“Showing Favoritism” 

(James 2:1-17) 

 My brothers and sisters, do not claim the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ of glory while showing partiality.  For if a person with gold rings and in fine clothes comes into your assembly, and if a poor person in dirty clothes also comes in, and if you take notice of the one wearing the fine clothes and say, “Have a seat here in a good place, please,” while to the one who is poor you say, “Stand there,” or “Sit by my footstool,” have you not made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?  Listen, my beloved brothers and sisters.  Has not God chosen the poor in the world to be rich in faith and to be heirs of the kingdom that he has promised to those who love him?  But you have dishonored the poor person.  Is it not the rich who oppress you?  Is it not they who drag you into the courts?  Is it not they who blaspheme the excellent name that was invoked over you?

If you really fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you do well.  But if you show partiality, you commit sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors.  For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it.

For the one who said, “you shall not commit adultery,” also said, “You shall not murder.”  Now if you do not commit adultery but you murder, you have become a transgressor of the law of liberty.  For judgment will be without mercy to anyone who has shown no mercy; mercy triumphs over judgment.

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but does not have works?  Surely that faith cannot save, can it?  If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food and one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill, and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that?  So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.

            This week our nation has watched as, yet, another school shooting happened in our midst.  I tell you, every time it happens, I think to myself, this is so horrible, so unbearable, that it will never happen again.  And yet, here we are mourning, once more, the loss of students and teachers in a shooting that isn’t supposed to even happen because, somehow, every time, we think we have learned the lessons that will prevent it.

            The statistics are stunning.  There have been 23 school shootings so far this year that resulted in 11 deaths and 38 injuries beginning with a shooting in Virginia on January 3^rd and the next day a shooting in a high school in Iowa resulting in 2 killed and 6 injured.  It goes on from there. 

…I believe there are ways to address this madness, but we have seen and heard, over and over, the same arguments and counter arguments, and the result is that nothing changes, nothing gets done.

What could possibly be more important than keeping our children safe in school?  What could possibly prevent us from doing everything we can toward that end? 

…Today’s lesson in the book of James, especially the first several verses, shows evidence of a community who acts in opposition to its professed ideals, a community that does NOT walk its talk.  In the case that James uses as an example, it is about bowing down to the rich and fawning all over them while sitting the poor in the back of the room or on the floor.  James’ community knew good and well what Jesus had taught about taking care of the poor and those who are down-trodden, and yet, they just couldn’t help themselves from getting all excited when the rich, popular, well-heeled, influential people showed up.  They were showing partiality, favoritism to those who had done nothing but oppress them and those around them. 

…And so it is with the mass shootings that have become everyday events.  We condemn them.  We promise thoughts and prayers.  We declare the evil of these events, yet we either act in contrast to what we know is right or we get caught up in wrestling matches with those whom we disagree, and it all becomes a diversion from the real issues.  We know that we must do something about guns.  Make laws requiring every gun owner to keep them securely locked up.  Do not leave children unattended around weapons and make laws that punish those who do.  And, for God’s sake, prevent automatic weapons from being in the hands of ordinary people.  There is no reason for this.  It goes against our stated values as Christian people.  Do not kill.  Rather, love your neighbor as yourself.  Care for one another.  Care about one another.

Back to James and the specifics he was referring to.  He was calling us all out on our tendency to honor and snuggle up to the rich and powerful, those who are well-dressed and smell divine.  But Jesus, on the other hand, was very clear in telling us to be careful about this universal tendency to fawn over the rich, influential and powerful. 

The truth is that through Jesus we know that God has chosen those who are poor in the world’s eyes to be rich with respect to faith.  It sounds a lot like Jesus’ Blessings in the Gospel of Luke (Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God…).  

This is so salient in the life of the church today, a time when churches are desperately trying to keep their heads above water.  And I think it is a perfect message for our church to hear.  Never in our history, and I say this knowing a bit of that history, never have we been fortunate enough to be positioned to walk our talk (remember what I preached about last week?  James’ words “Be doers of the Word and not merely hearers”). 

