JAMES 2:8-13
A LAW OF LIBERATING LOVE
[Matthew 22:36-40]
Getting a proper perspective can help change our attitude. A COWBOY out west was driving down a dirt road with his dog riding in back of the pickup truck and his faithful horse in the trailer behind. He failed to negotiate a curve and had a terrible accident.
Sometime later a state trooper came upon the scene. An animal lover, he saw the horse first. Realizing the terminal nature of its injuries, he drew his service revolver and put the animal out of it’s misery. He walked around the accident and found the dog, also hurt critically. He couldn’t bear to hear it whine in pain, so he ended the dog’s suffering as well.
Next he tried to locate the cowboy who had suffered multiple fractures when he was thrown out of his pickup. As the officer broke through the weeds he saw him. The cop asked, "Hey are you okay?"
The cowboy took one look at the smoking revolver in the trooper’s hand and quickly replied, "Never felt better!"
Getting a proper perceptive can change our attitude and behavior. The perspective of our text today should help us gain the understanding that we all need God’s mercy.
The Divine Law of the Old Testament is impartial and indivisible. To break it at one point breaks it all together because it is one unit. It applies to all people equally. Since therefore we all are law breakers, we need to seek mercy. Those who have found mercy from God’s judgment should no longer judge other’s with partiality but with mercy. For the person who refuses to give mercy on the human level will receive no mercy on the divine level. We would be wise to let mercy triumph over judgment so that we too might be judged with mercy. Let us follow the royal law, the law of love that is to be impartially extended to one’s neighbor.
I. FULFILL THE ROYAL LAW, 8.
II. THE INDIVISIBLE UNITY OF THE DIVINE LAW, 9-11.
III. MERCY RECEIVED BECOMES MERCY GIVEN, 12-13.
In verse 8 we are called upon to fulfill the royal law of love. If indeed you are fulfilling the royal law according to the Scripture, YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR (the one near you) AS YOURSELF," you are doing well.
The law of love, you shall love you neighbor as yourself, is called the Royal Law because it is the supreme law and is to be the source of all other laws governing human relationship. It is the summation of all God’s laws (Mt. 22:36-40; Rom. 13:8-10). It is also called royal or regal (basilikon for basileus, meaning king) because it is decreed by the one true King, the King of Kings (Jn. 13:34).
Love is the law of His Kingdom, it is the law of liberty. To fulfill the royal law is to carry it out, to put it into practice. Obedience to this law of love is the answer to prejudicial favoritism. There would be no reason for the Divine Law if each person truly loved his neighbor as himself. Love for God motivates us to obey the Word of God and treat people as God commands.
This generation needs to go "back-to-basics." Nothing is more basic than the "royal law." Frustrated, angry Christians contradict their calling. Football coach Vince Lombardi was fanatical about basics. Once, his Green Bay Packers were defeated by an inferior team. At the team meeting, the players had no idea what to expect. Lombardi gritted his teeth and stared holes through one man after another. Finally, he spoke: "‘OK, we go back to basics this morning...’ Holding a football high enough for all to see, he continued to yell: ‘Gentlemen, this is a football!’" that is like telling a piano player, "This is middle C." It is like telling an artist, "This is a paintbrush." yet, countless Christians and churches need to go back to basics in just that simple way. Christians need to love their neighbor as themselves.
Far too often Christians treat each other in a non-loving prejudicial manner. They gossip or talk about others instead of praying for others and reaching out to help them overcome their weaknesses. [Business meetings become times of verbal brawls, committee meetings erupt with anger, and] Christians who are too busy to stop and reach out to a hurting neighbor contradict the royal law. Christ’s people need to get back to basics!
Where Christians apply this royal law of love homes are remade, church are transformed, neighborhoods become true communities. James says some were loving and experiencing its results (Mt. 25:21). They were living in the power of the resurrected Christ, who alone can enable us to fulfill His command to love others as ourselves.
II. THE INDIVISIBLE UNITY OF THE DIVINE LAW, 9-12.
This section deplores the violation of the royal command. Verse 9 calls those who practice favoritism sinners. But if you show partiality, you are committing (work - perform) sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors.
Partiality marks one as a spiritual rebel. Transgressors are those who in rebellion step over God’s line. We must treat all people as we would want to be treated. We should not ignore the rich, because then we would be with holding our love. But we must not favor them for what they can do for us, while ignoring the poor who can offer us seemingly so little in return. We need to be aware of our natural inclinations and seek to love all those we encounter who are in need as the Good Samaritan did (Lk. 10:25-37).
[RAINCOAT EXPERIMENT] Clothing companies try to offer garments that match the public’s perception of what a successful person wears. To determine this, a clothing analyst performed an experiment with raincoats. An actor wearing a tan raincoat approached people at a subway station. He explained that he had left his wallet home and asked to borrow train fare. People were surprisingly generous with this supposedly unfortunate executive.
