It was a communion Sunday in the year 1865, a communion Sunday like we have participated in this morning. The month was June of the year 1865. If you know a little bit of history, you know that is shortly after the Civil War ended. And in a white church in the south on that communion morning, a black man entered the church. When the time came, he walked down the center aisle and he knelt at the altar. You can imagine it was causing quite a stir. What he did, there was a rustle of shock and some anger that kind of swept through the congregation. No one quite knew what to do. A distinguished layman immediately stepped up and he also walked forward to the altar and he knelt down beside his colored brother. Captured by his spirit, the whole congregation followed. The layman who set that example was a name most of you will know Robert E. Lee. I was doing some research on this and there's two newspaper clippings that are still around that describe that event from an eyewitness. And this person this person who writes this was among those who was offended. The article was called Negro communed at St. Paul's Church. Richmond Times Dispatch April 16th 1905 page five Colonel LT Brown said it was communion day. And among those who first rose and advanced to the communion table was a tall well-dressed Negro man and his words very black. This was a great surprise and shock to the communicants and others present who frequented this most noted of churches in Virginia's very prestigious church in Virginia. Its effect upon the communicants was startling and for several moments they retained their seats in solemn silence and did not move being deeply chagrined. General Robert E. Lee was present and he, ignoring the action and the very presence of the Negro, immediately arose in his usual dignified and self-possessed manner, walked up the aisle of the church to the chancel rail and reverently knelt down not far from where the Negro was. This lofty conception of duty by General Lee under such, as this guy described him, under such provoking and irritating circumstances had a magic effect upon the communicants who immediately also went forward. I being one of the number did likewise. As we return to our study of James chapter two, I think it's fitting on this Lord's table morning together with the Lord's church on this Lord's day that we remind ourselves that our Lord's death purchased people from every tribe and from every tongue and from every nation and from every ethnicity together to praise the Lord's name. As we celebrate communion we are reminded and should be reminded of our union together in Christ in his body which the bread pictures a body of people purchased by his precious blood which the cup pictures. We may not live in the South around the Civil War time. We may not live in Victorian England as we discussed last week with their pride and prejudice in other areas of society. We may not live in Palestine during the time when the book of James was being written, but we do live on planet Earth as human beings. And whether our discrimination, I don't say if, but whether our discrimination or partiality or pride or prejudice takes a different form, whether it's racial in nature like in that story or towards those in rags versus those who are rich like in the story James tells, or whether we simply judge people by externals or look down on some and exalt others in our mind because of the world's way of thinking like in our world and in our own personalized example of what this passage is about. All such sin has no place in the blood bought communion of our Lord Jesus Christ the crucified beautiful savior that we just sang about who died to not only save and to bring together all types of humanity but who died to abolish all such sin at the cross. I want to ask if you would stand in honor of God's Word as we read James 2 verses 1 through 9. My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism. For if a man comes into your assembly with gold rings, dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, And you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes and say, you sit here a good place. You say to the poor man, you stand over there, sit down by my footstool. Have you not made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil motives? Listen, my beloved brethren, did not God choose 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 have dishonored the poor man. Is it not the rich who oppress you and personally drag you into court? Do they not blaspheme the fair name by which you have been called? 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. This is the word of our Lord. You can be seated. We saw last week, if you were here and if you weren't here, I would encourage you to get that message so you can understand the flow of what's been going on here, all of which we won't review this morning. But there is an application in this text for all of us, whether we feel this exact particular illustration is a sin of ours is verse nine says it is sin. Anytime any partiality is being shown, Or as verse 1 says, God is forbidding even within us even an attitude of personal favoritism and how we look upon others and how we favor on and focus on certain types of people to the neglect of others we consider less important by our scale. Or as verse 3 says, when we pay special attention to only certain types of people based on externals and worldly values. Or as