“1 My brothers, do not show favoritism as you hold on to the faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ. 2 For example, a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and a poor man dressed in dirty clothes also comes in. 3 If you look with favor on the man wearing the fine clothes and say, ‘Sit here in a good place,’ and yet you say to the poor man, ‘Stand over there,’ or, ‘Sit here on the floor by my footstool,’ 4 haven’t you discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?
5 Listen, my dear brothers: Didn’t God choose the poor in this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom that He has promised to those who love Him? 6 Yet you dishonored that poor man. Don’t the rich oppress you and drag you into the courts? 7 Don’t they blaspheme the noble name that was pronounced over you at your baptism?
8 Indeed, if you keep the royal law prescribed in the Scripture, Love your neighbor as yourself, you are doing well.”
James 2:1-8
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I don’t know how many times I need to be taught this lesson, but God tends to like doing things in a way that does not reflect my expectations. I have publicly confessed my own lack of faith and imagination before, and I have had to admit to myself that the plans I make are only good insomuch as they mesh up with the plans already made by God. Preference of persons is simply a marker of misunderstanding in our hearts. As Christians, we are to have no preferences, but we are all probably guilty of some, one way or the other.

Where my mind lingers in this passage this morning is that God so often does what I do not expect, or He works in a way that I am not prepared for or in timing that, yet again, blows my min, and it looks like he’s doing that again, right now. And so we are left looking at Him, and I want to say He smiles about this, when His children are surprised by His goodness and grace. When we discover things like James lays out in this passage, He smiles as we discover more and more of His heart. When we see Him working, not understanding, and finally have that moment where the puzzle pieces start falling together, and we have that ‘AHA!’ moment and our faith solidifies in front of us…I imagine He has to laugh and smile again as our simplicity is wowed yet again by His generosity, goodness and love. Like a parent watching their toddler open a gift, and seeing them discover that the box was just as fun as the thing inside, God must delight in His children when we glorify Him and are wowed by Him.

The heart of God is, on the whole, incomprehensible to us. But we do get glimpses, images, pictures of who He is and those moments of realization are moments to glory in Him. The rich and poor both have His attention, equally, because both have their struggles. And so God destroys a convention we hold naturally with an attitude of love and compassion. One group is not better than the other. While they may struggle with finances, the meek inherit the earth, the poor are ‘rich in faith’ and have greater opportunity to live a life of trust in Him. The rich struggle with their wealth, and it is harder to depend on God when you seem to have things together on your own (so you think.) And so God shows us over and over that the way we would be naturally inclined to think things work, is usually not the way they do. He surprises us. He wows us. And the continual revealing of His love His disciples were confounded when Jesus told them it was easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into heaven. That still holds true today.

So, as we GoLove people for the sake of Christ today, and in the days to come, open your hearts and minds to the reality of how God usually works, and set your conventions aside. Remember that He does not work according to human standards or even according to our understanding. Period. He does things His way because His way is good. His way is righteous. His way leads our hearts and minds to holiness and it points toward Him that He would be glorified. So, show no preference in your evangelistic efforts. Expect great things from God, and yet do not expect them in the way your human nature tells you to expect them. Listen to the Spirit and the Word and the will of the Father becomes easier to discern. GoLove.