Then the actor wore a dark raincoat and approached people in the same way with the same story. This time he was treated differently. Not only would no one give him money, but he was physically threatened. The opposite reaction was linked to the color of the coat. People saw the dark garment as threatening and judged the man with suspicion.
Aren’t we also guilty of judging by appearances? Don’t we let externals determine how we respond to people? Though it seem unfair to so judge people we will unconsciously do so unless we are living in the power of Christ.
Whenever we discriminate according to race, age, gender, or income level, we are sinning. God is impartial, and when we accept all people equally we are reflecting His character.
Prejudice is a great time saver; it lets you form opinions without getting the facts. But let’s accept people the way God does, without partiality concerning the externals, and give them opportunity to grow and prove themselves.
[PREJUDICED USHER] In his autobiography, Mahatma Gandhi wrote that during his student days he read the Gospels seriously and considered converting to Christianity. He believed that in the teachings of Jesus he could find the solution to the caste system that was dividing the people of India.
So one Sunday he decided to attend services at a nearby church and talk to the minister about becoming a Christian. When he entered the sanctuary, however, the usher refused to give him a seat and suggested that he go worship with his own people. Gandhi left the church and never returned. "If Christians have caste differences also," he said, "I might as well remain a Hindu." That usher’s prejudice not only betrayed Jesus but also turned a person away from trusting Him as Savior.
[The "prejudiced usher" described in James chapter 2 welcomed a wealthy visitor but insulted a poor one. Perhaps he felt he was doing his job and only carrying out the wishes of the members in the church. But he displayed bad manners, and he could be guilty of a sin as serious as murder and adultery (James 2:9-11).]
When people visit our church, does love warmly welcome them regardless of their race or social status? Prejudice distorts what it sees, deceives when it talks, and destroys when it acts.
God’s love that drew salvation’s plan
Embraces every class of man;
It breaks the toughest racial wall
Because it offers Christ to all.
Verse 10 reveals why those who practice partiality are lawbreakers. for whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.
We need not break all of God’s Laws to be guilty. To break one link in the chain is to break the chain. To break one Law or one part of the Law is to violate the entire Law. Violating a single command of God makes a person a lawbreaker. Obedience at several points while neglecting another point still means we have disobeyed God. The law resembles a pane of glass and if broken at one point means that the entire pane is broken. No matter how well we think we do in one area it will not compensate for acts of disobedience in another area. We may think our prejudisum a little thing, but God still calls it sin.
[A LOST HOME RUN] According to Tim Franklin in the Chicago Tribune, in the 1996 summer Olympics in Atlanta, the U.S. women’s softball team lost only one game, and it was a game they should have won.
In the fifth inning, with the score tied 0-0, U.S. player Dani Tyler clubbed a home run over the fence. She took her home run trot around the bases, and when she reached home, amid the excitement and congratulations and high-fives from her teammates, she failed to tag home plate. When she reached the dugout, the opposing team of Australians tagged home, and the umpire at first base agreed that she had stepped right over the plate.
Tyler had to return to third base, where she was stranded. the score remained 0-0 until the end of regulation play.
The U.S. scored a run in the top half of the tenth inning. Then in the bottom of the inning, one strike away from defeat, an Australian player hit a two-run homer to win the game for Australia. The loss was an emotional blow to the American team, and especially to Dani Tyler. "I just can’t believe I missed it," she said after the game. "I didn’t know anything about it until I was in the dugout."
So often we assume that we are doing great, doing great things for God. Yet what we view as a comparatively small thing is keeping us from being the Christian we need to be. No matter how well your playing the Christian game you cannot score with God if you show partiality.
This does not mean that one sin is as bad as another sin or that it is just as bad to break all of them as to break one. "James is not dealing with the extent and degree of guilt, but with it’s reality. Some sins obviously are more heinous in the sight of God than other’s." For example, thinking about murder is not as bad as committing the act. Stealing a candy is not the same as committing adultery. Adultery when actually committed devastates far more than lust devastates. Lust consumes the lustful person. The act of adultery involves the adulterer, his partner in shame, and the betrayed spouses of both persons. Yet, Jesus says equal makes us guilty before God (Mt. 5:28). Open adultery and hidden lust are unequal in their human consequences; but, they both make one guilt before God. Every sin makes us a lawbreaker.
[Believers must see God’s law in the context of relationships. God gave His law as principles for guiding His relationship to His people. When persons break a single item of God’s law, they violate their relationship with God. (Gregory, 46). ]
Verse 11 teaches that the unity of the Law is because it originates in God. For He who said, DO NOT COMMIT ADULTERY," also said, DO NOT COMMIT MURDER." Now if yo do not commit adultery, but do commit murder, you have become a transgressor of the Law.
