Trailblazin Ministries

Favoritism: Part 13 - James 2:10-11

Written by LaRosa Johnson
Wednesday, 17 October 2007

It is a sin to show favoritism, it's that plain and simple. James put it out there for us, and showed us that we are not keeping the Commandments if we are showing favoritism towards people and not to others. There is no way around it, but the fact of the matter is that many people, Christians included, will try to rationalize things and do their best to make the sin not appear to be as wickedly disgusting as it really is. With that in mind, James continues and brings forth an argument that will surely put to death the train of thought that would allow us to justify and rationalize our sins. To take a look at this, let us go to James 2:10-11.

James 2:10-11 (NASB) - 10 For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. 11 For He who said, "Do not commit adultery," also said, "Do not commit murder." Now if you do not commit adultery, but do commit murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.

This is a very interesting argument that James makes. There is no real need to spend a lot of time breaking down the passage because it is put very plainly, and there is nothing I can do to make it any more plain than it already is. Simply put, if you break one of God's laws, you have broken them all. The one question that comes to mind is, "How is that possible? If I break just one law, how am I guilty of breaking all of them?" At the very least, that is the question that came to my mind when I was studying this passage; the more I thought about and studied it, the picture became much clearer and I began to understand what this passage is speaking of, so let us take the time to look at it so that we can understand the meaning and intent of James' words here.

As believers, we recognize that God is the Creator of all and that He is also the Lawgiver, there are no complaints about that. Well, if we look at the Law and the Commandments, we have to remember the reason why God gave them to Israel (and us) in the first place. It was God giving us His standards and expectations for living a life that is perfectly pleasing in His sight. As you study the Law, especially the Ten Commandments, you see that they are not merely individual rules that we are to follow, but each law works together to bring forth a unity of what is expected of us. In other words, if we break one law, just one, then we have fallen completely short of God's standard. You see, God demands perfection, and even a single blemish keeps something from being called perfect; therefore, breaking a single law (no matter how small we think it might be), brings us below God's standard. If you look at it that way, you can clearly see that the Law is one (be perfect and holy as God is holy), and to break one part of the Law is to break all of it. That is what James is saying here in this passage; he is showing us that the same God who told us to not commit adultery is the same one that told us to not commit murder; if we commit one of those sins, then we have broken the Law.

Let us try to make this all the more plain. As we've already stated, God tells us to "be holy" (1 Peter 1:16); at its very essence that is the Law summed up into one. Put conversely, the Law is: do not sin. Broken down, the Law is simply a means of showing us what sin is and isn't. As Paul states in Romans (7:7), he would not have known what sin was without the Law, and the same is perfectly true for us. The Law shows us what sin is, but even without the Law, the moral laws of God are written on our heart (Rom 2:15), giving none of us an excuse for our sins. If all of this is true, then to break one part of the law (i.e. telling a lie) is sin and makes us lawbreakers before a holy God who has commanded holiness from us. Therefore, we are all lawbreakers and transgressors of the law because the Bible tells us that all have sinned and fallen short of God's perfect standard (Rom 3:23).

It is for this very reason that Jesus Christ came to pay the penalty for our sins. None of us are perfect and we would all be doomed to hell, the just payment for our sins if it were not for the atoning sacrifice of Jesus the Messiah (Rom 6:23). Now, knowing what He has done for us, we must again go back to what we are shown in 1 Peter 1:16, being holy just as God is holy. In other words, if we believe in what God has saved us from, then we should in turn desire to live a life that more accurately depicts the life that He originally planned for us to have when He created mankind. With these pointed words James makes his point clear, that we are all lawbreakers who are in need of God's mercy, which he then uses to setup his closing words concerning the issue of favoritism, which we will take a look at next time. Until then, keep walking in holiness!