verse 4 says, any distinctions or any discriminations because we have judged somebody with sinful thinking None of that has any place in the church of Jesus Christ. The concern that James has, the concern that God's word has, which ultimately this is, is that this is no small thing. This prejudice, this partiality, this favoritism, the very gospel itself is the issue here. It is God's glory, which happens to be the most important thing in the universe. It is as valuable as the precious blood of Christ himself. The Lord's glory and his gospel of grace through faith is how this text begins in verse one, which really sets the tone for the chapter. And if you're a note taker, you're going to notice each of these three points, the inconsistencies of Christian prejudice here. Each of these have to do with the gospel and have to do with the glory of God. Number one, the first inconsistency of any Christian prejudice is it contradicts the gospel and God's glory in salvation. It contradicts the very gospel and God's glory in salvation. James says in v. 5, listen. And he's speaking to those who we're not listening to or looking to the needs of others in the body of Christ. He is wanting the attention of those who are not giving proper attention to some in the body of Christ who may be more needy than them and may not be able to do much in return like the orphans and widows a few verses earlier, but who are in greater need than those they tend to focus on. pleading with them here with passion and with emotion and brotherly love when he adds in verse 5 listen my beloved brethren he pulls out this this title here to us to express his affection as he is seeking their attention expressing his own care and love for these Christian brothers of his who should be loving their fellow brothers who are in the same family of Christ and this is so important to James because this is so inconsistent when they fail to do this it's so inconsistent with the very gospel we believe in as verse one says for us to dishonor the poor or the lowly of this world or whoever we might be tempted to do that to by excluding from our attention those who have received the attention of God's saving mercy if Jesus is as glorious as verse one says and of course he is If He is the very Lord of glory or the glorious Lord Himself and He is, we contradict and we corrupt God's glory in saving sinners when we dishonor those He came to save. When we consider as less important the poor or really anyone in the body of Christ, we are treating the shed blood of our Savior as less important than it is. And we are treating God as less glorious than He is. And we are treating the gospel of sovereign saving grace as less amazing than it is as well. When we neglect, James is saying, our brethren who are in rags or in our day, whatever it might be that we look down upon in our day today, like the guy at the end of verse 2, or when we give him or anyone a lower seat, whether we do that verbally or visually, even just in our own mind, mentally, we are neglecting the fact that in God's sight all of us have nothing but filthy rags of righteousness and none of us would be saved if God did not choose to condescend to give His grace to us. The glory of the gospel is that Jesus takes some of the most poor, some of the most needy, some of the most lowly, some of the most empty who are destined for hell. And by his grace alone, as verse five says, he chooses to make them rich in faith and to make them heirs of the kingdom who are destined for heaven instead. I love the way Second Corinthians 521 describes the gospel concisely. God made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in him. God made him who knew no sin, that's Jesus, to be sin, literally to be our sin bearer, to bear the sins of us, to be the, literally he says, to become sin so that we might become, so that we might, as our sins are given to Christ, that we might receive the righteousness of Christ, that we might become the righteousness of God in him. God made Jesus, who was without sin, to be sin so that we might be made righteous. Jesus at the cross takes the filthy rags of sin from the redeemed and He trades them for His perfect robes of righteousness as the Old Testament prophets speak of. He credits believers with His perfect righteous life when they trust in Him so that they can actually meet the standard that God has which is be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect, absolute perfection, glorious holiness, cannot look on any evil, nothing sinful can be in His presence. The only way a sinful man can ever be acceptable before a holy God is if the actual perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ is given to that person as a Gift and that is the amazing glorious truth of the gospel. What a beautiful Savior we have. Amen That is what our Lord Jesus did Jesus laid aside his royal robes and his regal rights above to be down here He traded praises for pride and prejudice against him to be mocked and to be maligned and misunderstood even by his own brothers who James the writer of this epistle originally was one of those before he converted. Jesus gave up temporarily and voluntarily all the glories of heaven to hear people down here his whole life really insult and revile him and say all manner of evil against him falsely. Instead of his rightful crown as king of the universe, he gets a crown of thorns from pagan soldiers who were spitting