Sept 6th
2015 Psalm 213 James 2- 1-17 Mark 7: 24-37
We Human beings have a great thrust for the word favourite. How many of us here today have a favourite story, book, movie TV show, desert , who is your favourite person, sibling, or relative. I don’t know about you but
with I was growing up I wanted to be the favoured kid in my family. It made you feel
important, and my parents, teachers, and co-workers all taught me well, favourites have status. You were not only handled differently but
you received differently. But what they didn't teach you was, that favouritism is always short lived. No one gets to hold that position forever and sometimes
it is not even for very long. How many
of us here today have felt the accolades of others one day, then turn into scorn
and rejection the next. What they,
parents and teachers, and coaches, didn't tell me was that hatred, and
jealously are the side effects of being favoured. I know people who literally nearly kill
themselves trying to be the favoured one, any
names come to mind! It is a fact of live people, we love favourites and favouritism, but only for a short time.
We either want to be one or we want to be best friends with one. And some people will do anything to become
part of the pack. We all want to be associated with the
winners, or the successful people of our world.
We do not want to seen with or have close ties to the losers in life do
we?
The illustration from today’s reading from James is a good example of
how Jesus teaching goes contrary to the ways and the teachings of the
world. By following our own human
standards, those which are set outside the will of God, we become like lost
sheep. Loneness, and depression do not
come from God and they are not part of God’s plan for you. They
come because we don’t understand how precious we are to our heavenly parent. The negative image you carry of yourself does
not come from God. The
truth is that when we fall away from God’s intended plan for us, when we make
up our own natural laws, and rules to live by, we generally have to face the
circumstances of our own free will. This
great wisdom and truth can be found in the original garden story from Genesis. When we ignore God and the natural flow of
nature and began to follow our own standards for living and creating, we will
pay a price as we are seeing in today’s society. We don’t have to look far to see how
humanity is doing controlling our world, our environment and we don’t have to
look far to see how the world is handling what man creates.
James condemns acts of favouritism.
The irony of this worldly teaching is this folks; the supposed winners in
our world, those who accumulate wealth, positions power, or an impressive life
style, these things come at great cost, and it usually is at the expense or the
cost of others. We cannot claim to be
good, generous and rich while others suffers in the world. This is not God’s plan. In addition, those who win, find it
difficult to identify themselves with the lost, and with God’s humble servant,
Jesus.
We are faced with a difficult teaching here as we have been conditioned
from very young by parent, teachers and employers that life is measured in our
successes, not our failures. The paradox
here is that successes comes not from successes but from learned mistakes, that which fails us in the beginning. No
one wants to be left behind in this aggressive, materialistic world. We all want to be successful to some degree
in a worldly way. So I ask you to seriously,
in the week to come, take a look at what impresses you. Check out your motives for doing and how it
effects your neighbour, our environment and those on the margins of life.
How do you feel about the Syrian crises. God views all people as equal, but Gods
heart goes out to the poor and powerless.
We should and our country should too follow
the example of Christ if we claim to be Christian.
One of the big mistakes we find in looking at people in this manner is
that we often judge a person by their color, geographical location, sexual orientation,
race or economic status. Winners and
wealth especially in the West indicate to us intelligence, wise decisions and hard
work we think. On the other hand it may mean only
that a person had the good fortune of being born in the right place at the
right time and into a wealthy family.
But it can also be a sign of greed, dishonesty, and selfishness. By honouring someone in this way we make
appearance more important than character.
The women in the story from Mark today is from Syria a Greek Gentile who
worships many Gods in statue form. Yet
that does not stop Jesus from offering his healing touch and presence. This is the hardest lesion that any Christian
must learn. We accept all no matter
what. There are no strings attached to
our love an acceptance or our forgiveness.
I have a couple question for you think about in the coming week. Does poverty, race, sexuality or religious
denomination make you uncomfortable?
How do you respond to those who are less fortunate or are in a minority
in your community?
Often people tell me that poverty, religious denomination or sexual
orientation makes them feel uncomfortable, but not uncomfortable enough to feel
empathy for their condition or responsible to do anything to help understand of
ease their anxiety. James tells us
that this kind of thinking insults the minority and the poor. Is there not enough love to go around for
everyone? No one should be without this
necessity in life, the necessity of feeling loved. God loves us all equally as we should love
one another. I go back to the theme of
the last few weeks. There is only one
commandment that will bring justice to all.
LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, MIND, SOUL, and STRENGTH AND
LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.
Thank be to God Let us Pray.
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