Introduction
Let me begin with a discipleship question: will we trust and obey Jesus in the real decisions of everyday life? Christ forms us through truth received, repentance practiced, and obedience lived out.
Main Points
Grace and Justification
we've been studying the book of james for the last month or a month and a half in a series that we're calling gospel on the ground we're really going to going to get to that today this will be a combination of the amazing truth of the gospel the good news of god's love and really as james will do throughout this letter to these churches now do it now here's what it looks like in your life outside of the church and so why don't we start by reading the first little bit of this if you're familiar with james at all if you've been around a sermon series in the book of james or study it yourself you know that we're approaching the dynamite section of this of this book where james is going to talk about faith and works and how they are related and if they can exist apart from one another we're not going to get there today but the theme of faith is really what all of this next chapter is going to be about and so we're going to talk about the faith that we have in god and the way that we practically see that played out in our life you say you have faith here's what it looks like so read along with me in james chapter 2 starting in verse 1 it says my brethren do not hold the faith of our lord jesus christ the lord of glory with partiality for if there should come into your assembly a man with gold rings and fine apparel and there should also come in a poor man in filthy clothes and you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and say to him you sit here in a good place and say to the poor man you stand over there or sit here at my foot still have you not shown partiality among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts listen my beloved brethren has god not chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which he promised to those who love him but you've dishonored the poor man do not the rich oppress you and drag you into the courts do not they blaspheme by the name by which you are called if you really fulfill the royal law according to the scripture you shall love your neighbor as yourself and you do well but if you show partiality you commit sin and are convicted by the law as a transgressor you heard a word come up you got an illustration as we're reading you're tracking along you get a picture as james will often give us of what it looks like to have partiality in the execution of the gospel and so we're going to talk about that illustration that is shared but we're not going to get there as quickly as we often do when reading this passage because often this is directly applied again to the way that we treat each other because the illustration is all about that but we cannot glaze over the very first verse that we read because it is the nucleus of this whole message it is verse 1 that james is using as reason to share the illustration that we're going to study today so i read again verse 1 to really set up the theme as to why partiality is so dangerous he says again brethren don't hold the faith of our lord jesus christ the lord of glory with partiality this is something that james is going to talk about in regards to the way that we trust and believe in god don't hold faith in jesus with partiality and it's this verse that causes us to actually look backwards again before we look forward so you come to church after a month and a half and you say finally we're in chapter two not so fast we're going to talk about chapter one just for a second it's worth considering where this motivation from james letters is coming from this is not disconnected james wrote to this church the church is scattered abroad we study this now with our own context of trial difficulty unforeseen circumstances happening in their church and he says when that happens when you get scattered when trials come trust god trust god with joy trust god in a desire to have god's wisdom or strategy for how to get through it and trust god that allows you to overcome the temptation to trust other things and so we often read the bible with the chapter breaks as page breaks or theme breaks this is the same theme this is all about faith and trust in god and so consider what we're being asked to trust in god as we thought about all of this for the last six weeks i'll let fb meyer give us a very concise summary when we think about what it means that we're holding faith it's like we're clinging to our trust in jesus here's what fb meyer says to recap everything we've been studying he says there are three urgent requirements for all of us wisdom to act and speak wisely in the hour of trial have joy because god's wisdom will give you the strategy to see his whole plan and why whatever trial you're going through is actually something that is good for your life in christ so wisdom for the trial faith that refuses to respond to the surging billows of doubt that is part of what holding the faith has to deal with you hold faith in christ and you hold it with all sorts of leaky aspects to the vessel and doubt will creep in and james says don't doubt don't be double-minded don't ask god for wisdom and then also look for wisdom in all of the strategies that exist apart from god and then finally humility and contentment with god's dealings this was what we talked about in the verses leading up to this we're really slow to speak and quick to listen and we want to be doers of whatever god says but let's not deceive ourselves and just and say well just because we're doing religious stuff it means that we're doing god's religious stuff that's why last week james says really pure and undefiled religion has to do more with orphans and widows than what your religious activity allows for and you're deceiving yourselves in other words be content in god's plan and don't tell him how to be god that is the faith that james says now hold on to it and what's going to happen when you leave this place is every one of these aspects of the summary of everything we've been