“The Demons Don’t Serve”
James 2:1-10, 14-19
When I was a freshman in college I became friends with a really awesome guy named Tim.
The first thing Tim asked me when we met, threw me off a little bit.
He asked, “Are you a Christian?”
I don’t know that I had ever had anyone ask me that before and certainly not another teenager such as myself.
But, since I had grown-up attending church and believed in God I answered “Yes.”
Tim and I started hanging out a lot, and we had a lot in common.
One thing, though, which became apparent to me was that Tim’s definition or interpretation of what a Christian was and my interpretation of what a Christian was were quite different.
Tim was actually living it.
And although Tim never second-guessed my proclamation to him that I was a Christian, it was obvious to me that Tim was “sold out” for Christ whereas I was not.
And, I had never met someone my age that was truly “sold-out” for Christ so Tim became someone with whom I became extremely interested in being around.
In contrast to my other friends, where we were always trying to outdo one another in how bad we could be…
…or whatever…
…Tim was trying to be “good” or to do “good” or to follow Jesus as best he could.
One Friday evening, Tim asked me if I wanted to go downtown with him in order to witness to people.
I had no idea what he meant by this, but I went along anyway.
As we walked down the city streets, Tim would walk up to random strangers and ask them if they knew Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
I just sort of walked along with him and watched.
One group of folks we met up with were a small group of homeless men who were drunk and asking for money.
Tim started sharing his faith with these guys when suddenly one of them said, “I don’t have anywhere to stay tonight, mind if I come sleep at your place?”
Tim thought about it for a few seconds and then said, “Sure, that will be fine. Come along with us.”
At that, the guy stuck out his hand and said, “Don’t worry kid, I don’t want to sleep at your place.
I was just testing you to see if you were for real; now I know you are.”
As we walked away, Tim admitted to me that it had been very difficult for him to say: “Yes,” but that he had been convinced that this is what Jesus wanted him to do.
That is being “sold out for Jesus.”
Eventually, God worked on me through my friendship with Tim.
I saw, for the first time, that it was actually possible for a teenager—for a person my age to not only talk the talk but walk the walk…
…and I wanted to do that as well.
Not too long into our friendship, I became “sold out for Christ” as well and I have never been the same person since.
And I wouldn’t trade that decision-- that experience for all the gold in the world.
It changed my life and the direction of my life forever.
I think this is the kind of thing—being “sold out for Christ”…
…not just talking the talk…
…but walking the walk…
…that James is trying to get across to us this morning.
“What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds?
Can such a faith save them?
Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food.
If one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about their physical needs what good is it…
…faith, by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.”
In an old Peanuts comic strip, Charlie Brown and Linus trudge through the snow bundled in fur hats, scarves, gloves and boots.
As they battle the elements, they meet Snoopy.
He’s standing shivering in front of his dog house, looking just plain miserable.
However, Charlie Brown doesn’t do a thing for poor Snoopy except for tell him: “Be of good cheer.”
Linus adds: “Yes, Snoopy, be of good cheer.”
Then they continue on their merry way, leaving Snoopy with what someone has called “a wonderful quizzical look on his face.”
God won’t allow the readers of James Chapter 2 to walk past people who are in dire need, leaving them only with flowery words.
God reminds us, through James, that true Christianity is not just a matter of what we believe or say we believe.
It’s certainly not about the nice words we might sometimes say to people who are needy.
God insists that true Christianity is about how we treat one another.
In fact, God goes so far as to say, through James, that faith without actively loving our neighbor as ourself is dead.
And this is so much at the heart of what the Bible teaches and is about that it is repeated almost verbatim by Paul in Romans and Galatians as well as in 1st John where it says: “If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person?...
…let us not love with words or speech but with actions and truth.”
The Bible is talking about making sure that faith is not just religion, but actually the way we live.
And the concrete example or illustration James uses to get his point across is about showing more attention and favor to a rich person who enters our church gatherings than we do a poor person.
Isn’t it interesting that 1st Century Christians had a difficult time treating all their visitors or guests the same way?
And I would imagine many of you know people who have had bad experiences in churches or you have had bad experiences yourself…
…there have been many people who have been hurt by the church and have thus lost their faith or their interest in Christ.
God forbid that we be a church who leads anyone astray by treating some people as if they were more important than others.
James writes: “My brothers and sisters, believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ must not show favoritism…
… “If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’ you are doing right.
But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers.”
And remember that the Scriptures James is referring to here are the Jewish Scriptures.
There was no canonized New Testament at this point.
And the specific Scripture James references comes from Leviticus 19:18 where it says…
… You guessed it: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
And if we were to take the time to look at Leviticus 19 we would see that loving our neighbor is defined in very down-to-earth terms.
For example, loving our neighbor is about leaving the gleanings from our field for the poor—in other words—feeding the poor, sharing our food.
It’s about dealing honestly with others.
It’s about honoring the handicapped.
It’s about not slandering others, not hating them, and not seeking revenge.
And as we can see from James it’s about not showing favoritism, not judging, not discriminating or playing favorites for any reasons which include—race, religion, gender, intelligence, politics, nationality, skin color—you name it!!!
In the Gospels we see how Jesus accepted everyone without discrimination.
No outcastes were cast out far enough in Jesus’ world to make Him shun them.
