A man and 24 of his friends and family and were refused service at a restaurant in Charleston, South Carolina. The reason: Michael Brown and his group are African-American. Apparently another customer - a white woman - complained that she felt threatened by their presence and Brown and his entourage got the boot. No, this snub didn’t take place 50 years ago when Martin Luther King and others were fighting for racial equality in the States; it happened last week. That kind of discrimination would never happen in Canada, would it? It certainly would never occur in our congregation, right? Before you answer those questions with an emphatic “No!” consider how the Apostle James had to remind Christians 2,000 years ago that God’s favorites have no favorites. The Holy Spirit wants us to learn that those who claim to be believers in the true God will show genuine love to all people regardless of their economic status or race. Nonchalance about our failure to do this invites God’s eternal anger.
Listen again to how James begins our sermon text. “My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don’t show favoritism. 2 Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. 3 If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, “Here’s a good seat for you,” but say to the poor man, “You stand there” or “Sit on the floor by my feet,” 4 have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?” (James 2:1-4)
According to James, members of the early church struggled with the sin of discrimination. We’re not talking Ku Klux Klan-type of discrimination where they were barring certain kind of people from their congregations. It was a more subtle prejudice. If an obviously wealthy person attended the service, the members would fawn over the individual and direct him to a seat of honor. Someone would perhaps run and get him a coffee while another introduced him to the pastor. There would be smiles all around. But if a homeless person walked through their doors, there would be a moment of inaction as members would glance at each other to see who was going to dispatch the “interloper.”
James says that such discrimination is motivated by “evil thoughts” - evil not just because the poor person was treated like dirt, but evil because the rich individual was seen as a gold mine, an object to exploit rather than a sinner to serve. Do James’ words hit close to home? When we think of the kind of people we want to join St. Peter’s, don’t we pray for a few millionaires? That would make paying our mortgage a breeze and easily allow us to keep two called workers on staff! A few well-connected members would also boost our congregation’s standing in the community. I’d love to be known as the mayor’s pastor.
Like us, the Christians of James’ day were more eager to welcome the rich and powerful than the poor. The irony was that it was the rich who were exploiting these Christians. So why were the members so eager to please them? The fact is God delights in showering the poor and the down and out of this world with the riches of faith. It is often the shut-in and the pensioner, not the high-powered CEO, from whom we can learn the most about what it means to express and exercise humble faith in Jesus.
But we shouldn’t think James is saying that anyone who is rich is exploitative. To assume that is to become judgmental in another way, just as I discriminate if I look at the car you drive and the vacations you take, and assume that you can do this because you’re not a generous giver to the Lord. Such an attitude can only be prompted by thoughts of jealousy and covetousness. Instead of being happy for you, I find it easier to condemn you and pat myself on the back for my supposed super-righteousness. This is the sin that James is warning us against.
Ah, but so what if we harbor thoughts of discrimination? It’s not like we’re hurting anyone the way a gangster might. James anticipated that kind of response and so he wrote: “If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing right. 9 But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. 10 For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking 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 commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker” (James 2:8-11).
What James is saying is that no one would dare make the claim that, because they haven’t murdered, they’re free to cheat on their spouse. No, God wants us to keep all of his commands, not just some of them. Therefore we dare not say to ourselves: “I’ve been faithful to my spouse, and I don’t steal so what does it matter if I discriminate and judge others from time to time?” It does matter. To break one of God’s commands is to break them all, James explains. If I come upon an electric fence, it’s foolish of me to think that it will only shock me if I run into it ten times in ten different places. No, that fence will shock the first time I touch it - even if I brush up against it accidently. Likewise it doesn’t matter whether I break one of God’s commands by accident or smash all of them on purpose. I am a lawbreaker deserving of God’s eternal judgment. So don’t discriminate! It’s a sin that God takes seriously and so should we. Students, that’s something for you to take to heart as you go back to school. It’s OK to have “best friends” that you like hanging out with, but as a Christian take the lead in showing love and respect to those kids that others find easy to pick on and laugh at. Eat with them at lunch. Invite them to join your games at recess. Show them Christian love because God’s favorites have no favorites.