talking about will be tried and one of the ways that will be tried is when something walks through the doors of the assembly or your life that says what about this what if god could actually be helped along by some other method of provision or some other method of strategy for the blessing of your church or your gathering so we're going to look at this in terms of the way your faith as you're called to hold on to it this is a message for the believers if you're not a believer this morning i hope you listen and hear the way that we believe in god unto our joy as an invitation to join us but there are three things that we read that we're going to cover this morning as we go through this first the thesis of the whole morning is to hold faith in christ in the circumstances of our world of your specific life and of all of the call that god has for you the believer cling to the faith and the first aspect of what we read is that will be tested there is a test to the faith the second thing that james leads us in is he says there's also a choice as any good test presents itself now there's a decision that must be made in your choosing and how do we make that choice and finally something that we often don't talk about in the age of grace in the gospel of grace is that there is actually a grade we read a verse today that said you know how you do this is either pass fail it's either you're doing it or you're a transgressor so we're going to talk about how this plays out in our life so we have a test we have a choice and we have a grad a grade and the test now brings us to the illustration i say this is the test of the text this morning and not simply the thesis because holding the faith is now going to give us a picture of what this may or may not look like in our life so let's re-read this moment where james is going to give us an illustration to say imagine in your desire to not be partial to trust god and not trust other things imagine it playing out in the assembly of church so we read it he says consider this you're being called to trust god but into your assembly a man with gold rings and fine apparel walks in and there should come also a poor man in filthy clothes and you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and say to him sit here in a good place and to the poor man you're like sit over there or make a spot right here i the attention is really for the person that represents all sorts of provision all sorts of material goods and wealth and a lavish lifestyle and before we get to the judgment of that in our gathering just consider the context in which we're reading this is a church that was scattered abroad and as we went through the initial uh the initial thrust of studying that it was like consider the circumstance they're in a certain spot they're persecuted because of their faith they need to flee to new regions of the world for safety they continue to trust god but it's hard and if you've ever moved from one region of the world to another you know that move comes with a lowering of the economic status it's okay i'll do anything to find work i'm new to this area i have left my economic relationship with my old place and here i am just looking for it and in many ways that's the church that james is writing to so sympathize with them for a second when all of a sudden they're gathering they're praying for wisdom give us wisdom because we don't have joy and we need it we're in trials and there's all sorts of temptation and comes the rich guy and they're like oh my gosh maybe our prayers are being answered because this guy could solve a lot of problems and the temptation potentially in all of the ways that they are trying to trust god is to say okay thank you god now we can really trust this guy if we get more guys like that if there's more people that are rich we'd have a better shot at actually caring for orphans and widows and actually you know getting our feet on the ground for the new places that we're in and in their honoring of the rich person they are now neglecting another person that walks in and the person that walks in is you saw a picture on the screen it's like maybe homeless it's like the clothes aren't great what they have done james will say is that they've judged with evil thoughts they've said this is the way god can provide and this guy's an afterthought they've made room for earthly possessions to somehow be their hope and they've neglected what god often times chooses and the lesson for the church age and for the way the gospel works and for the reflection of the image of god is that is not how god operates god is not partial to what people bring to the table as how much he can use them or not and so james rightly says if you've done that you've totally judged with evil thoughts because you're looking to them to somehow give to you're judging before you're loving jesus will as james and jesus often do well will support this message and come alongside our understanding of this there was a moment in the gospel of luke where jesus tells one of his famous parables we actually call it the parable of the rich fool where jesus will warn against someone who looks to earthly possessions as the way that their life could be content and provided for before he tells the story it's good to know why he told it there was a man who came up to jesus and said hey will you tell your brother to split the my brother to split the inheritance with me we've got a dispute our father has died and we can't figure out who gets the stuff and as they always say where there's a will there's a relative and that's what's happening here to which jesus says something that's very helpful for us it's just why we can believe that this is not how god operates it comes down to the essence of how he made us jesus says this take heed and beware of covetousness for one's life does not consist in the abundance of things he possesses it is true for one's life it is true for the life of a church it's true for the liveliness and the spirit of god for the gathering of believers to worship god never mind the possessions that exist in the assembly because the spirit of god and the way that