Favoritism and Prejudice

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Alright, so open your Bibles with me and we'll get started.
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We'll turn to James 2.
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We're out of the first chapter.
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Yay! Well, I'm happy because it only took us three months to get through the first chapter.
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So we'll finally get into chapter 2.
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We might step up the pace a little bit, but there's a lot of rich information here.
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We're going to read James chapter 2 verses 1-7.
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So take a larger bit, but it's all one idea.
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Verses 1-7.
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Chapter 2 verses 1-7.
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And I'll read it.
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You can follow along in your Bibles.
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My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.
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For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, you sit here in a good place, while you say to the poor man, you stand over there or sit down at my feet, have you not made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts? Listen my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He has promised to those who love Him? But you have dishonored the poor man.
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Are not the rich the ones who oppress you and the ones who drag you into court? Are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable name by which you were called? Let's pray.
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Father in heaven, I thank You for Your Word.
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Thank You for these men.
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Thank You for the opportunity to study what You have for us today.
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Lord, Your Word is rich and Your Word is able to divide us down the very center of our hearts.
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Divide us even bone and marrow, even soul and spirit.
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Lord, Your Word is sharper than any two-edged sword.
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And Lord, today we're going to talk about the subject of showing partiality and the sin of prejudice.
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And Lord, as we discuss the sin of prejudice, I know that for many of us this is a battle which we have fought or deal with or have dealt with in so many ways and in so many different areas of our life.
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And Father, I pray that You would open up our eyes to our own prejudices.
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Open up our eyes to those things which we see and we make judgments on which are not godly and in accordance with Your Word.
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Lord, give us repentance that leads to life.
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Give us the heart that wants to do what Your Word tells us to do.
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And Lord, when we see people, help us to see every person we see, no matter rich or poor, no matter young or old, no matter what race or social condition they may be in.
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Help us to see every person as an image bearer of God.
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I pray it in Jesus' name.
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Amen.
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Alright, so we are continuing on with the book of James.
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We've examined the first chapter together.
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And we've seen that the first chapter is a series of practical lessons.
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James begins by telling us to take joy in our trials, reminding us that trials have the purpose of bringing us to maturity.
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He tells us if we lack wisdom in dealing with trials to ask God to give us the wisdom to trust Him.
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He tells the poor brother to exalt in his position in Christ and the rich person to exalt in his humiliation.
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He reminded us that when we face temptation we should never blame God because God is not the one who tempts us, it comes from within.
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He encouraged us to remember that every good gift comes from God and the greatest gift is our regeneration.
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And we are also told that we should be quick to hear, slow to speak, and slow to become angry when we hear the Word of God.
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And finally, we were reminded that religion should dictate how we speak to one another and about one another and how we treat those in need.
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What is pure and undefiled religion? That we visit the widows and orphans in their distress.
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That's what we talked about last week.
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That's pure and undefiled religion.
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Ultimately, the whole first chapter of James is about having a living faith.
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A faith that doesn't just speak, but a faith that does.
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Remember what he said? He said if you look at the Word and you leave and you don't remember what you read, you're like a man who looked in a mirror and he went away not remembering what he saw in the mirror.
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It's like a guy with a dirty face, wakes up in the morning, crusty eyes, dirty face, bad teeth, and he sees his face in the mirror and instead of cleaning up himself, he goes away and he forgets what he saw.
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He said the Word of God is like a mirror.
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I don't know if you've ever realized that.
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When you read the Word of God, it reflects yourself back to you.
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And it shows you those areas that need to be addressed.
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It shows you those areas that need to be dealt with.
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It shows you those areas that you need to look at your life and make changes.
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One of the most dangerous things that has entered into the church today is the idea that you can become a Christian and then there is no change.
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That's a modern teaching, that you come to Jesus as you are.
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Well, I'll say this, you do come to Jesus as you are, but you don't stay as you are.
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Jesus will change you.
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And if Jesus hasn't changed you, you haven't met Jesus.
