course of Study, I was most impressed with history of the church. It was one of those courses, where you had to read 1,500 years of church history in two weeks. Dr. William Jennings Bryan was the professor, now I am not that old, it was not the William Jennings Bryan of Scopes Trail fame, but was actually an interesting character from Dallas. If you have been there you might have enjoyed some of the best barbecue in the state of Texas at Sonny Bryan’s BBQ. They are all over Dallas and the Dallas Metroplex. His family runs those, as a matter of fact his wife is Chief Operating Officer of the company owned by the family.

Anyway, I regress, what really impressed me about the course, was despite all the things we learned about the great leaders of the church and the different directions they took, was one chart in particular. It had Jesus up here, and then from there the twelve disciples and then into all sort of branches and limbs. It was like an inverted tree. Down at the bottom was some six hundred twigs.

There was the United Methodist Church, then the Free Methodist Church, then there was the Freer than Free Methodist Church, then the Southern Free Methodist Church, and the Freer Than Anyone Else Methodist Church. Then over here was the Baptist, they claimed to come from the very top and their branches went all the way from here to here. Now I am not meaning to belittle the Baptist church, we are all in the same boat. But it was interesting to me how we had all divided ourselves from the beginning to where we are today. And all of us claiming to be right and to some degree all the others wrong.