on him and mocking him and giving this robe as a joke and putting a name tag above his cross that says, King of the Jews. Instead of the nations being under his feet, men from the Roman nation nail his feet and his hands to a tree that his hands as God had created that very wood that they nailed him to. They murdered the very one who gave them life. That is the Savior that we have. That is the depths to which He came. And if you look at verse 5 again, the amazing truth is that Jesus chose to not only save many poor and lowly, He chose to become poor and lowly Himself to do so. He went from splendor to a stable. He went from the mansions in heaven to a manger down here with manure smell all around to be born to a poor and humble couple so that all who are spiritually poor and humble can be born again if they will trust in Him as their Lord. Jesus became the Son of Man so that we might become the sons and daughters of God in heaven. That is an amazing thing. The Prince became a pauper. The Master Himself became a servant so that we might be a part of His kingdom. We who rejected Him at that moment, we were His enemies and hated Him. He had no home on earth so that we might have a home in heaven. He died so that we can live. He became poor to make His chosen rich. What a wonderful Savior we have. What a glorious Lord we have. Turn to Luke 2, and I want you to see this in Luke's Gospel, how central this is to the very Gospel itself. Jesus went from riches in heaven to rags on earth so that others in rags here could have riches in heaven. And not just in the next life. This verse speaks of how God chooses to save certain physically poor people and to make them spiritually rich, rich in faith here as well. Hallelujah, what a Savior we have. And in Luke chapter 2, this is really the very heart of the gospel. This is the height of God's glory. As the gospel of Luke begins, the good news in verse 10, or the gospel depending on your translation, it first came to poor shepherds, the lowliest ones in society. The angel said to them in verse 10, do not be afraid for behold I bring you good news gospel of great joy which will be for all the people for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior who is Christ the Lord this will be a sign for you you will find a baby wrapped in claws and lying in a manger in a feeding trough what a poor humble lowly way to start but that is our Lord and Suddenly it says there appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying glory to God in the highest. This is the highest manifestation of God's glory right here. Verse 20 it says the shepherds went back glorifying after they had seen this they went back glorifying and praising God. This theme really struck me in the book of just this one gospel of Luke and Luke 1 verse 52. Mary begins her prayer. She is magnifying the Lord. She is glorifying the Lord for His good news to her and His grace in choosing her. In verse 52, she says this, God has brought down rulers from their thrones. He has exalted those who were humble or lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, and He has sent away the rich empty-handed. And what she's saying here, she's really recounting what she knows from the Old Testament. Many of these are allusions, if not quotes, from Old Testament Scriptures. And you see, when we reverse that pattern that she's speaking of there in the church that God has been doing, James is saying we are reversing the very nature of the gospel. Mighty unbelievers are dethroned. The rich, if they are full of self, are emptied. So don't exalt the high and the mighty who God will bring down. And don't send away the lowly and the needy who Christ called to come unto Him to be filled. If you were to look at Luke 4 and verse 15, glorified. He was being praised as he taught. And in Luke 4, verse 16, he returns to an area, the area of Nazareth, it says, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he entered the synagogue on the Sabbath and he stood up to read. Here again we see this tradition of standing in honor of God's Word which Jesus himself practiced. And it says, the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him and he opened the place and he found the place where it was written. The spirit of the Lord is upon me because he anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to captives and recovery of sight to the blind to set free those who are oppressed to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord. And it says he closed the book rolled it up. He gave it back to the attendant and he sat down which was the the custom of how the rabbis would teach in that day. He sat down and the eyes of all the synagogue were fixed on him and he says this, today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. What an amazing event this is in the history of what had been prophesied. Now he's saying I am he. Chapter 6 verse 20, many of those who he said these things to rejected him but there were disciples who followed him and it's to these he says in Luke 6 verse 20 turning his gaze toward the disciples he began to say blessed are you who are poor for yours is the kingdom of God and we don't want to wrench those words out of their context here he is speaking to his disciples he's speaking to his followers here poverty itself does not automatically save or bless or guarantee a place in God's kingdom but the context and the parallel makes clear that