The Merciful Royal Law | Sermon 04/17/12022

James on the Royal Law and Partiality

The title of the sermon today is the the merciful royal law the merciful royal law starting in verse 8 of chapter 2. Here now the words of the living and run true God. 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. So speak and so act as those who are to be judged by the law of Liberty.

For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment not sending the reading of God's holy inspired word. Let's pray quickly. Father please speak through me now. Help me to get out of the way Lord.

Lord help me to decrease and you increase. Speak Lord today to your people. Teach your people according to your word Lord. Enlighten them according to your word. Lord help us to dismiss all distraction and all things that would keep us from understanding and learning from your word today.

Help us Lord to So carefully and more deeply know what it means to love our neighbors ourselves as Christ did. So Lord help me to speak in a way that is clear and helpful and let it always be true in Christ's name.

Amen one of the most encouraging things to see our acts of true spirit wrought mercy in Christians following the example of their Lord. I'm certain many of us are well acquainted with the story of Jim and Elizabeth Elliot.

But I will retell the story anyhow. You see Jim and Elizabeth Elliot met at Wheaton College both majors in Greek. And Jim was so focused on serving Christ that he would barely look at women. He would keep his head down all the time.

It was said he did not want to be distracted with his mission to serve the Lord. But Elizabeth had caught the corner of his eye and through a swift courtship they got married. This young couple had an overwhelming desire to be Christian missionaries and to bring the gospel to the Amazon along with Nate's Saint Peter Fleming Ed McCulley Roger you Darian and each man's wife and children they stationed in Ecuador to bring the hope of the gospel to those people.

The Alka tribe, which is now known as the Wadani tribe is in an is an indigenous Amazonian tribe. Made up of nomadic hunter-gatherers. I mean we're talking. You know to this day they still live in that way.

Very much so to a very high degree. We're talking about loincloth and gauged ears. Sort of tribal people. Okay. But for decades The Wadani people the Alka people were known to be absolute killers. Fierce killers in the Amazon rainforest and they wouldn't simply kill any foreigner who came into their territory.

They would kill each other all the time all the time for any reason. Whether retaliation resentment or a simple insult they would take a spear or machete and Slay one another for years years and years in fact.

Their homicide rate is unlike anything we've ever seen. Their homicide rate was six in ten people would be murdered. Six and ten people would be murdered. That is absurd. But this was the people. These were the people that these five missionary families long to know the gospel of grace.

That there was a different way. So along with the missionary pilot Nate Saint in 1955. They would fly over tribal territory and they would lower down gifts in a basket or like a bucket. Okay, and the Wadani people would come and they'd see the plane and they would take the gifts.

And they did this for 13 weeks. They wanted to make sure that the Wadani people understood they meant peace so they would come every week and They would circle the territory in the plane and they would lower down the bucket and they would give all these gifts food drink Tools, whatever you name it.

In fact, they were shocked when one of those times The Wadani people had given them a return gift. The basket was moving and they pulled it up into the plane and they opened it and there was a big red parrot they had given them a Pet a gift to the to the missionaries and so they considered that a good sign you know, they've been given gifts for 13 weeks and they receive one back and so They thought it was time now to make contact with these people people who have never had contact with the outside world.

None, they said now was the time to reach these people. So after celebrating Christmas with their wives and children these five men Decided to embark on that to make contact with the most violent tribe known in the Amazon rainforest.

Many of the women had tremendous fear for their husbands. They didn't know what would happen. So they kissed the men. Goodbye and on January 3rd 1956 they landed upon kind of a Riverbank next to Wadani territory and they called it Palm Beach.

They landed on Palm Beach January 3rd, they set up camp on the fringes of Wadani territory and finally after three days of waiting a group of basically naked Wadani people came up and and Three of them did and came up to the to the river and so Jim Elliot He waded through the river and went across to them by himself and the men were the men were just like Okay, what's gonna happen?

So he's approaching three of them and he gives them food and he gives them drink and they're drinking lemonade and you know They're it's going just fine. At least in that moment. It was going just fine.

