Loving Our Neighbors
James 2:1-10
My brothers and sisters, believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ must not show favoritism. 2 Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in filthy old 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?
5 Listen, my dear brothers and sisters: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him? 6 But you have dishonored the poor. Is it not the rich who are exploiting you? Are they not the ones who are dragging you into court? 7 Are they not the ones who are blaspheming the noble name of him to whom you belong?
8 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, “You shall not commit adultery,” also said, “You shall not murder. “If you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker.”
If you show favoritism, you sin…
There is no such thing as ‘we are all created equal.’ It is still true however, that we are all created equal under God. As Christians, we believe human value is derived from our creation, not our performance. That’s the connection that makes us brothers and sisters. A child with encephalopathy or autism is no less our brother or sister. Likewise, the reverse is true. A PhD from MIT, with an Olympic gold medal may be incredibly impressive but her standing as a sister—as a child in the family is not changed. I know, in real life, such differences can lower and elevate people’s perceptions, but the biology doesn’t change. Each child is a member of the family. And at least hopefully, each is loved.
In real life, other children in families that include a limited or disabled child often cannot understand why that child gets differential treatment. “He gets what he needs and you get what you need” is a rarely understood explanation. “It’s not fair” is a familiar complaint. We want to believe in a reward and punishment system that is ‘fair’ and predictable. Outsiders are likely to imply that there was something wrong with the parents for such a thing to happen. Empathy would require that we realize that ‘except for the grace of God, go I.’ That is an uncomfortable knowledge. Empathy is hard to come by unless we have been in the situation ourselves.
The rich man with the gold ring in today’s passage does not want to know how fortunate he really is. Such knowledge would expose his vulnerability—so he makes up internal justifications. But as often as not those explanations are ways to avoid our human vulnerability. Differences in talent, abilities, place of birth, etc. are inexplicable but they are certainly observable. It is easier to say ‘we deserve’ or to blame ourselves rather than face the fundamental vulnerability that comes with being a creature. We are vulnerable creatures in a dangerous world.
We don’t like to know that the best we can do in life is change the odds. We cannot control the outcome. We can cross the street in the crosswalk with the light and after looking both ways twice—but a drunk driver can still come careening around the corner and kill us. There is a fine line between our obligation to do all that we can do, and the belief we can do anything if we work/try hard enough. We cross the line frequently. It is what James is referring to when he says: “have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?”
Our sinfulness and evil thoughts are our human rationalizations to explain differences and then to use those rationalizations to justify privilege. Instead of grateful humility, we lean in to self-serving, self-righteous entitlement. In its extreme, we have sophisticated (and I use the term ironically) arguments for a master race. Outsiders are dangerous. Outsiders are lazy, dishonest and promiscuous. This is the language of prejudice. It is the language of “I am better than you. I deserve my station in life and you deserve yours.” The beginning of such thinking is the favoritism described in today’s passage.
It is hard to accept love as a gift. It is a gift that is offered apart from our doing or earning. It is called grace. If you can accept such grace, you will feel grateful. You will be empathic. In real life, however, it takes a very long time to live safely in grace. We mortals are afraid. We yearn for love but all of us have discovered the frailties of people who say I love you. All of us have felt bereft and abandoned. All of us have suffered. It is hard to feel safe in God’s love in such times.
Our favoritism, however, will make such an experience even more difficult. “It’s not fair.” Our “woulda-coulda-shouldas” turn us away from reliance upon God. We attempt to explain what we cannot. And then we act as if our rationalizations are true. We become the arbiters of ‘the good and evil’ in the world when all we can really do is say what we like and don’t like. Each of these behaviors turn us away from a God who inexplicably loves us.
One closing caveat. We would be silly to act as if we should ignore caution. Walking in an impoverished neighborhood or an impoverished country flashing expensive jewelry is a good way to get robbed. Caution should not be thrown to the winds in the name of Christian charity. But that caution should not cross over into profiling and stereotyping. Be mindful of your caution but do not be governed by it. As usual we are stuck needing to discern with inadequate information.
Loving our neighbors means acknowledging our differences without using those differences to lead us into entitlement and disconnection. Let it be so.
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