realizing one's spiritual poverty realizing our spiritual bankruptcy is essential to going to heaven Jesus said in Matthew 5 3 blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs and the force of that is theirs and theirs alone is the kingdom of heaven it is those who are utterly poor and bankrupt spiritually who realize they have no spiritual resources before which they can lay claim to God's favor or grace all they can do is come like a beggar. And the word for poor there is someone who is so destitute he can't even work for a living at all. All he can do is hope that someone else will come and fill his empty hands. The word for beggar there is the word that Jesus uses for all those who are going to heaven have to come to that place where they are emptied of all their own efforts and righteousness as we sang earlier nothing in my hand I bring only to your cross I cling. you turn back to James it's it's these people who in physical lowliness many of which in the first century that was the majority of their society that they knew these people in physical lowliness or emptiness or neediness who as a result recognize their spiritual lowliness emptiness and neediness and who come to the Lord as spiritual beggars and spiritually bankrupt with humble hearts who plead with Christ to have mercy on them a sinner as we saw last time through the cross of Christ the wonder of James 2 verse 5 says God makes the poor in spirit rich in faith. That's in essence what he is saying there. Those who are poor in spirit are rich in faith. And the end of the verse says they love the Lord. Of course, you understand their love is the result of God's choice, the result of God's grace. Nothing within us merits or earns or anything we do the grace of God. As we sang earlier, our Savior is wonderful. He is beautiful. He is matchless. It would be incorrect to conclude and looking at this verse 5 here, that poor people are inherently better or that rich people are inherently bad, and that that's somehow the basis of God's choosing because that's not at all what the Scripture says anywhere. And certainly, James does not want us to despise the rich, and this is something his readers had to be careful of. Reverse discrimination is not right either. But it is clear if you look at this verse that God has a special love and a care for the poor and the needy and the orphans and the widows and others. We saw many verses in our past studies Others that the world overlooks, God has a special place for them in His heart if this verse means anything, and it does. But this sovereign love of God here that chooses especially to save from these ranks does not mean God has no love for the rich or no type of care for other types or classes of people. There's a story in the Gospels of a rich young ruler who came to Jesus, and Jesus showed him the law of God, and he didn't admit his spiritual poverty and bankruptcy before that he thought he was doing okay and that he had kept all these from his youth and he went away from Jesus and it says he was very sad and the gospel I believe it's the gospel of Mark's account says Jesus looked upon him and he loved him he had compassion for this one who rejected the gospel as far as we know never came to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ but Jesus loved him and I don't have to in my mind reconcile God's love for sinners and the fact that he hasn't chosen to save all sinners I just have to recognize whatever the Bible says and I don't want to simply reject what doesn't simply neatly reconcile in my little brain. But turn to 1 Corinthians 1, because that's probably the best cross-reference on this verse is 1 Corinthians 1. And while you're turning there, let me just give you a few in New Testament times who the Scriptures say had wealth that God called and saved. There was a man named Zacchaeus who came to the saving knowledge of Christ. There was a man named Nicodemus John chapter three doesn't record his conversion. But later in the gospel, it's it records that he came to trust Christ Joseph of Arimathea. And then in the book of Acts, we read others who had amounts of property at their disposal that they were even selling and donating to the church to help those who were in need. And we know of many in Old Testament times who who did have wealth. But First Corinthians one has a very important point beginning in verse twenty six. And I want to I like the way the NIV words this year. It says, Brothers, think of what you were. This is 1 Corinthians 1 26. Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards. Not many were influential. Not many were of noble birth. But God chose, God chose the foolish things of this world to shame the wise. God chose the weak, God chose intentionally the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things and the things that are not, literally the non-entities or the nobodies too, he chose this way to nullify the things that are so that no one may, what, boast before him. If we were to start a Facebook page for the group of the lowly, needy, foolish, weak, despised, non-influential, nobodies and nothings, the world would think we are nuts and we need to see a shrink right away. We have self-image issues. If our church had that on its sign, it probably wouldn't fit on the sign and it probably wouldn't work real well for marketing. But Paul is saying here in Corinthians, that is what we are. And it's not that there's