The Folly Of Favoritism – A

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Today on Real Life Radio.

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There is this temptation, there is this test, and there is this thing that we must deal with as a church, and that is this propensity to go to cliques and to go to clubs and to become exclusive. And that is not to be named among the Christian. None of us who are Christian should be ever guilty of being in a group that nobody can get into.

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This is Real Life. Welcome to Real Life Radio with Pastor Jack Hibbs. I’m David Jay, thanking you for joining us today as we listen, learn, and are challenged by God’s Word, the Bible. Have you ever stopped and thought, boy, what if Jesus were to come back today? In a world that feels more uncertain by the minute, it’s easy to lose sight of eternity. But what if we lived each and every day with the hope and anticipation that Christ is coming back? Now that’s the powerful perspective offered in One Day Nearer, written by Steve Millard. And it’s this month’s featured resource from Pastor Jack Hibbs, One Day Nearer. Through biblical insight and practical encouragement, this book’s going to help you face life’s challenges with faith and purpose, reminding you that with each sunrise, get this, we are one step closer to being with Jesus. If you’re ready to realign your focus and rediscover the joy of living for eternity one day nearer, it’s really a must read. The point is this, friend.

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Every day that you get up, you are one day closer.

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This book is available for a gift of any amount at jackhibbs.com slash real radio. That’s jackhibbs.com slash real radio. On today’s edition of Real Life Radio, Pastor Jack continues his series called The Book of James with a message titled The Folly of Favoritism. Now, before it became one of the books of the New Testament, James was a letter that was sent to those Jews who chose to follow Christ. And as new believers, James wanted them to know the dangers of favoritism. You see, in Christianity there is a great danger in showing favor to the wealthy, and they’re not to be shown any sort of preference because of their money, while the poor are shown less respect simply because they lack wealth. So today, Pastor Jack teaches us that God doesn’t judge based on our social status, our wealth, or appearance, but evaluates a person because of their heart. In the eyes of God, the rich have no advantage at all over the poor. Now, with his message called The Folly of Favoritism. Here’s pastor and Bible teacher, Jack Hibbs.