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You've met somebody, you've met something, but it ain't Jesus.
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Jesus never leaves us where we are.
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And so that's the whole idea of James.
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He's not telling us how to be saved, by the way.
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He's telling us what happens as a result of being saved.
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We don't earn salvation.
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We receive salvation as a gift.
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And as a result of that gift, things change.
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So as we enter chapter 2, James keeps on this trajectory of practicality and he begins his second chapter by dealing with a problem that is as old as time itself.
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The problem of discrimination.
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I want to ask you a question, I want you to be honest.
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How many of you have ever been discriminated against? I think we all have to say, we raise our hand.
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Now, I understand normally you hear the word prejudice or discrimination, you might think of race, right? And I know that there are people in here who have had discrimination because of race.
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Maybe it was because you were black and you were in a situation where white people treated you poorly.
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Or maybe it was the other way around, where you were white and black people treated you poorly.
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Simply because of who you were as a white person or a black person.
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We understand discrimination can work both ways.
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Is that true? Okay, just making sure we're all together.
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But is there other ways that you can be discriminated against? You can be discriminated against? Who said that? Brother, that's true.
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The church.
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I had breakfast with some men from the church this morning.
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We discussed the fact that not 100 years ago or so, it was pretty much the norm that everybody would go to church.
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That it was part of the...
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We'd take Sunday off, nobody worked on Sunday.
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It was a special day and the church was seen as an important place in society.
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They'd build the churches in the center of town.
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That's why they'd have town hall meetings because that was the place.
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That place had a social significance as the heart of the city.
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Now, churches are considered to be nothing of importance at all.
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In fact, now discrimination, as you said, is beginning to rise up.
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And so yes, discrimination for religion, absolutely.
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Is there other reasons why you're discriminated against? Yeah? I mean, not dealing with just color, but just who you are as a person.
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Yeah.
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I would say you've probably been discriminated against because you're from the south.
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I mean, you're a southern boy.
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I see a camouflage hat and all.
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Some people, you're...
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And I would never call it, but some would say redneck.
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Not that you are.
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I'm not saying that.
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But you understand, people use that phrase and in their mind, they're thinking lesser.
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You're lesser because you wear camouflage or whatever.
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And I'm just basing that on your hat, by the way.
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What was it? Age discrimination.
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That's right.
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Hey, I tell you what, I had breakfast.
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Everybody I had breakfast this morning with was retired.
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All of them were over 60 years old.
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All these men.
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And yes, the feeling of discrimination.
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And it works both ways.
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Older people think young people are dumb, stupid, don't know anything.
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Younger people think older people are decrepit, don't know anything.
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Both sides discriminate against each other.
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John, you had something? That's right.
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That's right.
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You were and you must still be.
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Are you going to fall back? Expectations.
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We think he's supposed to act a certain way.
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Act totally different.
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So I always was discriminated because it's like people expect me to act like them.
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So I had a lot of discrimination.
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But we all do it because I once did.
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So it's just something we all do.
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So just your mannerisms got you discriminated against.
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Okay, I'm with you on that.
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How about this? How about the fact that you're a man? Yeah.
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Is there discrimination against men? You are a man, so you're automatically sexist, pig, bigot, whatever? Yeah.
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Right? That's true.
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Your brother, you had something else? Social status.
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Absolutely.
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And I would say beyond anything else, even race, even race, I would say the thing that discrimination exists really hard in is the idea of where you are socially.
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Because if somebody walks in and they're in a nice three-piece suit and they've got a big diamond ring on their hand and they're wearing a Rolex and they've got, you know, Oakley sunglasses on and they're wearing them very nice shoes.
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I don't care what color he is.
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He's going to get attention because of the money.
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Whereas if somebody walks in yellow teeth glazed over with ick, face dirty, hair disheveled, wearing clothes that haven't been washed, what happens? People sort of take a step to the left.
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You can come in but I don't want you to sit next to me.
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Can't sit here.
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That's right.