not any from other groups that God has chosen to save, but it says not many. God intentionally chooses most of us from the most unlikely to make the church most unexplainable by the world as to why we can all love each other so much and be so close and yet be so different. God does it that way, so there's no question. as to the source of salvation. There's no debate as to where the glory goes because there's no human explanation for the church of Jesus Christ. And so James is saying if we know all that and if we as a church choose to focus attention and energies on those who are more impressive by outward human standards, the types that Paul's been talking about here, the influential, the wise and the great and the noble of this world, when we focus on those and our energies on those who are more impressive to the dishonor of those and the opposite camp whom God delights to choose and say we are turning upside down the very purposes of God and we are reversing the gospel. That's the first point that James brings out in verse 5 and then in verse 6 we see a second inconsistency and that is it glorifies this Christian prejudice or whatever you want to call it. It glorifies those who oppose God and His gospel. It glorifies the very ones who oppose God and his gospel in the middle of verse six he says is it not the rich who oppress you. James is not prejudiced against the rich that would go against his whole point but he is greatly concerned of the sin of glorifying and glamorizing the rich and the famous and the influential and the mighty not only because all glory must go to God alone but also because it opposes the very heart of the gospel. And for the original readers in this context he was predominantly the rich as a class of people that were oppressing and opposing the Lord and His people in this day. When James speaks of the rich in this context, it is the ungodly rich. If you were to look at James 5, you'll see more about these. We'll see those in a future study. But in James 5, verse 4, he rebukes the rich. These are some of the things they were doing. James 5, verse 4, he says, Behold, the pay of the laborers who mowed your fields which has been withheld by you." They were holding back just wages to those who had to work for the mercy of them and had to work for them. He says, The outcry of those who did the harvesting has reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth, the Lord Almighty or the Lord of hosts. He says, You have lived luxuriously on the earth and led a life of wanton pleasure. You're taking advantage of these poor around you and living a fancy, rich and famous life. You fatten your hearts in a day of slaughter. Remember James one verse one is addressing Jews who had been dispersed abroad. Some of that dispersion may have been because of persecution. And as a result even if they maybe had a better life in the area of Jerusalem or the area of Israel as they're dispersed abroad they were for the most part poor. They were forced in many cases to work the land of the small upper class. It was not the same type of advantages and opportunities that we have today. And the wealthy landowners really were notorious for their injustice and their oppression from what we know of history. Douglas Moo writes, what we know of conditions in the first century Middle East is a small group of wealthy landowners and merchants accumulated more and more power while large and larger numbers of people were forced from their land and grew even poorer. The rich people were undoubtedly using their wealth and influence with the courts to secure favorable verdicts against the poor. Practices familiar in every age such as forcing people to forfeit their land for late payment of mortgages, insisting on ruinous interest rates for monetary help, and the like are probably in view. So he says, aren't these people that you're focusing on and fawning over when one of them shows up at church, aren't these the ones who are oppressing you? And he says, aren't they the ones who are personally dragging you into court? It wasn't just harassing people over the phone like creditors may do today. If a creditor met a debtor on the street and that day he was Legally able to grab him by the neck of his robe nearly throttling him and to literally drag him into the law courts right then and there James is saying to these believers here Haven't you been listening to these prayer requests that have been? Shared among you and your church times how many of these prayer requests have to do with these people doing these sort of things to you? It's been a lot of these prayer requests. Hasn't it? Why are you focusing on and fawning over these types of people? the rich ones who can pay for the lawyers and litigations and the lawsuits and Often justice was not taking place for these ones that he's writing to. And he says in verse 7, do they not blaspheme the fair name by which you have been called? Apparently, not only was their physical and financial persecution coming mainly from those with wealth, but apparently at this time in the church, their spiritual persecution as well was primarily from the upper class. We don't know exactly what the content of their blasphemy was. It may very well have been the pejorative, the negative insult that they would use the name Christian. It was a negative insult in the book of Acts. It was a label they put on. You're those Christ ones. You're those Christians. And