They were. They were so excited. They could barely contain their excitement. This is what they've been praying about for so long to reach these people so two days go by and and they've been reaching to you know, just a few tribes tribal people and.

So two days later Nate sends a radio signal in his plane to all the wives and he says to his wife This is the day this is the day and He sounded so excited on the radio, but for some reason his wife Marjorie Couldn't help but think this is the day meant something else.

So 12 minutes past 3 p .m. On Sunday, January 8th Nate's wrist watched was suddenly smashed and the hands were stuck in that position. 12 minutes past 3 The hand stopped moving. This is believed to be the moment that he and the four other men were ambushed by Wadani tribesmen.

With spears and machetes and they lost their lives for Christ and they were just completely torn up. Spears sticking out of them just gruesome deaths. All for Christ a Search party was assembled. They found them a few days later floating in the river.

It went all over the news. In fact many people. Probably our grandparents. They remember that it seemed to go all over national and global news. Five Christian missionaries martyred in the Ecuadorian rainforest.

And as you can imagine the wives and children were utterly devastated. Five widows five widows on one day. Fatherless children. And some wondered why why didn't they defend themselves? They had guns in the plane.

Why didn't they defend themselves and you know what the men said before they left when someone asked them if they're going to Defend themselves if they get attacked one of the men said We are ready to meet God.

They aren't and so they did it they went ahead. They went ahead and they gave their lives for Christ to reach those people so Jim's wife Elizabeth along with her ten-month-old baby girl Stayed behind in Ecuador and her parents and everyone thought she was crazy.

Her and her ten-month-old daughter and along with Nate's sister Rachel in Hopes that one day what they did was not in vain. They would reach the Wadani people for Christ. That their husband's death meant something.

So eventually two women from from the Wadani tribe made their way and and tracked. You know hiked through the jungle to Elizabeth's camp and they wanted the women to come back with them. So they said this is it.

We're being invited back to the Wadani tribe. And so they grabbed all their stuff and they headed into the jungle and they went to Wadani territory. They ended up living with the tribe for two years. They brought them God's Word translated the Bible.

Teaching them to forgive fearlessly love tremendously. They completely transformed their way of life. Christ completely transformed their way of life forever. Nate's children were also invited into the tribe where his son Steve Committed his life to the tribe and you won't believe this but when Steve came to faith in Christ We're talking Nate was murdered.

His father was murdered when Steve came to faith in Christ in Ecuador. Minkay the very man who killed his father baptized him in the river. Unbelievable unbelievable. And the children of the Wadani and the children of these five men had one thing in common all their lives they had seen family speared to death and Their parents their fathers were speared to death as well.

They had that common bond. The gospel went forth and these people turned their lives to Christ despite such tragedy. And now I mentioned all of this story. Because it was the mercy and forgiveness. That the women and children of these five families these five men were willing to show the Wadani people that was a living testimony of the mercy and grace of Jesus Christ.

Many would have considered these killers too fierce to reach for Christ. Many would not love their neighbor as themselves and bring the life-giving message of the gospel. Partiality would dictate such savage people don't deserve to know Jesus.

But as James said as I read the end of that in verse 13 mercy triumphs over judgment. With such selfless love and mercy in mind. Let's consider now what our text and James is teaching us today starting in verses 8 and 9 if However, you are fulfilling the royal law according to the scripture you shall love your neighbors yourself you are doing well.

But if you show partiality you are committing sin and are convicted by the laws transgressors. So James continues his admonishment related to the personal favoritism he spoke about in Verses 1 through 7 two weeks ago our sermon from two weeks ago.

This is kind of continuing the thought. He said not to practice personal favoritism because it goes against God's concern for the poor and also he said because it's absurd. Since the rich have historically Treated them wrongfully for years.

So he tells them why are you why are you treating the rich man better? Remember that they had the rich he had the rich man come and sit closer to the front. They they doted on him several of them were we're all over the rich man.