But if Christians are not to discriminate, why do we seemingly do just that when we celebrate the Lord’s Supper? Why do I regularly announce before Holy Communion that it is a meal only for members who have studied thoroughly what the Lord’s Supper is and who agree with everything that we teach here? Isn’t this a form of discrimination which James and Jesus himself would despise? To draw that conclusion is to ignore what James says in our text about following the “royal law” – that well-known command to love your neighbor as yourself. I show love for my neighbor when I ensure that all those who come to Communion are properly prepared for it. The Bible teaches that Holy Communion is not a symbolic meal of bread and wine; it’s a miraculous meal where along with bread and wine we receive Jesus’ body and blood for the forgiveness of sins. If we don’t know or believe this truth, we would harm ourselves by partaking of the Lord’s Supper says the Apostle Paul (1 Corinthians 11:27-30). Therefore it would not be loving of me to invite anyone to the Lord’s table who has not had a chance to study this truth and confess it. Just as we expect our physicians to ask what kind of allergies we have lest he prescribes medication that can harm us, so it’s my role as shepherd of this congregation to ask that all those who come to Holy Communion properly prepare themselves for it. But you can’t do this if you don’t know how. So our practice of closed Communion is not a practice of discrimination; it’s a practice of love - love for God’s Word and love for people.
But now let me turn your attention back to our sermon theme: God’s favorites have no favorites. Do the first two words of that theme make you uncomfortable? How can God have favorites? He does. I’m his favorite…and so are you. This is an unfathomable truth about God. He loves me and he loves you as if we’re the only people in the world to love. That’s the truth that baptism and the Lord’s Supper highlight. In the sacraments God comes to us individually and speaks to us of his undying love, grace, and forgiveness – won for us by the death of his beloved Son, Jesus.
And why should God loves us like this? It isn’t because we deserve his love. I’m the discriminator that James speaks against in our text. I discriminate when I fervently pray for certain people on our Friendship Newsletter list while rarely thinking about the others. I can’t drive down the road without discriminating as I look at the way people dress and the cars they drive and make judgments about them. Do you also struggle with the sin of discrimination? I’m sure you do. So why does God love us? Because he doesn’t want us to die in these sins and suffer in hell. That’s what he sent Jesus to do in our place.
But since Jesus earned this forgiveness for all people, we can say that God’s favorites (believers in Jesus) have no favorites. There isn’t a person you’ll meet for whom Jesus didn’t die. There isn’t a life in this world that isn’t precious to God. That means that this church we are building is not just for us. It’s for everyone regardless of race, economic status, or hockey allegiance for that matter! That truth means that you’ll to be friendly to everyone who walks through these doors – no matter what past encounters you may have had with them. God’s favorites have no favorites because Jesus’ blood does not discriminate; it has forgiven all of our sins and all the sins of everyone else in this world. May God help us proclaim this truth not just in sermons but also in our actions. Amen.
Sermon Notes
James spoke against the sin of discrimination in our text. He said that discrimination is a sin because it is motivated by “evil thoughts” - evil not just because the poor were treated like dirt, but evil because the rich were seen as a gold mine. What did he mean?
Many of the rich people in James’ day were exploiting Christians. While James was divinely inspired in his assessment, why do we have to be careful not to draw the same conclusions about the rich today?
Why is the biblical practice of close(d) Communion not discrimination? Practice explaining your answer in a loving way so you’re ready the next time a visitor objects to our practice.
How did James address those who would say: “James, there are bigger sins to worry about than the sin of discrimination!”
The sermon theme stated: God’s favorites have no favorites. How can we say that God has favorites?
How can our congregation do a better job of making everyone feel welcome? How can YOU do a better job of making everyone feel welcome?
Was there anything in the sermon you didn’t understand or have questions about? Share them here.