Playing favorites is easy, though; loving everyone is hard.
A man named Will Campbell found this out the hard way.
In his two memoirs he describes his own experience of learning to love without limits.
Campbell was an ordained Baptist Preacher who played a central role as an activist and agitator on behalf of African Americans.
But to leave it at that would be to badly represent him.
He worked with the civil rights leaders in the 1950’s.
In 1957, for example, Campbell was one of four people who escorted the 9 black students who integrated Little Rock’s Central High School; and he was the only white person to attend the founding of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference by Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. and the hate mail poured in.
But as he got older, Campbell started to have the uneasy feeling that he hated the people who hated.
He discovered how easy it is to play favorites and to oppress the oppressors.
Strange, he thought, how he enjoyed thinking God hated all the same people that he hated.
He realized that he had created God in his own image, and after his own personal and political likeness.
Can any of us relate?
I can.
Through a series of encounters Campbell came to the conclusion he had played favorites and taken sides; he had subverted the indiscriminate love of God for all people without conditions, limits or exceptions.
And acting upon these convictions, he started sipping whiskey with the Klu Klux Klan.
He did their funerals and weddings, and even befriended the Grand Dragon of North Carolina.
When they were sick he emptied their bed pans.
Since God doesn’t play favorites, Campbell concluded that neither should he.
That is an amazing way to put your faith into action.
It’s a radical illustration of taking the words of Jesus and of James very seriously.
A saint who lived in the late 500’s and into the mid-600’s once wrote: “Blessed is the one who can love all people equally…always thinking good of everyone.”
So, when it comes down to it James Chapter 2 and the entire Bible for that matter is about not showing favoritism toward the rich nor is it about showing favoritism toward the poor.
It is about not showing favoritism toward ALL.
It’s about treating everyone as you would treat Christ.
After-all, what did Jesus use as His measuring rod of life in Matthew 25?
“I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, thirsty and you gave me something to drink, a stranger and you invited me in, sick and in prison and you visited me…
…for whatever you did or didn’t do for others you did or didn’t do for me.”
The life of Christ is a life of unconditional, undiscriminating love.
And, oh boy, isn’t it a relief that this is what God is like???!!!
Everyone has problems, both poor people and rich people.
And everyone has the need to serve God by serving others—both rich and poor alike.
A woman at my last church helped us with our weekly feeding ministry to the homeless in the area.
She was so poor that she too needed some of the food we were taking and delivering to folks.
Yet, she was also a kind of leader in the food ministry, and she often was the one to pray before we went out.
She was also one of the most joyful, humble and fun persons to serve beside.
She helped us all come to know God better.
In our Scripture Reading for this morning, in James 2:18, we have the very famous line: “Someone will say, ‘You have faith; I have deeds.’
Show me your faith without deeds and I will show you my faith by my deeds.”
One of my favorite passages of Scripture, written by Paul and found in Ephesians 2 says that faith is a gift from God.
And salvation is a gift from God.
And “We [those who are sold out for Jesus] are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
Just as clearly as Paul says we aren’t saved by works, he immediately adds that we are created in Christ to do good works, work that God had planned for us to do long ago.
In other words, it’s why we were created in the first place, and it is through faith in Christ we are able to, at least to some extent, fulfill our destiny—doing good works.
The only way we can be the people Jesus created us to be…
…The only way we can fulfill the Royal law—“love your neighbor as yourself” is to be sold out for Christ.
And you know the most exciting thing about all this?
To love others as we love ourselves isn’t really about us at all.
It’s about loving others; the ones in fine clothes, and the ones in smelly rags.
No favorites—or rather all are favorites.
Because when we do that, mercy triumphs over judgement.
Love wins over pride.
Caring brings us freedom.
And we need not worry about competing with the world with the mindset of the one who dies with the most stuff wins!
And what a relief that is.
To get our mind off of self.
To let go of that burden—that stress.
To love others by offering clothing and daily food…
…by welcoming the stranger…
…by focusing on others as if they were Christ Himself…
…this is Perfect Freedom…
…This is the only way to serve God and help change the world.
And that is what we—the Church of Jesus Christ are here for.
And if we aren’t, we might as well pack up and go home.
After-all, even the demons believe…
…the thing is, the demons have no deeds, no love.
Their faith is not saving faith.
A story is told of a town where all the residents are ducks.
Every Sunday the ducks waddle out of their houses and waddle down Main Street to their church.
They waddle into the sanctuary and squat in their proper pews.
The duck choir waddles in and takes its place, and then the duck minister comes forward and opens the duck Bible.
He reads to them: “Ducks! God has given you wings!
With wings you can fly!
With wings you can mount up and soar like eagles.
No walls can confine you!
No fences can hold you!
You have wings.
God has given you wings, and you can fly like birds!”
All the ducks shout, “Amen.”
And then they all waddle home.
There is no time for waddling. It’s time to fly!
God has given us faith.
Faith is for loving, for serving, for saving.
And this world sure needs saving.
We can put our faith to work.
There are so many ministries that this church does and there are so many things that need to be done that aren’t getting done.
What a blessing to be a part of a community where there are so many ways to put our faith into action.
If we aren’t doing this; now is the time.
As James asks: “What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds?
Can such a faith save them?”
Let’s not waste the precious gift God has given us.
Let us not have a dead faith.
Amen.