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James chapter 2 this morning, and we’re going to be covering verses 1 through 4, and the title of the message is The Folly of Favoritism. The Folly of Favoritism. As we march through the book of James, we come now to chapter 2, verses 1 through 4, and if you’re a note taker this morning, set it up this way. There are only two points, and there are about six sub-points total, three per each point. Very simple. First point is this, James chapter 2, verse 1. And that is that favoritism or partiality, partiality hinders the work of Christ in our lives. Jot that down if you would. And the second point is in verses two through four, and that is it damages, it damages the cause of Christ. Very simple. And we’re going to be talking about this thing about partiality, how dangerous it is. It’s a very dangerous thing. Partiality, listen, from partiality we have cliques. Every scenario, every gathering of human beings together in any capacity, you’re gonna have the temptation to form a clique. They are diabolical, they’re wrong, they’re evil, and you shouldn’t be, I shouldn’t be involved in a clique or a group or a club that is exclusive. God hates that stuff. And yet, why do we struggle with it? Because it’s in the human nature. James is going to remind us clearly how much it is within our nature. And we as Christians have got to fight it. That’s a great danger. We’re going to see that. The folly of favoritism. He says to us, chapter two, verse one, my brethren, do not hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with partiality. For if there should come into your assembly a man with gold rings and fine apparel, and there should also come in a poor man in filthy clothes, And you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and say to him, you sit here in a good place. And say to the poor man, you stand in here or stand there or go to the back or sit on this footstool. Have you not shown partiality among yourselves? Listen, and become judges with evil thoughts. Wow. James is not lightening up on us at all, is he? He’s not going any easier. He’s talking about conduct. In chapter 2, verse 1, he’s talking about Christian conduct regarding the assembly of coming together as a church. One of the most wonderful things that should highlight our week is the fact of coming to church. You know, I hope in your heart it’s not like, oh, brother, man, I’m going to go, and I’ve got to sit there through that thing again. I can’t stand it. Listen, you know what? Either please leave this church and find a place that you’re really encouraged and convicted and challenged and growing in, or Find that place. And if you go to that place, and you go to that place, and you go to that place, and you go to that place, and you’re still, oh, brother, I wish this guy would just put a lid on it and get… Then you know what? You need to find out if, in fact, you even know Christ at all. Because the Bible talks about us being hungry for fellowship, hungry to pray, and hungry to know the Word of God to come together. And that’s what we’re doing right now. This is a time of worship. And that’s our focus. And let me see if you’re all awake this morning. Who have we come to worship? All right. Well, listen, that’s the motive of our hearts. And we need to keep our focus on worship because if a poor man or a rich man enters the sanctuary, we are not to worship them or we’re not to denounce them. We are to keep our eye focused on Jesus Christ. Why? We’re here to worship, aren’t we? We got dressed up. Some of us did. I mean, I didn’t, but some of you are very well dressed. You’ve come because you’ve come to worship the Lord. We sang this morning. So what, we can try out for some choir? No, to worship the Lord. We’ve come here to worship him. We’ve come here to love him. As Matthew 2, verse 2 says, and we have come to worship him, says the wise men. And if you’re going to be a wise man, a wise guy in these days, you want to worship him too. You want to make sure that when you come to church, your focus is on giving Christ all of the glory, all of the attention, all of the praise that’s due to Him. Now, coming to church, unfortunately, is a gathering Especially on Sunday, where you have people that might come out of tradition. They might come out of being coerced. They may come here because of a bribe. We do do that, you know. We invite our neighbor to come and we’ll take them to, you know, somewhere after church. Oh, come, I’ll take you out to breakfast. We’ll get a free breakfast out of it, let’s go. Some people come like that. It’s hard on a Sunday. Most pastors, when you read enough stuff after a while, and behind the scenes ministry terms, this is what pastors call the mixed multitude. It’s Sunday. People come and they may not ever go again. They come certainly on Sunday. It’s this gathering of the so-called mixed multitude. And that is that there are some who love and serve the Lord Jesus. And there are those who are just religious. And then there are those who could really just care the less. But they’re here. And the scripture Jesus made reference of in his teaching. He said, listen, be careful. As the church age continues on, churches will get larger and larger, and he said, the kingdom of heaven is like this, or the kingdom of God. It’s the same term, interchangeable. That the kingdom of God is like a mustard seed that you plant, and it grows, and that mustard seed, which grows into a little bush, you can scarcely call it a bush, Jesus says, well, it grows and goes past the bush stage and it grows into a big tree. Well, that’s not