they would mock them. And they've even found from the first century ancient graffiti mocking Christians. I saw a picture of this. It was a carving, a marking of a Christian, a man named Aleximenos, who was worshiping someone who was crucified. A man who was crucified. And the head of this man is an ass or a donkey and they're saying that's what you Christians worship blaspheming the fair name by which they've been called the name of Christ dragging the precious and glorious truths that we worship through the mud and I don't think I have to convince you that that continues to take place today as well the honorable name of our Lord who owns us is also dishonored the noble names of our beautiful Lord and Savior that we just sang about her dragged through the mud. And they're used as every type of curse word in society in general, in all levels of society. But it's still especially the influential movers and shakers in our world, especially in entertainment and media and the Hollywood who seem to be on a mission to blaspheme and assault everything that we hold precious and dear. And we as Christian Americans, many Christian Americans glorify that by watching it and laughing at things that blaspheme our Lord and pay good money for it and invest many hundreds of hours giving precious time and attention to what blasphemes what is truly precious. And sometimes we don't even realize it because we have become immune to it. Lest you think you're not guilty of what James 2 talks about, let me get in your kitchen a little bit further. This last month, as we've been going through this study, as we've been going through these things in the book of James, how much time have you spent thinking about and praying for or even talking to thinking about ways to serve those who are more needy and more lonely among us at this church. I don't have any idea what that would be, but I also want you to think of how many hours in that same month you were engrossed in worldly entertainment, much of which dishonors the name of our Lord that we belong to. See, this is a convicting thing when you don't just look historical context there. But as we look at our context today, what are some ways, as I've been looking at my own heart, what are some ways that we are guilty of this very thing? And I think the point of James 2 in those first few verses there of the chapter applies to us whether or not a celebrity walks through our doors on Sunday that we focus on to the neglect of the needy among us. If we focus on and follow those celebrities during the media during the week but have little or no thought of our brothers and sisters in Christ, James would say, What are we doing, my beloved brethren? Are you paying special attention to the latest gossip of the media and TV, not even real people you ever see, but not the lowly who are in need of ministry around you? Are you enamored with celebrity sinners out there more than the Savior and for those for whom he died in here? Aren't most in Hollywood and some of those places the ones who are the most blaspheming of our Lord's name? Go back to the intro we had last week talking about a guy, a fictional example, but let's say one of these guys wanders into our church and you can tell he looks famous. You don't know where you've seen him, but he looks influential. He's got to be somebody important. He's walking in. Everyone's distracted. We're about to worship. The choir's coming on stage. One of the guys going up to the stage and choir sees him and is distracted, actually trips while he's going up the stage. There's a distracting scene. You see this guy come in and we're all looking at him and focusing on him and we're supposed to be looking to our Savior and focusing on him and we are ignoring the very important people in this church that he died for. Maybe this guy is a congressman, maybe he's a senator, maybe he's a lawyer or a lawmaker or a distinguished judge from Sacramento or San Francisco. Are we going to stumble over ourselves to flatter him? James is saying, aren't these the type of people who are persecuting Christian values? Aren't these the guys who more than once have usurped the voice of Californians by legalizing same-sex marriage or trying to and villainizing and persecuting any who would dare oppose it? Aren't these the same types of people in our state who temporarily made it virtually illegal to have your kids in a Christian school home environment? Another measure that was overturned. Aren't these the same types of people who are proposing bills and have to make illegal the biblical duty to discipline your children lovingly in our state? James would say, what are we doing? If I could just switch gears for a second. If you are maybe a student in school, do you tend to focus on? Who do you tend to focus on? Is it those who are cool? Is it just based on an external thing as to who you're going to talk with and hang out with? And who do you tend to neglect? Who do you tend to look down on based on their looks or their externals? Us adults who may not be in school anymore are still tempted in those ways. And even at church, it is still a temptation we have. And it pains me to say we had someone who'd visited here about two or three weeks. These last two or three weeks while I was teaching on these very things, someone very lonely, really didn't know anyone here, and just lost a loved one in this person's life. And I spent a couple hours