Sunday Challenge - Faith Moves; Faith is Action 6-8-25

Beware of Personal Favoritism – the Test of Brotherly Love

My brothers 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, in 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 there,” or, “Sit here at my footstool,” have you not shown partiality among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts?

 Listen, my beloved brothers: Has God not chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him?  But you have dishonored the poor man. Do not the rich oppress you and drag you into the courts?  Do they not blaspheme that noble name by which you are called?

If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you do well; but if you show partiality, you commit sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors.

What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 

If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,”

but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? Thus, faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. (James 2:1-9, 14-17). 

This principle works across the board; preachers showing favoritism toward each other. They sit in special seats, and there are various cliques in the church that show favoritism toward their group; they also tend to think they are better than some of the others. Showing partiality because of someone’s status is not love.

What about “Loving your neighbor as yourselves? Who is your neighbor? Not the person who lives close to you, but everyone you come in contact with.

Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’  On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 26:37-40)

Show me your faith and I’ll show you my good works. The opposite of good is evil/bad.

His handmaiden, Betty A. Burnett ~ burnettministries.org