normal for a mustard seed. And then Jesus gives us the tall tale sign of evil. He says, this mustard seed grows into a big tree and the birds of the air come and live in its branches. And, you know, we read that passage and we go, well, that’s nice. Well, listen, if you understand the Bible, when the Bible mentions the word birds, it is evil. When it mentions the specific name of a bird, that’s another story. Example, Jesus said that the father cares and is concerned about the sparrow. that falls to the ground he mentions its name it’s it’s genus right he says sparrow it’s a type of bird but whenever the term bird in new testament appears it is not good example jesus says the word of god goes into the heart of a person but satan comes like a bird and snatches the seed out of their hearts before it has a chance to germinate and change their lives Birds are not good. Jesus is saying, and the Bible teaches us, that as a church grows, in the mix and in the multitude of an assembly, there is this temptation, there is this test, and there is this thing that we must deal with as a church, and that is this propensity to go to cliques and to go to clubs and to become exclusive. And that is not to be named among the Christian. None of us who are Christian should be ever guilty of being in a group. that nobody can get into. In other words, in this church, there had better not be, but if you perceive it, I want to know it, there had better not be the leadership and the laity. There had better not be the rich and the not so rich. There had better not be the good looking versus the not so good looking, or the whatever, the outgoing and the non-outgoing. Whenever you begin to segregate and to separate the church, which is a natural tendency of the human heart, that church will not live long. If we cannot come together with people who are wearing suits and people who are wearing shorts, and we look at one another and say, well… Look, hey, if we depart from our focus of Jesus and begin to judge one another, we are a very ill body of believers. There’s a great story that’s told where a woman in England, she was going to a church and Charles Wesley had been preaching. And so she was excited and she came, but Wesley’s campaign moved on. And so she wanted to go to the church in her community. And so she goes to that church and the pastor of this great, great church saw her walk in and he said, ma’am, you know, why don’t you go home and read your Bible right now and come back next week after you read the New Testament. Just read it. And so she went home and she did. He didn’t think she would, but she did. And she came back the next Sunday and she was ready to worship the Lord. And he saw her again and she was not very attractive. She didn’t smell very good. She was obviously not well to do. And this church was. So he said to her, why don’t you go home now and pray and see where the Lord would have you to go to church. And so she did that. And she came back and she says, well, I think I took on hair. And he goes, you know, why don’t you go home and fast and pray and read your Bible and see where God would have you worship him. Guess what? She said, he never came back. Six months later, this pastor of the church bumps into her in the marketplace. He says, well, I remember you. She goes, well, I remember you. And he says, well, you know, I didn’t see you anymore, so you must have gone home and did what I said. She goes, oh, absolutely, yes, I did. And he said, and what did God say? She says, well, the Lord told me not to come back to your church. In fact, the Lord told me that he’s been trying to get into your church for years, and he’s not been allowed. Isn’t that good? A lot of churches are like that. I’m not faulting anyone. I think they eventually grow into this. We have to be careful we don’t grow into this. But a lot of churches might as well have a sign nailed into the lawn out front, suits and ties and dresses only, or whatever the case might be. Or those who make over $100,000 a year in this church are welcome. I mean, whatever the deal is. There’s an evil that’s in the human heart and it even is found among religious gatherings or those who know God and we have to be careful to guard against it. And it so often manifests itself in this thing called partiality or we can call favoritism. That there’s an elite group. And it’s wrong. They have their own parking. They have their own seating. They have their own arrangements that’s special for them. We need to be very, very careful. These things are not Christ-like. So the first thing that we see in James chapter 2 is the dangers of showing partiality. We’ll see three of them. And that is in verse 1. He says, first of all, that partiality undermines the faith of Christ. If you’ll jot that down. Partiality undermines the faith of Christ. It says in verse one, my brethren do not hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with partiality. Know this, first of all, that partiality undermines the faith. And if you mark your Bible, or if you’re taking notes, you ought to mark this, the faith. The word in the Greek is definite article stressing the the. It is the faith. What faith? The faith that’s mentioned in Ephesians 2, verses 8 and 9, that tells us that the faith is a gift, regarding the grace of God given over to us. God gives us the faith to believe in the gracious gift of salvation offered by His Son, and thus we come to faith in Christ. The faith is the faith that saves us. It’s the understanding of the nature and gift and love of God, the faith. When a person comes to faith, they’re coming to the faith of Christ.