with this person this week talking with them. And this person appreciated the church and likes the worship and the teaching. I don't believe this person's a believer necessarily yet, but said she felt so lonely and that no one really cared about them and that no one talked to them and that they just felt so alone. I know that's not intentional, but I think this is something that we should be concerned about. I know not every visitor or person feels that way, but I wonder, I still don't feel any better about it. My heart broke as I talked to this person. I hope this person will be back. But as we're studying this very thing, we need to ask ourselves, we need to look at our own heart and see, do we show partiality? Are we so into ourselves that we are not reaching out to and talking to others? Are we showing prejudice because of pride or selfishly ignoring people in the body of Christ, choosing rather to speak to those we would prefer to? Do we tend towards the more good-looking, the beautiful, the wonderful, the well-to-do? Are we wowed by worldly values? In James 2, the splendor of men All needs to fade in the presence of real splendor. In the royal king that we sing to. Beautiful savior. Wonderful counselor. Clothed in majesty. Lord of history. You're the way, the truth, the life. Star of the morning. Glorious in holiness. You're the risen one. Heaven's champion. And you reign. You reign over all. I long to be, the last line says, where the praise is never ending. I yearn to dwell. where the glory never fades where countless worshippers will share one song and cries of worthy will honor the land. We will all be singing one song in eternity on the same level all the lowest level with our faces to the ground all honor and glory alone going to the Lord of glory alone who humbled himself to death. How can we not be humble in this life. The ground is level as we said before at the cross. There's a third and final point that we'll just touch on. We'll pick up next time. But the inconsistency of what James is talking about here is that any sort of prejudice or partiality or favoritism falls short of God's glory and gospel love. V. 8-9 says, 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. He's going to go on to talk about sins like murder and adultery and other things that we can't categorize and say that those things are really bad, but partiality is not in this context here. Any sin like that makes us guilty as a transgressor. Partiality is no little sin. It's no minor misdemeanor. It is a violation of the law of God, a sin that falls short of the glory of God. And we'll look more at that The law is used here in James in relation to the gospel, and there's more to say, but this royal law, this law of love, what he is saying here is it's ultimately so inconsistent with the law that sums up our duty to each other in the Old Testament, which is to love each other as ourselves. This is the word of our Lord of glory, and it's all about the gospel, and it's all about God's glory. And what the word of God calls us to do is not just something we can do by our own human willpower or with the motive of trying to be a good person. It has got to be God produced in a gospel transformed heart doing it from the Lord through the Lord and to the glory of the Lord. Let me just say as we close and we'll come back to this idea here next week as we begin. If you do not truly know the Lord if perhaps for the first time you have come to understand really why Jesus came to earth and what the gospel is all about if you would love this morning to make your life right with the Lord, to bow before Him as Lord, to receive the free gift of salvation from Jesus as Lord. I would urge you to do that this very day, to cry out to Him like the man we talked about last week who all he could do is just beat his own breast and all he could do is say, Lord, have mercy on me, the sinner. You recognize that you are a sinner in need of grace. You have nothing that you could bring before God, nothing you can do that would ever earn God's love. If you cry out to Him in your heart in that way, plead with Him, to have mercy on your soul. If you cry out in your own words, in your own heart, sincerely trusting what Jesus Christ did on the cross in your place, trusting His sacrifice for you, trusting and understanding those things we talked about, you can experience the saving, amazing grace of Jesus Christ. I hope you will do that. If I can help you do that, I would love to talk with you more, pray with you more. Let's pray and close our service. Lord, this very moment I recognize that not everyone in this room has experienced some of the glories of the gospel that we have shared. There are those that only You know infallibly who have not yet come to confess You as Lord and believe in Your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead, trusting in what He did on the cross. hour would be the hour they first believed and experienced God's saving grace. I pray, perhaps even this very moment as we pray, as we close out the service, that they, in their hearts right now, would be crying out to You to save them, to have mercy on them, knowing that it's not what You do plus what they do. It is God's grace alone through Christ's work alone on the cross alone. I pray, Lord, that You would this very moment deliver some from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of your son for his glory. We pray. Amen.