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And again, that kind of surpasses the color line at that point because whether you're white, whether you're black, whether you're Hispanic, whatever, if you look poor there's an automatic social oppression which is placed upon or a social discrimination which is made.
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That's the discrimination that James is dealing with.
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Over and above race and creed and religion because there was all kinds of religious, there was religious discrimination in the first century.
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There was racial discrimination but primarily it was more along the line of religion.
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There was Jews and Gentiles.
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The Jews thought the Gentiles were dogs.
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The Gentiles thought the Jews were awful and so they didn't really associate with one another.
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In fact, when a Jew would go to a Gentile land and come back to Israel he'd wipe his feet off as he went in because he'd wipe the dirt of the Gentiles off so he didn't bring that tainted land back into Israel.
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So there was this great divide of discrimination but where there was discrimination all around was the discrimination of the haves and the have nots.
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Those who were affluent and those who were poor.
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I remember a few years ago I'll never forget this I was having lunch with a man he's no longer with our church but he was with our church then and he and I were having lunch he said he said, Pastor Keith you know what I'd really like to see for Forest Church that was what church used to be called Forest Church before we changed our name he said you know what I'd really like to see for Forest Church I said what would you like to see sir he said I'd really like to see a doctor or a lawyer or a judge become a member of our church he said because I think if a doctor or a lawyer or a judge became a member of our church that that would increase our status that that would lend a little bit of class to our people if I'm lying I'm dying I'm not making this up I promise you I happened right over here at a seafood restaurant it used to be up here on 17 I remember where I was and I remember that I almost swallowed my tongue because I never heard something so asinine in my life as to say you know what we really need in the church is not more missions we don't need more evangelism we don't need to reach out to the lost, the dying, the hurting the poor, the invalid we don't need to reach out to the widows and to the orphans what we need is we need a doctor up in this thing because he will get us known what a shame but that was really his thought if we could just get a doctor if we could just get a lawyer if we could just get a judge, a politician somebody with some notoriety somebody with some money then that would really help the church you know what always drives me crazy what when people get all excited about celebrities who are believers and I understand guys like Tim Tebow God bless him, he's a good young man from all I can tell he's a believer doing his thing and that's great but when we place celebrity status in the kingdom that's a problem when we put people above other people because of where they are in the social hierarchy whether it be financial or any other reason that is idolatry and it's wrong and it's a problem and that's the problem James is dealing with in this text so the question today is do we show discrimination because I got to tell you it doesn't just happen in the big rich churches it happens in poor churches too it happens in men's groups too it happens at set free too discrimination happens everywhere because it's a part of that sinful nature that we battle and James is calling us to a higher standard in how we treat others so let's read through the text I'm just going to make comments as we go and then I got some application points I want to make he says my brothers and by the way Adelphoi my brothers this is love speaking to them he's saying show no partiality as you hold the faith and our Lord Jesus Christ the Lord of Glory show no partiality that word partiality it means to receive them or to accept them based on their appearance it literally means prosopon is the face and the idea of receiving somebody because of their face receiving somebody because of what they look like that's the idea of the Greek behind it and ultimately it means appearance not just what you look like I will say this though one of the other ways we discriminate against people is what they look like not just race or whatever but beautiful people have a better life a lot of times I've had to deal with this my whole life and I know because this ain't beautiful here but people that are just naturally good looking they kind of get a better shot at a lot of things and in essence it means to make an unjust distinction by treating one person better than another person because of external features it literally is the word that we would say for prejudice prejudice one quote on this passage is the word prejudice originally was neutral it meant judgment formed beforehand which might be favorable or unfavorable yet so predominantly do men form harsh judgments before they know anything that prejudice has become to mean something bad used to it simply just mean to make an opinion beforehand but now we say prejudice is always bad because we always make bad opinions and we use it to make bad judgments and he's warning us against prejudicial behavior what's he using though to warn us in he says show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus see that's the key you're holding the faith of our Lord Jesus you're carrying it, you're bearing it that's what's motivating you how can your faith in the Lord Jesus cause you to see somebody as something other than a child of God or let me say this, a creation of God let me ask you this when