James 2:3-4‏

"And you pay special attention to the one who wears the splendid clothes and say to him, Sit here in this preferable seat! while you tell the poor [man], Stand there! or, Sit there on the floor at my feet!" James 2:3

Maybe this isn't our stance... maybe someone's heard sermons on this warning before. In fact, maybe we've heard it too many times, and maybe we've been stung by thinking more highly of a rich person than we should have. In fact, some of us now, would rather give the preferable seat to the poor man before we would some rich Yuppie. Well, we still don't get this truth, then... we've gotten ahead of God's message again. We are doing the same thing James is referring to, but now focused against the other person. Let's look at the very next verse...

4. "Are you not discriminating among your own and becoming critics and judges with wrong motives"

Again, we are brought to, not the practical issues of life... not what seems rational, logical... but to the heart of the matter. Both of these two types of people are loved by God and we have discriminated and judged them with motives derived from nothing more than sin. We look at what one can offer us or how little the other can offer, when we are told to look at one another the way God sees us.

Because we've been saved, don't think that the love is not in us because it is. The problems are that Christ has not been given an area of our heart yet... or when we are urged to give our "preferable seat" to one or the other, (or something like that) we still resist. There are many things that quench the Holy Spirit and most of them deal with our ignorance yet, of God's Word.

Let's pick up with James verse 2:5-6 next time.

I love you.