Churches have a tendency to succeed, calcify and then become elitist. It happens to most every church or Christian denomination, It happened to the Methodist's in the 1800's. It happened to the Anglicans in the 1700's. One such movement started the Salvation Army. There was a story of a poor young woman who wanted to join a fashionable church in the rich part of town. One day after Church she spoke to the pastor about becoming a member. He suggested she go home and think carefully about it for a week. The next week she asked him the same thing. 'Now let's not be in a rush', he said. 'Why don't you go home this week and read your bible every day for an hour. Then come back and we will see if you still feel this way.' She wasn't happy about it but she tried it. At the end of the week she was back. 'Yes, I still want to join this church.' This time the pastor, at the end of his ropes, suggested that she go home and pray and ask the Lord whether he wants her to join. The pastor did not see the woman for six months. One day as he passed her on the streets, he stopped her and asked her what she decided. She said, 'I did what you asked me to do. I went home and prayed. One day when I was praying, the Lord said to me, 'Don't worry about not getting into that church. I've been trying to into it myself for the last twenty years!'

In our society, favoritism runs wild. That should never take place in the church. Lev 19:15 Prov 28:21 Mal 2:9 Prov 22:2 What does it mean to show 'partiality.' It means to make a judgement on the worth of a person based on something external. Again James is getting back to the root of Christianity. Believers must internalize some attitudes in order to be faithful. But here is where the Church blows it. We like to show favoritism, don't we? If there is a church vote, who is more likely voted onto the board? Rich people, or educated people, or smarter people!!! What about the poor, uneducated, or less intelligent of us? What about women, and children. Believe it or not we have this prejudice set up in our minds about who can do what. This flies against the promptings of the Holy Spirit.

"Have you not discriminated among yourselves." As we look at this part of the verse we lose much in the translation. The word discriminate more commonly refers to wavering or inconsistency. Are you not inconsistent within yourselves, is probably the intended meaning. It captures the idea again of chapter one. One who is determined not do what he knows he ought to do. He faces both ways. To the gospel and to the world. He knows what he should do, but conforms to the world's standards. We set ourselves up as judges governed by wrong reasonings. We misunderstand our position in Christ. It is not our place to judge. We have also trusted our judgement, and that we should never do. Again it is God who is the righteous judge.

We should not judge the rich this way. 1 because God chooses those the world would never choose 1 cor 1:26, to reveal his wisdom. 2 On the whole it is the rich who oppress the world.

God is no respecter of persons. In the church, and at the foot of the cross, the ground is level. We all stand before God as sinners who need grace. We all come to God, no one better than the other. Favoritism flies in the face to the Gospel we are trying to proclaim.