you go to James or when you go to the book of Genesis what do you learn about every man created in the image of God the word it's an important word it's a Latin phrase that it's good to remember the imago Dei the imago Dei the imago Dei is the Latin for the image of God remember that in Genesis chapter 1 he created man and woman in his image let us make man in our image according to our likeness in the image of God he created them, male and female he created them men and women are created in the image of God what does that mean does it mean we look like God yeah while we reflect this character we know this God is spirit so it doesn't mean necessarily that God looks like us in the sense of having eyes, ears, nose and all that God is not, God is spirit so he doesn't have those types of functional things anytime he talks about seeing us or holding us in his hand those are what are called anthropomorphisms those are words that use man language to describe God's features but when we see God's image what is God's image well when it says it's you you are made in the imago Dei you are given the imago Dei it's a reflection of God but in what way, what makes you special there are three things that and you're all nailing it you're like circling the wagon there's three things that I would say separate us from the animals because by the way, he created the animals too, right he created the animals, but did he say the animals are made in my image no, whales are not made in the image of God dolphins aren't made in the image of God cows aren't made in the image of God and you know what's interesting, you know the difference between animals you know, cows, dolphins, whales you know what the difference between them and us is they don't worship you don't see cows out in the field going you don't see monkeys surrounding an altar offering sacrifice you don't see apes or any other type of creature even the most advanced of animals they say dolphins are brilliant and apes have this mind that's able to do but you don't see them worshiping God and even the unbeliever worships something you notice that you go out to the deepest darkest tribe in Africa, what are you going to find totem poles or statues or some kind of idols, why because Romans 1 tells us that every man knows God exists he suppresses that truth and unrighteousness and he replaces the God who exists with the image of created things like birds and animals and other creeping things because he's got to have something to worship the imago Dei creates within us a desire to connect with our creator because that's who we were created by and so we would say the imago Dei makes up three parts intellect, emotion and will we know we desire and we do intellect, emotion and will and those three things are all governed by the fact that we were created by God in His image and we're the only animal if you want to call man an animal we're the only animal that wants to do that and has a desire to do that and does do that the unbeliever does it in rebellion and he does it falsely but he worships everybody worships something even your unbelieving atheists, you know what they worship intellect intellect, family but primarily they worship their own understanding their intellect yeah yeah exactly and so we have the image of God and so when I see you come in and I say oh man he's poor or oh man he's dirty or oh man he's fat, you said it whatever whatever oh man he's whatever what I'm not saying is this there is an image bearer of God there is a person who bears the image of God that's the heart of the problem we see through eyes that are sinful eyes, we see through eyes that are prejudicial eyes, we only see the things that don't matter we don't see the one thing that does matter that's who they are in created order, they're created by God let's look at verses 2 and following he says for if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say you sit here in this good place while the poor man you say you stand over there sit at my feet have you not made distinctions among yourself and become judges with evil thoughts let me ask you a question and be careful how you answer is it always wrong to judge no I was wondering if somebody would say yes because in our modern world it's become pretty popular to say it's always wrong to judge I would say one we always judge by nature anyway and a lot of times our judgments are wrong but there is a sense in which we have to make judgments, we have to make righteous judgments, Jesus didn't say judge not and stop, he said judge not lest ye be judged for the judgment that you judge with will be judged for you so before you judge your brother take the log out of your eye before you remove the speck out of his eye yes that's right yes we talk about judgment as discernment right but the problem in verse 4 is not that you're judging but that you're judging with evil thoughts that your judgment is coming from an evil intention consider this picture, just imagine this picture, maybe you've been here maybe you've been in a situation where you walked into a church and you felt like the church did not want you there or they didn't want you in a prominent position there we'll let you come in but you've got to sit over here where nobody will see you or we'll let you and you say I can't imagine somebody would be so brazen it happens you know one of the things that we haven't dealt with a lot but we have a little bit and that's the sometimes people have favorite seats in church yep and somebody will come in and they'll be sitting in their favorite seat and the person will come up and say you don't know this but that's my seat I understand you're new here and all brother go ahead most of the time when I judge people it's usually, it can be sometimes a jealous judgment too that I'm jealous of how you might act or how people enjoy you or I just have to have a and then I can manipulate any situation in my mind am I giving him righteous judgment or I can be judging that person because I am so much like him and I don't like you know what I'm saying he's got an evil mind but I'm so much like him so most of the time when I'm judging people it's usually people that I clearly understand what they mean so I'm so quick to judge them but I'm so much like them.
