Royal Law or Royal Love

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Royal Law or Royal Love

July 3, 2022 • Mike Burt • James 2:1–13

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“The Gospel is good news of mercy to the undeserving. The symbol of the religion of Jesus is the cross, not the scales.” John Stott
Have you ever wondered what would happen to us if God were not impartial? We live in a day when special interests are constantly seeking preferential treatment for a particular group or from a particular group. Yet, so many people around the world suffer because of biased treatment given to some on the basis of their ethnic preference, gender bias, religious prejudice, or socio-economic class discrimination. Fortunately, James teaches us in this passage about God’s perfect impartiality that rises above any hint of favoritism.
Can we do this on our own? We can read the Mosaic Law, how can we learn the Royal Law? Only God is able to help us rise above our sinful preferences to become impartial in our dealings with others. It is the Lord’s impartiality that helps us become less judgmental, inclusive and merciful in our attitudes toward those who need Christ.
James gives us a glimpse into the early church where bribes, corruption and favoritism were the rule of the day inside and outside of religious circles. Not so much different than today I am afraid.
Sunday I will try to take us past our preferences and over our bias and beyond any discrimination – to the Royal Law – whose crown is mercy. See you Sunday!
Pastor Mike

What do you expect?

August 28, 2022 • Mike Burt • James 5:13–20

Pray for one another! “Men may spurn our appeals, reject our message, oppose our arguments, despise our persons, but they are helpless against our prayers.” J. Sidlow Baxter Prayer should be seeking the face of God and asking His will in our world. Too often, prayer is asking God to look in on us and get His blessing. World events, COVID, racial tensions, poverty, natural disasters, political uncertainties. All these cause us stress, concern and too often worry. However, God tell us that we have a divine outlet – prayer! As the final short message in James, the brother of Jesus encourages us to turn our heart toward heaven in prayer. Sunday we will focus on prayer – the expectations, the expressions and even a few errors. I know many of you will be at our Family Retreat so we will have the message recorded and available by the time you get back – check our website to wrap up this last chapter in James. “Pray and let God worry!” Martin Luther

Identity of a true Missionary

August 21, 2022 • Mike Burt • James 2:14–20

Home from Liberia, West Africa – God is Good! Sunday, I want to share what God is doing in the Churches of Liberia. What a great group of men and so many wonderful Church Families. I want to talk about missions from the perspective of James, the brother of Jesus. Missions of outreach and love going beyond boundaries, borders and comforts. I wanted to spend some time talking about what unites us as a Church. What brings us together as a Church. So, for that reason I wanted to jump all the way to the end of Romans, where we see Paul repeating to the church in Rome his reasons for writing them this long letter in the first place. Sunday morning, we are going to look at Romans 15:14-21 together. James told us that words or faith alone is not enough – deeds, obedience and action are called for! Paul gives us the three key elements to Mission – folks who are fruitful, faithful and focused. You prayed and God blessed – let me share some of that Sunday and let us all hear God’s call to the Great Commission! See you Sunday, Pastor Mike

Truly Rich

August 14, 2022 • Josh Burt • James 5:1–12

This Sunday we look at the first part of James, Chapter 5. James describes two extremes and their impacts. Here we see the James points out two things… First that this world can distract us from God, and second NOTHING this world can do is worth distracting us from God. We see God’s protection, provision, and purpose in these verses. We are continually reminded of His love and leading for what is truly most important. I hope, the same, as every Sunday, that we leave seeking Him together! We will take a look at the lessons that James wrote about here and will seek to apply them in our life as well. Patience is so hard! It is not just a hard lesson “learned” - it is hard to see the “purpose” of learning this lesson. Suffering is the same! But we are reminded of Christ in these times. Hebrews 5:8 "Although He was God’s Son, He learned obedience through what He suffered.” - We can not look at suffering simply in terms of lacking, losing, or loathsome - We need to see it as LEARNING to walk as He did. See you this Sunday! Pastor Josh