And then the poor man was asked to sit basically at under dirty feet to sit in the back. And so he continues that. Now he establishes that participating in this is sin and it goes against God's law. And before we dive into the implications of the commandment he quoted notice it says royal law royal law.

Some consider it the royal law as though it were supreme or above all other laws. Others see it as an all-encapsulating Law and that is what makes it royal. But the Greek word here Literally means the law of the king.

The Law of the King and the Two Tables

Not just royal law, but it means the law of the king. You see because a law isn't royal or authoritative in and of itself. It is royal or authoritative because there is one who backs it one who is behind that law.

One who wields the authority and kingship to back it and that is the Lord and King Jesus Christ. In Matthew 22 36 through 40. We see Jesus give a clarifying resolution concerning the law. It says this Teacher what is the greatest commandment in the law?

And he said to him you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart with all your soul and with all your mind. And with all your strength. This is the great and foremost commandment. And Jesus says the second is like it it is you shall love your neighbors yourself.

He says on these two commandments depend the whole law and prophets. What it's significant is. Just immediately after he says this after Jesus gives this about the law. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart soul mind and strength and he says you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

He he asked them if they know who if if they know who the Christ is. Who do they who do you think the Christ is? He he asked this immediately after and Then he quotes from Psalm 110 showing that he will rule with a scepter forever at the right hand of the Father.

Jesus immediately points to his kingship after demonstrating his law. The king said what his law is. Love the Lord your God with all that is in you and love your neighbor as yourself. So that was that's what makes it royal.

The king the king gives the law the king gives it authority. These are often called the laws of love. These laws Jesus says are the representation of all the law and prophets. All of it is wrapped up in these two precepts.

But they are also bound together. And I think that's why Jesus presents them in that way. He presents them together. In fact in John's first epistle He says if someone says I love God and yet hates his brother.

He is a liar. For the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen and This commandment we have from him that the one who loves God should love his brother also.

Essentially you can't have one without the other. If someone claims they obey the law that they love God with everything in them. But then they hate their neighbor. That person demonstrates he doesn't actually love God.

That's what he's saying here and No one could properly love their neighbor in a way that God demands if they first don't love God. That's true. That's true. You can you can be moral you can try to do righteous deeds.

But ultimately you can't love your neighbor. The way they ought to be loved unless you first love God first. James states the royal law is according to Scripture. See that the royal law according to Scripture.

This once again points to the authoritative nature of it. God spoke this statute. God revealed that he desires for us to uphold this and This isn't simply a humanized golden rule. Christ states it in another way on in the Sermon on the Mount.

He says in everything therefore Treat people the same way you want them to treat you for this is the law and the prophets. So this isn't When he says that Excuse me. That's not an additional law. This is the love your neighbor as yourself restated.

Treat people as you want to be treated. The problem is Culture has adopted the golden rule. Godless culture has adopted the golden rule and they've discarded all the gold with it. They've discarded all the gold.

The golden rule can only make sense or be reasonable if one can understand What is truly good and and what is evil? Oh. From the Bible's perspective. From the Bible's perspective in other words if the single most righteous and glorious thing That can happen to a person is receiving salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Then our desire should be for all our neighbors to receive such a gift. But society would say That is not treating that's not treating me how I want to be treated. Don't give me your gospel. Don't give me your stuff about Jesus.

I don't want that. That's what society would say. You see how they humanize the golden rule. No, I don't want that. Don't treat me the way Treat me how I want to be treated which is with apathy and indifference so I can continue in my lawlessness.

I can continue in my error and wrong thought. Don't give me the gospel. That's not how I want to be treated. That's that's what they say. They twist the golden rule. They twist the love your neighbor as yourself.

But we love them more than that. We love our neighbors more than that. So loving your neighbor as yourself is loving them. Not how they feel they need to be loved. Loved absent from the Christian worldview, but loving them the way the Bible tells us to love.

You hear that? Loving your neighbor as yourself isn't loving them the way they feel or want to be loved. Loving your neighbor as yourself is loving them the way the Bible defines love. The way the Bible defines how we share and show love to people.