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Isn't it funny how the things we don't like in others are usually the things that we don't like about ourselves? Yeah.
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Things that are so true about us but we'll say oh that guy's so arrogant and they're like have you seen yourself? Yeah.
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Brother did you have your hand up? I'm sorry.
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No I was stretching.
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Oh okay.
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No no you're fine.
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Just one Ellison.
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Yes and so James is not saying never judge but he is saying think about how we judge.
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Think about what criteria we use to judge.
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I want to point to a text this is in my mind this morning because it goes with similar to this.
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Turn to Luke 16.
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Turn to Luke 16.
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This is a passage you're probably familiar with but just want to look at it real quick because he's talking about the rich man and the poor man.
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He says you've got this rich guy who comes in he's got a gold ring.
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He's got fine clothing.
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Poor man comes in shabby clothing.
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You've got the picture.
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You've got the imagination of what's happening here.
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Now there's a story in Luke 16.
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Most of you are probably familiar with it but let me pull it out.
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Verse 19 Yeah.
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I just want to read through this to remind you again why judging according to appearance is not always going to tell you who's right and who's wrong.
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It says there was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen.
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By the way if you wore purple at this time period in history you were something else.
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Because purple was made with a very special type of dye that was taken from a certain type of sea creature that was very expensive to get.
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So if you wore purple that was a big deal.
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Yeah the dye came from, I think it was a mollusk that they used to extract to create that purple dye and it was very rare.
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This is why when Lydia in the book of Acts is called a seller of purple it's why we think she was probably more well to do because you didn't sell purple.
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Yeah.
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But she was a woman of notoriety because of what she was selling.
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It would be like if I said you sold diamonds.
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Well poor people don't sell diamonds right? Unless they stole them.
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But if you're a diamond dealer you're dealing in the expensive stuff right? Well this guy's got purple clothing, fine linen, and who feasted sumptuously every day.
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And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus covered with sores.
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Who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man's table.
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Moreover even the dogs came and licked his sores.
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Now before we go to verse 22 if you think about the picture in your mind, the difference you got a guy who's well fed and he's got a guy and it says he says he was he desired to be fed with what fell from the man's table.
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Like a dog.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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Because nothing, he's poor and he's sitting outside this guy's house.
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Anybody in society would have naturally assumed here's the guy who's blessed by God the rich man here's the guy who's not blessed because he's poor.
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Here's the guy who knows God because he has and here's the guy who doesn't know God because he has not.
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I mean honestly you listen to any TV preacher today that's what you're going to hear.
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Trust in God who will give you health, wealth, happiness beautiful wife and a good job and a full bank account just send me your seed money.
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You got to send your seed money and you'll have it all.
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It's junk.
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It's false theology.
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It's garbage.
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But here we have the picture.
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Anybody in that local place would have seen the rich man as blessed and the poor man as cursed.
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Verse 22 The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's side.
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Verse 22, Luke 16, 22 The poor man died was carried by the angels to Abraham's side.
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The rich man also died get this and was buried and in Hades being in torment he lifted up his eyes.
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Now just stop right there.
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Before we get into the whole he saw Abraham have the conversation get this picture.
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Poor man dies.
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Angels escort him to his position in glory.
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Now how we talk about where Abraham was and the idea of Sheol and all that, that's a larger conversation.
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The point is and I believe this is even today.