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You’re listening to Real Life with Pastor Jack Hibbs. You know, to hear more episodes and maybe catch up in the series, just go to jackhibbs.com. That’s jackhibbs.com. And for now, let’s get back to our teaching. Once again, here’s Pastor Jack.

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This is what Jesus gives. What kind of faith? What’s the quality? What’s the standard? What’s the hallmark of it? It is the faith of Christ. This is what he gives. It’s not faith in Christ. That’s what happens. What do you put in your faith in? The faith of Christ, meaning the quality of faith he gives us. So don’t underestimate what he’s saying here. When we show partiality, it undermines the faith. Why? Because the faith of God is not partial. The Bible tells us in John’s gospel that Jesus said, you come to me, I will in no wise cast you out. He won’t cut us off. He will receive all those who will come to him, who will express that faith that Christ commands, and that is, you just come to me. Isn’t that exciting? He doesn’t say, you know what, I’ll give you faith if you do this, do that, or the other. He says, come to me, and that faith that he gives is this very, very simple, thing found in verse 1 that if we show partiality, we are undermining the faith of God. Why? Because we are speaking or showing in any way an elitist type of mentality when in fact Christ welcomes all people to come, rich and poor, influential and non-influential, tall, short, anybody. And when a church begins to depart from that and become a church of a certain thing, then that’s not good. We begin to get in trouble. And what’s our standard for this? What is the criteria? The person of Jesus, I would say. Where do you find him? How do you find him? You find Jesus among all people. You saw Jesus when he was preaching in his day. You saw great, influential, powerful, rich men like the religious Nicodemus coming to faith in Christ. Then you see very poor people like slaves and those who are outcasts coming to faith in Christ. Because when you looked at Jesus Christ, you were not challenged and you were not confronted with an elitist type of standard. He made all people feel welcome. The rich were comfortable with him. The poor were comfortable with him. The various nations were comfortable with him. If you were white, if you were black, if you were red, if you were yellow, you were comfortable with Jesus Christ. Why? Because he doesn’t focus on the silly outward things that man does. It is within the heart of every human being to show partiality. Isn’t that bad? Yeah, it’s bad. We have to fight it. The Christian has to fight this because it is a dangerous thing. It undermines the faith of Christ. We’ll talk about this more in a moment, but I do want to say it really dampens our effectiveness in evangelism when we show partiality. The Bible says here in verse 1, do not hold. The word actually is stop holding it. It implies that we do have a tendency to do this. We do have the tendency to say we’re Christians and to, in fact, be Christians, but to gravitate to partiality. Oh, I like them. They’re rich. Oh, how terrible. Well, you never say it. Well, yes, we’re going to go over to their house because they’re rich. People wouldn’t say that. But it might be in your heart. Well, I like the things that we can do because they’re rich. Or, you know what, we’re gonna hang out over there because those people are really powerful, you know, they’re movers and shakers in the community. Let’s hang out with them. That’s sick. Can you imagine if God thought that way? Hmm, he looks over a cloud and he goes, I wanna find the perfect person to fellowship with. In fact, I wanna find the perfect one to save. Where would you and I be? I remember walking into Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa in June of 1977. I didn’t go there for the right motive, I’ll tell you that. I walked in there with the wrong motive. I didn’t even know it was a church. They didn’t have a cross out there. What’s a dove anyway? It’s like some, you know, bird farm or what was this thing? I didn’t know what it was. I’ve never known. Walked in there, sat down. Oh man, there’s like 3,000 young people. My, this is cool. And I got to tell you, I drove my car up there and I was making a lot of money and I’m thinking, you know, Oh, well, this is great. People have Bibles. That’s kind of weird. No, well, anyway. And I was doing great monetarily. I was young. I had money. Things were happening. And hey, I had the world by the tail, I thought, until Greg Laurie got done with that message that night, and I found out the world had a bite of my tail is what was going on. And the fact of the matter was, when he got done preaching a message that night on Revelation 20, verse 11, which is about hell, I got saved at the end. I knew I was in trouble. Greg Laurie said, if you’re doing this, doing this, doing that, and doing the other, you’re not gonna make it. And I said, aye, aye, aye. And I got up and I went forward. And I gotta tell you, when I first sat down, I’m thinking, this guy playing the piano, why doesn’t he get a haircut? And then from my seat, I could tell that he had no shoes on. And in fact, in this one song that he was singing, you put this love in my heart, he drug his toes across the keyboard. He had an Afro out the ear. And I thought, this is a sick guy. And then when he got done, this guy comes out and they, welcome Pastor Greg. Pastor Greg? What am I in here? This guy comes out with hirachi sandals on. I don’t know if I’m saying that right, hirachi, or however you guys say it, I don’t know. But he had sandals on. And he had a hang ten shirt on with the big feet. Remember when I said hang ten? And he had long hair and a big full man shoe. And he went down like this. That was Greg Lurie. And he was a hippie. And I’m thinking, this place is nuts. And Greg Laurie goes, let’s give Keith Green a wonderful welcome here. You know, that was the guy, Keith Green. Everyone goes, oh, this is nuts. I got to tell you, if I would have known in advance there would be this Afro bearded maniac playing on the keyboards and a hippie giving a message from the Bible, I wouldn’t have gone in there. Because my concept of church was stained glass, steeple, robes, sleeping, boredom. And I was terribly convicted, but guess what? I was there on Thursday night. I was there Saturday night. I was hooked. Because it wasn’t the focus of the things, it was the focus of Jesus. He was the issue. He was the glory.