So we love our neighbors by giving them the gospel we go to the loving word of the loving God to figure out how to love. Loving them by not wanting them to endure hell. We love by sharing What God has given us when the when there are those in need of it.

We do that with even in our church. We do that with meal trains. We do that with gifts. We do that with sharing things together providing care for each other. We we do that. We've we've helped some of the poor in our community has come come out of this church.

We we've done that before here. So we share with the gospel we love with the gospel we love with these gifts. Remember we were having a hard time financially a Few years ago and someone from our church had put a hundred dollars under our doormat right when we needed the most.

Those are the kind of amazing things that God Does with his people as they give grace to others? We love by praying for one another bearing each other's burdens. Here's one we don't always like in the moment, but we love each other by speaking the truth of God's words.

God's word into areas of sin in our lives. When when when we're sinning when we're going through issues one way we can love each other is Helping each other through that discipling each other through that.

And it's it's not like picking someone apart and being like you're doing all wrong. That's not the loving your neighbors yourself, it's coming alongside someone and Showing them what the Word of God says and helping them get there helping them get there.

We don't just let our brothers and sisters tear down the house. We help them rebuild it. And of course James shows us we love our neighbors by not practicing favoritism. That's the big thing here. There is a contrast here.

If you really keep the royal law you are doing well. You're doing well, but if you show partiality you are sinning doing well sinning. Keeping the law showing partiality. They're at odds with each other.

They're contrasted to each other. Leviticus 19 15 says you shall do no injustice in judgment. You shall not be partial to the poor nor defer to the great but you are to judge your neighbor fairly. That verse highlights exactly what James is talking about with the illustration of the rich man and the poor man.

What is amazing is that that verse Leviticus 19 is just three verses prior to Leviticus 1918. You're like, of course, I know how to add. But Leviticus 19 18 says To love your neighbor as yourself. So they are directly correlated not showing partiality.

Loving your neighbor as yourself. They go together. They're right there in the same context of Leviticus 19. They're just three verses apart. So it stands to say that partiality again is in opposition of loving neighbor.

One has judged according to appearance but not with righteous judgment as Jesus says make no mistake. James is saying what they are doing would be sin and they would be convicted or exposed by the law.

And transgressor is made up of two parts in the Greek para is contrary to and Bano is go. So it means walking contrary to God's law. So if the commandment was a line to cross they went over it they went over it.

Committing is literally you are working sin when he says you are committing sin. The Greek word is you are working sin. You are working sin. Works have always been a positive thing in James's letters the noun works he faith.

Faith rot works is James's big thing in his epistle here works that a result of a genuine faith, but now Working as the verb is now seen in a negative way. Working sin crossing over the law. So he doesn't mince words here.

We need to know what we are doing when we commit partiality and he says we're transgressing the law. Now on verses 10 and 11 He says 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. It may be hard to connect. But I think one point James is making is that sinning and personal favoritism or not loving your neighbors yourself.

Is rebelling against the whole law? That's what he's saying. Because it's the law of the king. It's binding on everyone. The king has made a law. Breaking any part of it Goes against the king. Breaking the law with partiality breaks the royal law which breaks every law.

It goes against God it goes against your fellow man. Think about it because favoritism. Truly favoritism is self-love. How is partiality or favoritism self-love? Because you hope by by favoriting someone by practicing favoritism on someone.

Buttering them up flattering them treating them better than someone else you hope to gain out of that. You hope that they'll that they'll treat you better out of something like that that they'll they'll treat you.

Well that they'll they'll do the same to you. So in a way. Even though you're acting like you're giving someone love. It's false love. Showing favoritism partiality you're hoping to get something out of it in return.

So there it breaks not just the second table of the law, but the first you say what is table. Let me say let me let me explain that real quick of the Ten Commandments. There is the first and second table of the Ten Commandments.

The first table of the Ten Commandments is All the ones focused on God. So it is I'm the Lord your God and you shall have no other gods before me. It is number two it is it is you shall not make any graven images.