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When the believer dies, when the blessed person dies God escorts them where they're going in a safe, comfortable way that they know that they are cared for from the moment that they close their eyes.
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Just a week ago we buried a lady who I loved.
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She was a lady who'd been a believer.
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She was a sweetheart and she was such a blessing to my life and I said this.
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I didn't say she passed away on January 12th.
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I said she opened her eyes in heaven on January 12th because she was taken to the Lord.
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Now, the poor man or the rich man, the blessed man from the earthly standards he closed his eyes and he didn't get no escort.
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How many of you have seen the movie Ghost? Where the little demons come out and they grab and they yank the man down.
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That isn't what happens.
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Not that you really thought it was.
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But the movie Ghost kind of paints a picture of when the evil person dies, the demons come up and grab him and drag him down.
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No.
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It says he closed his eyes here, he opened his eyes in hell.
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He opened his eyes and there he was.
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No possibility of parole.
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Yeah, we can talk about eschatology another time because we're talking about the difference between the resurrection and the lake of fire.
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I don't want to get off on that subject.
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I'm going to tell you now.
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Go ahead.
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Ask a question.
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I'm not going to get off on the eschatology question.
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The Bible says if you die and go to hell as an attorney but you know, blah, blah, blah.
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Then what about the stings from Tramp on the ashes of the tenors that were burned up? Okay, I would have to look at the passage and go over it with you.
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Not really what I'm on though right now.
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I don't want to divert from the subject because the subject of what happened.
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I believe that death, the believer's spirit is with Christ.
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I believe the unbeliever's spirit is alive in torment.
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But I do believe there's coming a resurrection and at the resurrection of the living and the dead, the saved and the lost, that the lost are going to go into the lake of fire, full and completely into the lake of fire where they will be forever in eternal conscious torment and that the believer will be forever in eternal conscious paradise.
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That's what I would believe arguing from Scripture.
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But that is certainly a conversation for another time.
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Okay, okay.
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I'm just saying that as far as where they trample on their ashes and stuff, I'm not sure.
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I'd have to look at the text and figure out the context and everything.
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But the point of this text, how I'm tying this into James 2, is James has said there's a rich man who's come in, there's a poor man come in.
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Why would the church treat the rich man better than the poor man? Because they figure he's blessed, right? Because they figure this is the kind of guy we want here.
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Because this is the guy who's going to bring us something.
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Rather than we've got to help him, he's going to help us.
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Sort of like what that guy earlier I said from my church.
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You know, we need that doctor, we need that lawyer, we need that politician because they would bring us something, right? They'd bring us notoriety, they'd bring us status, they'd bring us money, tithes, right? The world measures blessings by bank accounts.
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And selfishness.
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Yes, absolutely.
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The world measures blessings differently than God does.
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You realize this, and this is something that's hard for people to wrap their minds on.
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You can be blessed by God and be poor.
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You can be blessed by God and be living here as set free.
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Oh yeah, and I want to say that because some people would say, you can't be rich and go to heaven.
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I think that there are godly men who God has used them and their wealth to bless others.
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And that's why I don't think, I don't believe in vows of poverty, I don't believe in monkishness because to be a monk, like having to renounce everything and become a monk, but there's been a time in Christian history, especially the Middle Ages, where you were only considered to be really righteous if you were to give away everything you had and go live in a monastery.
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That was where the term monk comes from.
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And so I would say that's a monkish type of righteousness that I don't think is necessary.
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Here's what I believe.
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You can be a Christian business owner.
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You can be a Christian businessman.
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You can be a Christian man of wealth, but it must be a godly way that you treat that.
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The problem is a lot of people who have wealth don't allow themselves to submit to God because they're submitted to their wealth.
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That's why Jesus said it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle.
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That's what you're going to say.
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Because of that very thing.
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I tell you what, when I go out witnessing, sometimes I'll go over to Ocean Way Village, Double Wides Trailer Park.
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Man, those people welcome me.
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Not everybody.
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But a lot of those folks are normal folks, blue-collar folks, working hard every day, earning their dollars.