The oneness of the Law grows out of the fact that every Law is part of the whole, because the Enactor of the Law tied them all together. "The same God who said, "Do not commit adultery," said also, "Do not kill." The entire law is stamped with the same diving authority. To violate willfully 1 of its requirements is to resist the authority upon which all the precepts are founded." (Vaughan, 46)
We cannot decide to keep part of God’s Law and ignore the rest. You can’t break the Law a little bit; if you have broken it at all you have broken all and you need Christ to pay for your sin. People cannot despise the poor and keep God’s favor anymore than they can commit murder and still please Him. Measure yourself, not someone else, against God’s standards. Ask for forgiveness where you need it, surrender to God and then renew your effort to put your faith into practice.
III. MERCY RECEIVED BECOMES MERCY GIVEN, 12-13.
These verses conclude the discussion of partiality with a final appeal for obedience to the royal law of love in both speech and action. Verse 12, So speak and so act as those who are to be judged by the law of liberty.
In light of God’s stern expectations every believer should live daily in light of the final judgment. This certain and fixed date of judgment is not for determining eternal destiny for James is speaking to believers whose eternal destiny has already determined (Jn. 5:24). It is a judgment of rewards for believers (1 Cor. 3:12-15; 2 Cor. 5:10; Rev. 22:12).
James is saying to those who make a habit of judging others that they face a day when God will judge them and had best prepare themselves for that day. The standard of judgment will not be this or that external rule, but the law of liberty. What did you do with the freedom God purchased for you on the Cross of Calvary? It is a judgment of our yieldedness to the Spirit of Liberty and the labor He has done in and through us. It is the judgment of the degree in which our heart and life have been dominated by the Spirit of love. Those who realize the certainty of judgment and Who will judge them will speak and act as the law of liberty directs.
God’s grace does not cancel our duty to obey Him; it gives our obedience a new basis. The law is no longer an external set of rules, but is an inner Law that gives freedom and one we joyfully and willingly carry out, because we love God and because we have the power of His Holy Spirit to carry it out.
Verse 13 enforces the appeal made in the twelfth verse. For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy; mercy triumphs over judgment.
The warning is that those people who show no mercy shall find none at God’s judgment. They have not acted in the spirit of the law of love, but in opposition to it, thus they themselves will reap no benefit from it when they stand before God. Where God finds repentance and faith, He is able to show mercy. Where He finds rebellion and unbelief He must administer justice. By failing to show compassion to those in need we prove ourselves destitute of basic Christian character with no vital connection to God.
In the Parable of the UNMERCIFUL SERVANT (Mt. 18:23-35) Jesus taught the necessity of forgiving others.
A king demanded of one of his servants the immediate repayment of an enormous debt. Facing the prospect of debtor’s prison for himself and his family, he begged the king for mercy, promising repayment if given more time. The king was moved to compassion by the pleas and did more than grant the requested extension of time. He forgave the debt completely. Mercy triumphed over judgment.
This same servant went out and found a fellow servant who owed him a relatively small sum. Seizing him by the throat, he demanded immediate repayment. When his debtor pled for more time to repay the loan, he refused to grant his request. Instead he had him cast into prison until he could pay.
Informed by grieving servants about what had happened, the king summoned the man whom he had forgiven so much. He chided him for receiving mercy but not extending it to his fellow servant. Thus he handed him over to the torturers. Judgment was without mercy to him who showed no mercy.
If a person stands on their rights to do with others as they please, God will stand on His right to judge us as we deserve.
Let us be aware not only of our personal favoritism but of the church’s partiality also. The trend of the church today is to identify increasingly with the privileged rather than the underprivileged, the rich rather than the poor. We would do well to remember that Jesus grew up in a carpenter’s home and the majority of His apostles were men who dirtied their hands to earn their living.
But our text does not end on the note of judgment but mercy for mercy triumphs over judgment. When we stand before the law of God we all are condemned as guilty. But the wonderful thing about God’s courtroom is that when we admit our guilt, we are offered mercy. Instead of the sentence of eternal death those who turn from their sin find forgiveness through the shed blood of Jesus and eternal life through His resurrection into new life in His Spirit, having died by the power of His cross to dead works. God’s justice condemns us but God’s mercy and grace forgives and redeems us. That’s God’s system for all who seek His mercy. (Prov. 21:13; Mt. 5:7, 6:14f, 18:21-35).
CONCLUSION
Christian people have too frequently reflected the culture of their day and have shown little concern for the plight of the poor and the oppressed. We have closed our eyes to prejudice, exploitation and injustice. Instead of championing the cause of the weak and oppressed we often cast our lot with the powerful and privileged.
We must let our beliefs control our behavior and not our behavior control our beliefs. We must let our convictions control our conduct and not our conduct control our creed. A test to see if we are loving our neighbor as the Good Samaritan did is seen in how we treat the deprived and dispossessed that come into our fellowship seeking the mercy and forgiveness that we have found.