You shall not make it make any idols for yourself. You not shall you shall not worship any false gods. Number three. You will not you shall not take the Lord your God's name in vain. And number four. Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.

Those first four are the first table of the law. Okay? And the second table of the law is all the ways that we are to love our neighbors ourselves. So it is it is number five through number ten honor your father and your mother.

Do not commit murder do not commit adultery do not steal do not bear false witness and do not covet. That's the second table of the law. So I I want you to understand first table is is really directed towards God's second table of the law is really directed About fellow man, but but we're gonna see how there's a unity with these two tables of the law.

Okay? So What am I getting at? I said that Practicing favoritism is self-love. It's self-love. So what am I talking about? It's making yourself into a God. Despite the Lord saying you shall have no other gods before him.

You are exalting yourself above God in that moment of practicing favoritism. Okay, so so breaking the love your neighbors yourself laws breaks the first table of the law. It makes yourself out to be a god.

So Once you break one law you become a transgressor of it. That's what he says. It's all or nothing. No one is a partial breaker of the law. You've either broken the law or you've not. And we downplay our sins all the time.

We call them mistakes. Hey, honey, I made a mistake or. Or You know, I have a lot of learning moments that I need to go over. We downplay our sins all the time. But here it's saying we're we're a transgressor of the law.

We've sinned. One act against God is seen as rebellion. You might remember in the Gospels the Jews in the first century were often making distinctions between What they considered to be lesser laws As opposed to more important ones.

So they you might remember the Apostles were hungry and they grabbed little heads of grain of wheat in the field and they were they were eating and they had not washed their hands and The Pharisees point them out.

You're your disciples don't wash their hands according to the law of Moses or. Or there was those moments where where they said you're not observing the Sabbath correctly. So they were sticklers about hand-washing there were sticklers about the Sabbath.

But then Jesus says when it comes to things like making false vows or fast false swearing they would do it all the time. They would do it all the time. So they they elevate one or the other. I should probably make it clear that The text isn't suggesting one could keep the whole law his whole life perfectly then.

Shoot right before you die you fail in it once and you're and you're damned. That's not what this is trying to. Say that you could keep it keep it all. James is making a point here a Point building up to show later.

We need mercy because no one saved Jesus Christ. Can do this whole law? No one can do this whole law except Jesus Christ. So that's that's the point. He's working up to. James gives us an example of what he means in verse 10.

He he said for whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point He has become guilty of it all so then he he gives us an example. He says 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 obeying one. But sinning in the other Still makes one a transgressor of the law he's saying because these are laws all about loving your neighbor as yourself if You love them in one way and yet hate them in another then you hate completely.

Think about it. What if a man said judge look I know I murdered my neighbor. But I never committed adultery with his wife. It'd be absurd it would be absurd. One commentator states regarding verse 11.

Perhaps then he intends to single out people in his community who may be priding themselves on Their avoidance of the sins of the flesh that is adultery all the while they are discriminating against poor people in effect committing murder as Jesus said hatred of the heart.

That's what one commentator thinks, but but these are more likely these are aids I think to demonstrate the harmony of the law of God. That is to say if you're climbing up a ladder. Okay, if you've gone seven steps up a ladder, and then you fall off on the eighth step.

You've fallen off the whole ladder. You don't go. Well, I got up seven steps. No you fell you fell off the whole ladder. It doesn't matter at that point. And this really shows the indivisible unity of The law of God the commandments are bound together.

We already mentioned this before but the first table of the law is focused on God. But one can't do the second table of the law and love their neighbor properly if they don't worship the one true God.

If you follow idols you hate your neighbor. If you follow idols you don't love your neighbor. There is a unity in God's law. We can't look at these commandments as individual laws. Where one is disobeyed when one is disobeyed it's independent of the others.

That's what he's saying. The fact is these commandments were spoken they were spoken by God so to sin against the eternal God once is to bear the weight of sinning against his full character and being.

God's full character and being is wrapped up in his law and to. To rebel against his law in one way is to rebel against his very nature. One transgression renders a person fully guilty before God. That's what the Bible makes clear.