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I go over there and say, hey pastors, good to see you.
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I go over to the other places, more rich places.
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No soliciting.
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Didn't you see the sign? You're not allowed to be here.
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You know? The attitude.
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The poor person oftentimes is more receptive because they know of their need.
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While the rich person feels like their needs are met by themselves.
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Oh yeah.
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That's why pride comes before the fall.
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Pride is established by what? Self-reliance.
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And if I've got everything I need, I don't need God.
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So that's a danger.
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So that's why it can be dangerous to have wealth.
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It's not always, but it can be.
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But again, getting back to the text.
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Why would the church treat this person better than another person? Because of his status.
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What they're failing to recognize is that both men need to be treated the same because both men are made in the image of the same God.
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If both men are made in the image of the same God, both men need to be treated the same.
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Like I said, I don't want to spend all of our time on Luke 16, but the point is this.
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The man that the world would have said was not blessed is the one who went with Abraham to Abraham's side and was blessed in glory.
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The one who the world would have said was blessed went to Hades, opened his eyes in Hades where there was no possibility of parole.
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Hell is truly a final destination.
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There is no opportunity for salvation.
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I remember one time Jehovah Witnesses came to my door and I was trying to talk to them about salvation.
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And I said to the lady, I said, you know, if you die in your sins, you will go to hell.
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And they don't believe in hell, so that automatically took her off.
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Yeah, they don't believe.
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Yeah, Jehovah Witnesses don't believe in hell.
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But what she said to me was, she said, well, after you die, you get a second chance.
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And I did.
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I said, can I hold your Bible? Because mine does not say that.
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Mine does not say that when I die, I get a second chance to repent.
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And you don't.
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And that's what, I mean, Luke 16, very clear.
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Because that guy said, can't you go to my brothers and tell them that they would not come to this awful place? No.
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Well, what did he say? He said, if they don't believe Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe in somebody who rises from the dead.
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What was the whole point of that text? Jesus rose from the dead and they still didn't believe.
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So James' example is simple.
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Going back to James 2.
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His example is simple.
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If you've got a man with a gold ring, if you've got a man who comes in, you treat him better than the other man.
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You are exercising wicked, evil judgment.
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And then he goes on to say, listen, my beloved brothers, verse 5, has not God chosen the poor in this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He has promised to those who love Him? But you've dishonored the poor man and are not the rich ones, the ones who oppress you and the ones who drag you in the court.
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Are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable name by which you were called? Now here, I want you to understand this.
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I want you to understand that James is speaking in generalities.
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Not everybody who is rich blasphemes God and not everybody who is poor reaches out to God.
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But James is speaking in generalities because he's dealing with an issue.
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The issue is this.
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They're treating the poor badly.
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They're treating the rich well.
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And he's saying, but really though, who is the issue with? Who do you really have issues with? Is it with the poor people or is it with the rich people? And in this sense, it's the rich people.
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He says the rich people are the ones who are calling you into court.
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The rich people are the ones who are blaspheming God.
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It's not the poor people.
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Why are you so good to the people who hate you? I don't want to go there, but yeah, I mean, the whole point of the text is simple.
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You're judging wrongly because you're judging on the wrong things.
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You're being wrong in your judgment because you're looking at the thing that doesn't matter, the external appearance, and you're saying that's what's going to let me choose him over another.
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Why would we automatically show favoritism to the rich more than the poor? Because they think in some way they'll benefit us.
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Why would we automatically show favoritism? Because in some way we think it's going to be a blessing to us.
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So is it not selfish? Poor person comes into the church.
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Young woman, no money, five children.
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I know she has needs.
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She probably needs somebody to help her watch those kids while she goes to work.
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She probably needs somebody to bring her a meal once a week so she don't have to cook every night for her children after she gets off of work.
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And you know what I see when I see her? Work.
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Because that's what she is.
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She needs help.
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And help is work.
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And you know what the automatic response is a lot of people have when they see that? To run.
