“It’s Hip to be Square”
James 2:1-18
In his first year in seminary, Jim Wallis and his friends did a thorough study to find every verse in the Bible that deals with the poor and social injustice.
They came up with thousands.
For example, in three of the Gospels one out of every ten verses deals with these issues.
And in Luke it’s one out of every 7.
And yet they couldn’t remember a single sermon on the poor in their home churches.
One of them found an old Bible and started to cut out every single biblical text about the poor.
Many of the Psalms and Prophets disappeared.
That old Bible would hardly hold together.
They had created a Bible full of holes.
But the real Bible, is not full of holes about loving our neighbor, caring for the poor, the widows, the orphans, the outcastes, the hungry, the homeless.
There are over 2,500 verses in the Bible that deal with these issues.
And it has been suggested that this is God’s plan A for Christians—that we are to address the issues of fairness, the issues of helping the poor, the sick, the hungry…
…and that we are to allow God to work through us to accomplish God’s good plans for this world and for how we are to live our lives.
And that there is no plan B.
Just a plan A.
Even the most faithful Christians have always found it tempting to gut our Bibles in ways similar to this, by naturally overlooking God’s stated concern for the poor, and cutting out the Bible’s calls to care for people who are needy.
A few years ago, I was having a conversation with a Christian woman who was preparing to retire from a career which paid her millions—yes, millions of dollars a year.
She said to me, “I’m trying to figure out what to do in retirement.”
I asked her, “Would you be interested in helping the poor?”
And without skipping a beat, she said, “No.”
While God has a special concern for people who are poor, James suggests that the Christians he is writing to have the opposite preference.
After all, it seems that one day when their worship service was just getting started, two people walked in.
One of them clearly had a lot of money that he spent on a gold ring, and the hippest of clothes.
He may have even smelled a bit like money.
The other person was obviously poor.
We are told he had “filthy old clothes” and probably smelled more like moldy cheese than money.
Everyone watched as the head usher practically tripped over himself to make the rich guy feel welcome.
He gave him a bulletin and perhaps even elbowed a few people out of the way to find the him the best seat in the house.
But the same usher seemed a bit annoyed that the poor man had even decided to darken the door of the church that day.
He might have told him there weren’t any bulletins left and he told him that all the seats were taken so he would have to sit on the floor if he wanted to stay.
Based on appearances, on those tell-tale signs of wealth and poverty, the church James is writing to has “received these two people—who are both equally created in the image of God—very differently.
“Have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts,” James asks them.
In writing this, James makes it clear that it is evil to judge people based on—well based on anything, but certainly included in that is money, class, race, sex, sexual orientation—think of the Ethiopian Eunuch in Acts Chapter 8.
The church has been guilty of such discrimination for centuries now.
And we have always found a way to justify it: “Those people are lazy, or smelly, or dishonest, or genetically inferior, or mentally ill, or twisted up in their thinking.”
There’s always a good reason to treat people differently based on the cover of the book.
But James will have none of it.
Christians are to treat others as we have been treated by God—with non-judgmental, unconditional love and grace.
And that love and grace is the focus of Jame’s next major point.
He refers to the “royal law found in Scripture, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’” and in doing this James is distinguishing between God’s law and the law of the Empire.
The law of the land may allow discrimination, whether its based on race or gender or sexual orientation.
Then the law of the land is changed by Congress or the Supreme Court, and suddenly certain kinds of discrimination are no longer legal—although they still exist.
But Christians are under a higher law, the law of the Kingdom of God.
No matter what the law of the land requires or allows, we are accountable to the law of LOVE.
And the law of Love is written on human hearts through faith in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ and a believer’s complete trust and giving over of one’s life to this truth.
In other words, it’s a faith that transforms our worldly way of thinking.
It’s a faith that doesn’t discriminate.
It’s a faith that leads to action, because love can’t stand around and watch while others suffer.
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 forlornly in front of his doghouse, looking just plain miserable.
However, Charlie Brown does nothing for a shivering Snoopy but tell him, “Be of good cheer.”
Linus adds, “Yes, Snoopy, be of good cheer.”
They continue on their merry way, leaving Snoopy with what someone has called “a wonderful quizzical look on his face.”
“What good is it, my brothers and sisters,” James asks, “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, “God in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?
In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action is dead.”
This is the same thing that Paul says in Galatians when he says that “what
matters” is “faith working through love.”
(pause)
Let’s think about it:
Who are some of the most difficult people to love?
Well, I suppose it would be those who can’t pay us back…
…or those who repulse us…
…those who are most unlike us…
…those whom it is most easy to discriminate against.
Perhaps that is one reason why Jesus went out of His way to honor those on the margins: the sick, the mentally ill, the social outcastes, those deemed by society as “no good rotten sinners,” and especially the poor.
Think about it, Jesus celebrated the gift of the widow who only put two small copper coins into the Temple treasury as if they had been worth two million dollars!!!
And even Jesus’ enemies noticed (although it often frustrated them to no end) that Jesus didn’t judge people by the positions they held or the money they made.
It’s been said that this Scripture passage “speaks not only to the profound issue of acceptance but potentially to the inclusion of the ‘uncool.’”
And how many of us have felt “uncool” at some point in our lives?
Maybe we feel that way now.
Perhaps we feel that way most of the time.
If that is the way YOU feel, you are not alone.
As Hughie Lewis and the News used to sing: “It’s hip to be Square”!!!
And within the Kingdom of God, it is “hip” to be the person God created you to be…
…loving, impartial, filled with mercy, kind, patient, forgiving, accepting…
…and I could go on and on and on…
…for after-all, YOU and I and EVERYONE else were created to imitate the Divine Image of God Who is all these things and more—much, much more!!!!
Again, there is no plan B!!!
From an article in USA Today, I read this:
“In Portland, Oregon, the homeless gather under the Burnside Bridge.
For more than three years, carloads of Christians from Bridgetown Ministries have shown up on Friday nights and ministered to these needy men and women.
In addition to providing hot meals, shaves, and haircuts, some of the volunteers wash the homeless people’s feet.”
The writer of the article described this as “one of the most audacious acts of compassion and humility I have ever seen.”
The article states, “This group of society’s outcastes had their bare feet immersed in warm water, scrubbed, dried, powdered, and placed in clean socks.
One man reported with a smile, ‘I can’t find the words to describe how good that felt.’”
The writer of the article commented that “Washing someone’s feet is an act best performed while kneeling.
Given the washer’s position, and the unpleasant appearance and odor of a homeless person’s feet, it’s hard to imagine an act more humbling.”
Preparing for this outreach, the leader of the ministry offered these words: “When you go out there tonight, I want you to look for Jesus.
You might see Him in the eyes of a drunk person, a homeless person…we’re just out there to love on people.”
That is the kind of Christianity that converts people!!!
This is what it means to live out the “royal law of Christ—Love your neighbor as yourself.”
This is putting our faith into action; this is faith working through love: “Jesus shaped faith”!!!!
“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
Isn’t this impossible?
It is.
It is, unless we allow Jesus to love through us.
It’s a journey I wouldn’t miss for all the money in the world.
How about you?
Mother Teresa had a prayer which I’d like us to bow our heads and pray together: “O Jesus…grant that, even if you are hidden under the unattractive disguise of anger, of crime, or of madness, I may recognize you and say, ‘Jesus, you who suffer, how sweet it is to serve you’”—how sweet it is to love you.
In Jesus’ name we pray.
Amen.