we come alive to worship him is really the abundance of who we are and the stuff which we're grateful for has no impact on whether or not we can truly love god and love one another here's how wesley says it if you judge and you and you think that the rich person is a better provision of god you judge ill or you reason ill and so judge wrong for fine apparel is no proof of the worth in him that wears it's a john wesley quote so i tried to figure out what kind of shoes he would have been wearing he's an older he's an older uh a preacher but the point is this what i see right now tells me nothing about the state of your soul and nothing about the way that god wants to use you to be part of the assembly and i love when the word gives a message to the church that the church can so easily give to the culture because we live in a time where i actually think as a church we do this pretty well i didn't plan on the opportunities that would be presented today before church but it just so happened that we have an opportunity to give gifts to poorer people across the world and to visit people who are homeless and it seems as though there's a great excitement in this church about those things so that's a good thing this is not necessarily an admonishment this is just us taking a pulse of what the word is calling us to be and saying okay how are we doing at that and i think one of the reasons that this test text is so nourishing is that we live in a time where to not judge things on the outward appearance means you're going against the tide of the culture because we live in a culture that loves the outward appearance that elevates people based off the way they look on the outside and the clothes that they wear and the lifestyle that they present and the culture makes a lot of room for those at the top of the economic stratosphere and does not make a lot of room for those at the bottom so as the church gets this right we actually increase our witness to what is actually valuable about a life and it's important that we share this with the way that we live it out and also the way that we admonish one another on how to live and how to be lights in the dark because as much as the culture is buying into the lie that you can tell who to follow and who to listen to and who admire based off clothes and lifestyle they're being burdened by the in the inability to actually live it out there's young people everywhere that don't feel sufficient because they think that life well lived is seen on a feed and it's not so we have to be refreshed by this message for the way that we gather the way that we allow the gospel to make us impartial people towards one another and the message that we bring to the world that we are not trying to collect the rich people to provide for the church and then all the things that we do are judged by how well those rich provisions do for us so that's the of the test the illustration for the people that practically walk in but i want to share the definition of the word partial to you because remember this is just an illustration so that we can all get a test in our lives for how this faith lives in our heart so listen to the definition of partial it says this favoring one side in a dispute above the other or being biased james says don't have a partial faith here's one way you might see it play out if you do but the core of the message is do not put your trust in god with a biased view of how he should direct your life do not say god give me wisdom and the wisdom i'm really looking for is wisdom how to do the thing that i have planned i call that the bible college prayer how many of you have been to bible college and you have that moment when someone thinks they're called to marry another person unbeknownst to the other person and they start praying for the lord's will to be done by opening their eyes and directing their class their class steps together and if the person said no it's like change their mind lord i just want your will to be done in a very specific way this is an illustration of how the faith that we hold can be by us in just everyday life we all have a preference for the life that we want to live we have a desire that comes to the lord that says take my life i'm yours and i'd prefer it to be over here i'm partial for things about my life and there's a great danger in that uh read proverbs chapter 3 verse 7. many of you hear proverbs chapter 3 and you automatically think of the tattoo because there's a very common tattoo that says trust in the lord with all your heart verses five through six always read the verse after the tattoo that's probably where the real crux of the message is and for this it says this don't be wise in your own eyes fear the lord and depart from evil james is comparing this to evil in your life we wish that evil lived in a much more compartmentalized sense and that's why james will give them a lesson next week as we study it that it's not enough to just not murder and not commit adultery the lord is judging you based off how much his life in you is actually everything about you and we are so biased towards what we want here is a little axiom for you to remember this in your own life in how we hold the faith hold the faith in our lord listen to this trusting god means letting go of your default preferences that's what it means to not be partial because every single one of you have been saved came into the kingdom with all sorts of preferences that are being called to the cross jesus says anyone who wants to be my disciple pick up a cross and follow me so the gospel is this jesus died on the cross for your sins but he did not die on the cross so you wouldn't have to die he died on the cross to teach you how to die and we all come and we say okay lord i accept the free gift of forgiveness of sins i'm not so sure about the cross the cross is where you take your preferences that existed for the way you wanted your life to go and you lay them at the feet of the lord and you say no longer my will whatever you have for me in whatever wherever whenever whatever i am now being directed by you in a way that will no longer be by us i will not tell