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I don't want to work.
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See they see somebody come in.
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He's a man and a woman with two kids.
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The kids are teenagers.
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He's got on a Rolex.
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She's got on a nice pair of pumps.
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And they come walking into church and they're going to bring money and they ain't going to ask nothing from me.
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That's who I want.
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It's selfishness.
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It's selfishness because I don't want to help that woman.
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Hopefully I wouldn't really feel this but I'm exaggerating the point.
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This is how they feel.
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That person needs something and I don't want to give.
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They need me to sit with them and talk with them and I got stuff to do.
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They need for me to comfort them and I ain't got time for that.
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It's selfishness.
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It's brokenness.
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And it still exists in the church.
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There was a pastor who and I couldn't imagine doing this.
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Number one I couldn't get away with it because I'm 6'2", 300 pounds.
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But there was a pastor up north who dressed as a homeless man and went into his church just to see how he was treated.
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Like I said, I couldn't get away with it.
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Number one, I'm so big.
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If I dressed up, people would be like, Pastor, why are you fooling? But it would have been a wonder.
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Yeah.
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This is the most well fed homeless man in history.
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But it just wouldn't work.
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But I was curious to see and exactly what he thought would happen, happened.
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Deacons came to him and sort of escorted him where he wouldn't be seen.
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Pushed him to the side.
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And eventually welcomed him to leave.
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Massive church.
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They didn't know though.
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He had had a makeup artist come in and put long beard on him and put shabby clothes on him so they wouldn't know who he was.
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What a shame.
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But it's a lesson because we would say, oh yeah, this happened in the first century.
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This isn't happening today.
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It's still today.
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His church.
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His own church.
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What an amazing testimony that he would be willing to do that and then share it to show the error.
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And I know we've got to close, so let me just give you three points of application and then I'll be done.
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Number one.
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Points of application for today.
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Number one, prejudice begins when we make judgments based merely on external observation.
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Prejudice begins when we make judgments based merely on external observation.
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I don't care whether it's race, cleanliness, tattoos, facial hair, size of the family, whether somebody's single or not.
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A lot of times people don't like single people in the church.
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We want families.
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We want kids or single mothers or single fathers.
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All of those things can incur prejudice.
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Right? So there's external observation.
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Number two.
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It is impossible to know the heart of a man based solely on his appearance.
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It is impossible to know the heart of a man based solely on his appearance.
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In fact, we can't know the heart of a man perfectly anyway.
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The Bible says in 1 Samuel 16, the Lord sees not as man sees.
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Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.
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Only God knows our heart for sure, but we can certainly not know the heart simply by looking at someone.
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Number three and finally.
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If the poor and needy are welcome anywhere, it should be in the church.
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If the poor and needy are welcome anywhere, it should be in the church.
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You guys are part of set free church, and I'm thankful that y'all welcome the needy here.
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And I pray that we would have the same heart at Sovereign Grace, and I want to pray, we're going to pray now, I want to pray for the heart of the church in general, all around these areas, that they would open their hearts up to the poor and the needy, and not make their decisions based on unrighteous judgments.
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Let's pray.
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Father, I thank You for this ministry.
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I thank You that You've given a heart to Pastor Mark and the others to welcome in the broken, the needy, the one who needs help, Father.
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And Father, I pray that as our church continues to try to help set free, Lord, that they would be blessed.
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And I pray, Lord, that You would help our church to be welcoming.
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When we see those who are in need, that we would reach out to them.
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When we see that poor mother come in who only has herself and her children and no one else, we'd say, come eat with us.
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Come fellowship with us.
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Let us help you with your children.
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Let us help you with your work.
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Let us help you with your food.
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Anything.
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Lord, help us to love the needy.
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Help us to love them.
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Because in doing so, we're reminding ourselves that this person bears the image of God.
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That they're valuable to You.
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That they stand, Lord, as a testimony to Your grace.
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And Father, help us to be agents of grace in a world that is so far from it.
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In Jesus' name, Amen.