One author likens the Indivisible unity of the law to the moon. He says when we see a crescent moon in the in the night sky. We don't go. Oh wow look at that look at that partial moon. We say wow look at the moon.

Look at the moon tonight not part of it because we understand the Crescent represents the whole. And so the royal law Represents the whole of the law it represents the rest. It is indivisible. Okay. But look it is also written for he who said starting verse 11 for he who said I Told you the royal law was about the king.

James appeals to the lawgiver rather than simply the law. Because the law is a representation of God's very nature to remove one of his precepts. Would be trying to divide his attributes away from him.

But God isn't made up of parts. You can't separate God's eternality from his omniscience. His love isn't detached from his holy wrath. Now is it easier for us to articulate it that way. Yeah, then that's fine.

That's fine. It's easier to articulate that way easier to understand it that way with that kind of language, but there is a oneness in God's being. There's a oneness in God's being. The lawgiver must uphold his standard.

We've talked about this before but an all-perfect God Cannot let any sin pass his justice. His justice would be corrupted then and we tell people this in our evangelism all the time. All the time people in evangelism they point to their acts of service.

I remember I went I met young one young man, and he said, but you don't understand. I I went to Habitat For humanity. I helped build houses in Mexico all this stuff. I I did all these wonderful things and he was appealing to all the the good works.

He's done and That doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because it says if if you fail in one part of the law you failed it at all. And the second thing is is Jesus. Jesus says apart from him. Such works are as filthy rags.

They will they will never merit salvation. We tell them you need someone who has never failed in the law you need someone who has never stumbled in the law. And it's not like anyone has ever gotten close.

The most pious the most holy the most the most earthly Righteous person that has ever lived on the earth. Maybe Job. I don't know. Maybe it was Job as God really pointed him out maybe it was someone else the most the most earthly righteous man in all the world is probably Exponential degrees away from the perfection of Jesus Christ.

There's there's just no getting close to it. Only one in the history of all mankind Has ever or will ever be able to live up to the standard that God said and that is Jesus of Nazareth the Lord of Glory.

Judged by the Law of Liberty

So let's move on to our last two verses. Verses 12 and 13 read. So speak and so act as those who are to be judged by the law of liberty. For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy mercy triumphs over judgment.

So this is unlike James in a way. There is no endearing Beloved brethren. He doesn't appeal to them beloved brethren. Hear me out. He cuts right to the to the heart of it. Appointed double imperative.

This is a double imperative here. So speak and so act. Speak and act or speak and do this might as well be the anthem of the book of James. If you are truly a follower of Christ. Speak and act like it.

Speak and act like it. And these are in the present active tense. Which means to say if you are truly a follower of Christ. You're gonna keep speaking and you're gonna keep acting like one who truly follows Christ.

It's constant. So that the man Who spoke and acted like a Christian ten years ago, but you wouldn't have any idea today. In fact, he curses God. You couldn't say that that man is in the kingdom of heaven that he's part of the kingdom and Yet it's God who preserves us.

It's God who truly preserves us. He causes us to endure to the end. Those who are truly saved. It's kind of like our modern idiom. If you're going to talk the talk you better walk the walk. That's what James is saying in a way here.

Merely speaking like you're going to do the right thing is as worthless as merely hearing the word. Where is the action. Just because Christ fulfilled the law impeccably on our behalf that does not give us the right to transgress it.

Christ saved us from our lawlessness and Not to simply remove the penalty of our lawlessness. But to allow us not to be lawless anymore. And I really think much of this passage shows the continuity of the moral law to Christians.

It's much like the Exodus and Passover which Is being celebrated this week. Passover. So think about it. God redeemed his people in Exodus 6 then he applies the benefits of the Lamb of God in Exodus 12 and Finally in Exodus 20 God reveals his law to the people.

So he gives grace. He gives deliverance. He saves them. He applies the blood of the Lamb to them and then he gives them the law at Mount Sinai. Grace and law now with his church God redeems his people.