you how to be my lord that's holding the faith without partiality and if you're doing that you're not going to tell god how he can love people through you're not going to choose the politics that you'll love and the neighborhoods that you love and the racial groups that you love and the ethics that you'll love you say god i'm yours without bias you do you can do whatever you want in me so i use my own life as an example of that because i've been called to a cross and for those of you who only know me through a pulpit or through a church you'd think this guy must just love being a pastor he's up there every sunday you do what you love and i do love it in my spirit i love it in the same way for the joy set before the lord he endures the cross but there is a flesh inside of me that identifies more with the rich man with than with the pastor there's a there's a person that lives deep inside my soul that lives in the caribbean and he works on a yacht and he has a scuba dive shop that he works on the weekends and he never does any ministry and he never shares the gospel he lives for himself and he lives as though the rich man was walking through the doors and i see myself in the rich man that's my flesh that's what i want i don't want to preach in my flesh but i do when i'm picking up my cross and i'm following the lord and i'm saying without bias god without partiality you get my whole life because you gave me yours what does that look like in your life what does it look like to trust so god trust in god so much that you lay down your default setting this is what i was going to do these are the people i like in my flesh it's easy to like these people james is saying do not hold the faith with partiality the test is in the people but the core of your soul is how partial you are for the will of god for your own life so now we come to the choice because james has made it clear there are two people you've neglected one to prefer the other and now he's going to talk about the way god chooses which is so differently than the way that we choose so here comes the word choice in our scripture listen verse 5. listen my beloved brethren has god not chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which he promised to those who love him so if you want to follow christ you want the same spirit that was in christ now in you directing your life in a way that has laid your preferences down you start to choose what god chooses and james says if the two people walk in think about the model of god this is not a message to make anyone feel burdened by the economic status that they have this is a message to say the poor man was neglected the rich man was treated great that's great if you treat anyone the way that he was treated come sit down the problem is that we neglect the things of god we make room for some things that we like and we don't make room for the things that god has made the most room for god chose the poor god chose those who would receive him as the lord of glory not as an option for the wisdom of their life and aren't we glad that this is the message that god chooses the least likely that we're not presenting god with our credentials this morning to worship him to receive his word to receive his spirit freely and to go live for him says in first corinthians chapter one for you see your calling brethren that not many wise according to the flesh and not many mighty not many noble are called not many doesn't mean not any it means that there is a model by which god surprises people by not choosing who man would elect and to be honest we all have these moments where we would elect way differently than god does for the offices of the church and ministry and missions and all the things that he does to push the gospel forward haven't we all sensed that have we all felt that sense of assurance when we find out a certain celebrity is a believer you're like yes we got him that's awesome i love tim tebow and i do love tim tebow i love this music artist the celebrity it's like man don't we all have someone in our mind it's like if they got saved how many others would get saved for me that's bob marley i've spent way too long arguing with people over whether bob marley confessed christ on his deathbed and for me i listen to those songs and i'm like i got to tell all my hippie friends that we got bob marley and they should get in so they can continue to have the joy of bob marley it's like that's not who god chose now i don't know the status of bob marley's soul but i know that if i give my hippie friends bob marley and not christ i'm failing them and if we think that this world needs another celebrity to be convinced we are failing the method that god works by he does not work by elevating men he works by elevating christ if you've been coming to our wednesday service we are actually um there's a thread that is existing now between uh last wednesday and this because tom velasco and if you haven't listened to sermon you certainly should uh he did a recap of how we got to the story of jacob and leah and it's like okay that's a weird story but there's a there's a summary that he gave us that was like look at the way that god chooses so differently than we do because culture and world and throughout time inheritance and honor goes to the first born son and time and time again throughout scripture god says but that's not how i work now ishmael is the firstborn and ishmael came from a just a thriving young woman but i choose isaac w
Conclusion
We return to the opening teaching: discipleship is not just information, it is transformation through faith and obedience to Jesus. If we receive His Word and walk it out, He will shape us into people who endure and bear fruit.
Lord Jesus, help me hear Your Word, obey it with faith, and grow as Your disciple. Amen.
Conclusion
We return to the opening teaching: discipleship is not just information, it is transformation through faith and obedience to Jesus. If we receive His Word and walk it out, He will shape us into people who endure and bear fruit.
Closing Prayer
Lord Jesus, help me hear Your Word, obey it with faith, and grow as Your disciple. Amen.