James 2 cont’d:
If,
however, you are fulfilling the royal law according to the Scripture, “You
shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well. But
if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. For
He who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do
not commit murder.” Now if you do not commit adultery, but do commit murder, you have
become a transgressor of the law.
Loving our neighbors as ourselves – Jesus said to
do that in second order to loving God with all our heart. In other words, when
we love God…we will love others…and we will do well.
But here again is that word, that sin, that was
mentioned back at the beginning of the chapter, “partiality.” And these verses reiterate that partiality is
just as much a sin as committing adultery or even murder. In fact, I would contend that sometimes when
we show partiality we are committing a murder…of sorts.
When we favor one person over another because of
outward appearance or economic status, we are in essence turning away from a
person of value. And when that person
sees this, it can crush her spirit. It
happens in families all the time. A parent favors the child who does well in
school and shows potential, and disregards the efforts of the child who is a
challenge or makes a mistake.
This is one of the strongest passages in the
bible, in tone. We often shake our head
when we hear of another marriage in shambles because of infidelity, and we
shudder to think that someone was murdered in our town. But do we feel the same emotion when
partiality is rampant in the church?
Maybe we don’t really love God with ALL our
hearts if partiality is present.
It’s something to think about…
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