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pastor and Bible teacher, Jack Hibbs, here on Real Life Radio with his message called The Folly of Favoritism. Glad you could be here with us today. You know, this message is part of Pastor Jack’s series called The Book of James. It’s a series on being doers of the Word of God and not just hearers only. And we’ll continue on the next edition of Real Life Radio. Did you know there’s an easy way to stay informed on the latest biblical events shaping our world today? Check out the Happening Now section at jackhibbs.com. Now, these live events feature Pastor Jack Hibbs alongside special guests diving into current events, cultural shifts, and how they align with biblical prophecy. It’s a unique blend of Bible teaching and real-time analysis that helps you make sense of today’s headlines through the lens of Scripture. Happening Now is not just about information. It’s about equipping you with the truth and encouraging you to stand firm in your faith, no matter what’s happening around you. Now, these discussions are eye-opening, they’re thought-provoking, and they’re a great way to stay spiritually grounded in a rapidly changing world. Whether you watch live or catch up on past events, Happening Now will help keep you connected to God’s Word and what’s going on in the world today. Visit jackhibbs.com and click on Happening Now. Don’t just watch the news. Understand it from a biblical perspective. If your kid or your grandkid is in a season of doubt about God, what would you do? Let’s say he’s a young, let’s say he’s eight years old and he’s kind of thinking about God and doubting God.

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Yeah. Well, first of all, Lisa and I have raised our kids, and now it’s the grandkids. So I know that question. What we do, believe it or not, what we’ve done, what we do is take them outside. And if this is appropriate, dependent upon the weather, have them lick their finger, right? Put their finger in their mouth.

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Yeah.

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Get it wet. Stick their finger up in the air. And ask your kid, what side is your finger cooler on? Or what do you feel? I feel the wind blowing. How do you know that? I can feel it. Look at the trees. What’s happening? The leaves are moving. Well, how do you know the leaves are moving? Look at them. The leaves are moving. So, hey, buddy, but what’s moving the trees? Wind? No, you got to do better than that. What’s wind? Get them to think. You can’t give them the answer. That doesn’t build faith. Show them how to think critically to come to a conclusion. They see a tree moving. They feel the finger cool on one side that the wind is blowing on, and yet they cannot see the wind because their eyes are not capable of seeing molecules and millibars in the atmosphere. Right. But they see the effect of it. So the same is true about God. Right now, we’re not in heaven yet. In heaven, we get our heaven eyeballs. We’ll be able to see him. Right now, we can’t, but we see his evidence everywhere. So when you see the ocean moving, he said in the Bible, by the way, I’m going to move the ocean. I’m going to move the seas with the swells. And by the way, he says in the book of Job, I’m going to draw a line at the shore where these mighty waves cannot go past. Right? Take your kid down to the lake or down to the beach and show them this is evidence of God. So that’s going to start to dispel doubt. But we must never, ever allow doubt to go unanswered. That’s a recipe for disaster.

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This program is made possible by the generous contributions of you, our listeners. Visit us at jackhibbs.com. That’s jackhibbs.com. Until next time, Pastor Jack Hibbs and all of us here at Real Life Radio wish for you solid and steady growth in Christ and in His Word. We’ll see you next time here on Real Life Radio.