Blessedly we are able to provide parking for our village, asking only for goodwill donations.  Many people comply with our ask so that we have extra money that helps us to keep our parking lot maintained and to provide ministry and outreach.  I am part-time which has allowed our church some financial breathing room, and part-time is enough for our mission and ministry.  Also, you all have been faithful to your call to be givers to our church, entrusting your resources to our Finance Committee to keep their eyes stayed on our mission. 

Given all this, we are in a good position to look after the poor, the widows, the needy, the hungry.  We happen to reside in an area in which there aren’t that many people in need of financial help.  I’m sure there’s plenty of spiritual and emotional need, though.  We all can minister to each other and our neighbors who are hurting emotionally and spiritually.  That’s a big part of why we are here.  So, in addition to reaching out to our own community, we are privileged–blessed even–to cast our net wider in order to help the ones whom James refers in today’s lesson.  We cannot say to each other, “We’re only going to keep our money at home.”  That flies in the face of our calling from Jesus.  He made it clear in the Good Samaritan story that our neighbor is whatever person who is in need. 

And James makes it clear.  Yes, of course, welcome the folks who look good and smell good, but be even more welcoming to those in need, those who may not present as well as those who look and smell good, but are just as important or even more so in the Jesus House.

Because in the Jesus House the love of neighbor is the law of our community.  Our faith must be translated into practice.  We get distracted by thinking that we must know the right truth or to hold the right position on everything.  We worry that we have said the right things in our prayers or our conversations with our fellow Christians, that we won’t be saved otherwise, that we won’t be thought to be righteous.  No, in the Jesus House our faith comes through our actions, through our attention to the least of these, to the poor, the children, the prisoners, the weak, the widows, the women.  “Our faith,” as James tells us, “if it has no works, is dead.”

Today’s text makes it quite clear that what we do matters deeply.  James has taken Jesus’ message and ministry to the next level.

Lynne Garvey Hodge messaged me that she knew one of the teachers who was present when the shooting happened at the school in Winder, Georgia.  This young woman, Britany, had grown up in Lynne’s home church, Burke Presbyterian.  That church loved and nurtured her.  Brittany will be dealing with the traumatic stress that everyone in her building, her school system, all the students, will suffer from.

Are we walking our talk when we don’t do everything possible to prevent these horrible events?  If we believe that all life is sacred, is putting more guns into school buildings the answer?  Would it not be more loving to provide as much mental health care as we possibly can?  Would it not be more loving to stop the flow of guns, to be honest with each other about the truth about firearms.  They should only be in the hands of people who are trained.  The truth is that there is no amount of gun carrying staff that can prevent a very mentally ill person from their sick goal.  The only answer is to prevent those people from having access to any guns.  The truth is that most of us have no business owning guns of any sort.  The truth is that simple rifles or shot guns used for hunting will, by and large, not be used in school or other mass shootings.  The truth is we need to make a decision to err on the side of safety and caution when it comes to selling and distributing guns. 

Let’s put our energy into walking our talk, into being who we say we are, followers of Jesus, members of the Jesus House.

I give Brittany, the teacher who Lynne knows at Winder HS, the last word: “I started teaching in 2014, and vividly remember talking with my dad about having a plan if there was ever an intruder, and I always have.  To hear people say things or read things like, “how could you not be prepared?”  But I am.  It makes me sick to my stomach.  

I have sat through countless trainings. It doesn’t matter.  Nobody trains you on how to keep 20+ kids calm and silent for hours.  Nobody trains you on how you switch gears from singing in your classroom to protecting your children from anything that might come through that door.  The jumps and gasps that come from your students every time they hear something.  On Wednesday I did that.  I sat in the room, I kept them quiet, I held their hands, I answered their questions.  And then, I watched the looks on their parents’ faces while I walked child after child to their parents.  

My job is to protect and teach and I will go back on Monday and love my students still and teach them.  I will answer their questions and I will continue to do what I love.  

What happened in my community hurt us all, but it won’t break us.  Our community doesn’t need your politics, and your opinions.  We need your love, kindness, encouragement, and we need you to not forget about us.”  Amen.