2:1
James now moves on to favouritism. Peter also noted that God does not show favouritism. “Believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ”. This is a large part of the reason why we should not show favouritism, or perhaps better why showing favourtism is mind numbingly stupid. We belong to our “glorious Lord Jesus Christ'', we have been saved by Him, we are loved by Him, we are co-heirs with Him. On a purely selfish basis what do you think you can possibly gain by showing favouritism to a mere man, no matter how important he might seem to be in the world?
2:2-4
James then gives a practical example of what happens. Suppose a poor man and a rich man come into the church. The natural inclination is to show favour to the rich man because we think he is important, but to ignore or treat the poor man as less important, the poor man. If we do this we have “become judges with evil thoughts”. Both were created by the same God in the image of the same God. Christ has died for both of them. They are of equal importance and value, and worthy of equal honour because of Christ. We find our own identity in Christ, and we give equal worth to both because of Christ. If we do otherwise we are not acting in a Christlike manner.
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