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Howdy.

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Well, you know, I was noticing the other day

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there were a lot of different cartoons that I had growing up

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and something that I had noticed when I was younger

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is that I kept trying to figure out that there were two of them that seemed to have some of the same characters.

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The Jungle Book and Robin Hood.

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And I kept trying to figure out it's like you had a big bear in both of those named Blue.

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He's named Little John in Robin Hood.

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But then later on you end up seeing a snake in both of them and you end up seeing a lion that's in both of them as well.

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And in my mind when I was a little kid, I actually thought that there were actual actors, little cartoon actors

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that were going around and applying for different movies to be in.

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So it was like in my head that these little cartoon characters had actually gone to try out for the role in Robin Hood

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and that they had come out to try out for the Jungle Book.

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And I don't want to admit how old I was when I realized that they were just cartoons.

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But with that, the fact that they just reused the cartoons,

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is that this idea of Robin Hood ended up being something that comes into our mind

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because Robin Hood as a character, as a person,

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is oftentimes someone that stands out in our myths, in our legends, in our collective psyche.

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See, the story of Robin Hood has been around six centuries more or less.

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Like since around 1400 AD.

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And this idea of the rogue who rejects all of the upper class,

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those who are in authority and steals from the rich and gives to the poor.

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And you get to love, it's like, oh, what a charming criminal.

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Oh, I love it.

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And you see this character where you're like, oh, great.

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He's kind of making things a little more equal for everybody.

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But the reality is that the original Robin Hood story didn't really have him

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stealing from the rich and giving to the poor.

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The focus was really more on his being a rogue, rejecting what others were doing around him.

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It was more of the idea of pushing back and not letting anybody tell him what to do,

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which frankly, that's a little bit more of what we really appreciate about the character.

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You see, it begs the question, do we really look for things that are more equal?

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But if we do, then why is it that there are so many things that are not equal in the world around us?

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It begs this question, if we actually want equality, then why do we do so many unequal things?

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Because in reality, is there a lot of ways in which James's letter applies to us

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the same way that it applied back then?

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You may be saying to yourself, you know, that's not really fair.

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I try to do my best to do right by all people and to try to treat everybody equally.

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I treat everybody the same. I don't see anybody any differently at any point in time.

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But then you pause and you say, well, but yes, but why is it that sometimes we treat some people

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a little differently than others? Well, there's good reasons for that.

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Sometimes you have to deal with things from a practical standpoint,

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or sometimes you need to look at the moral of the issue in front of you,

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or you have to be professional in certain ways,

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or frankly, I'm trying to stand for things that are just and good and right,

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and then we still end up asking this question of,

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why is it that sometimes we ignore some people and treat others with privilege?

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You may be wondering, whoever does that anymore, everything in our society,

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everything is built on merit and built on what you deserve.

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But if that were true, then why is it that when applying for a job,

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you could take the same resume and change the name on the top of the resume,

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changing a name from someone who you might think looks one way

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versus a name associated with someone looking differently,

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and all of a sudden they get a lot more job interviews.

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Or the times whenever we might think or see somebody as being wealthy,

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we might automatically assume that they must be good and smart and right.

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Instead of asking, are they just manipulative?

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Or even more than that, are we willing to disagree with them if they were wrong?

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What would we do in looking at if we have employees

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and how often we're looking to see what can I get away with paying them

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versus what should I be paying them?

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Times whenever we make deals with people that we know might eliminate anybody else

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having a chance to compete.

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Times whenever we listen to the pretty people with the good smiles,

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the ones that we think can pay for things in the first place,

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look at every commercial or marketing employee that's out there,

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or the times whenever we may be looking for easy money

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at a time whenever we have a home and a car and food on the table,

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and we have absolutely no interest in being concerned about the person

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who is desperately just trying to find a way to exist.

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There are so many times and so many ways in which we are in a world

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where we treat people unequally,

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but we keep looking for reasons to justify it

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and keep finding reasons to allow ourselves to base off of appearance,

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status, or trying to impress the people who are well to do.

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We're not really that different from the people of James' time.

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But maybe now a question to you is, are we even willing to admit it?

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Because even now, I am sure how many of you are still, as you're hearing this,

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still in the back of your mind.

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No, no, I had a reason for why I needed this wealthy person to listen

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and to be impressed because I needed them to donate money to my cause.

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No, no, no, no, I really needed to make sure that I rewarded this person over here.

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The other people weren't really doing enough to impress me.

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Are we even willing to admit where our hearts and our minds are at?

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But what's difficult is where this comes from.

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You see, this gospel, sorry, this letter, this epistle, coming from James,

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one of Jesus' disciples, became the epistle that Martin Luther hated.

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He hated hearing from this particular epistle.

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He hated listening from this letter.

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It was this constant feeling of, how can you possibly question my faith?

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The idea of faith without works is dead.

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And time and time again, no, no, no, faith is free.

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Faith is something without works.

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You don't need to worry about your works because faith is something freely given.

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Grace is something freely given.

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We don't need to obsess about these things.

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So then we become the same type and we say, how dare you question my faith

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because of your social issues?

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How dare you question what I believe just because of things happening in the world around me?

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But you see, then we need to pause for a moment and maybe ask a different question.

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Is to say, if we really believe that we are saved out of love,

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if you really believe that you did not deserve God's love

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and that he only saved you because he wanted to,

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then why would you not want to love others the same way?

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If we cannot get our minds around that,

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then is it any wonder that we may struggle with that part of reaching out and doing for others?

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Because sometimes we just sit there and we're like, why do anything at all?

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I don't need to really be worrying about this stuff.

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Why is it important to emphasize doing anything at all?

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Faith is so simple, grace is ours, we're done.

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Why even worry about all this other stuff that's here?

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The thing is, is that it shouldn't have to be something to be explained, but we'll do so anyway.

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See, the thing is, is that if you were to truly believe that God's grace is what saved you,

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if you were to truly realize that you have nothing that God would ever be impressed with,

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that in God's omnipotence, in God's omniscience,

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in God's overall looking at the world, that you are genuinely so worthless in comparison,

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and yet God would still do whatever it took, even letting his son die for you in order to help you,

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then wouldn't you want to be so grateful that you would do the same thing for other people?

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But you know what, maybe, maybe that's not enough.

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Maybe though, what if we were to still look and realize just how much we still struggle?

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And sometimes the way that we may feel like we're struggling or that we're in some level of poverty,

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sometimes it might be kind of like on the surface, and we're like,

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oh man, you know what, I couldn't upgrade my car like I wanted to because I've got to save up for vacation.

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Oh man, what a struggle. I feel so poor today.

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I might not be able to supersize my fries. I don't even know how I'm going to survive in this world.

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And then we even end up seeing though, what about the times when we actually do struggle?

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The times whenever you discover that you lost your job and weren't expecting it,

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nobody wants to buy what it is that you're selling,

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or that for whatever reason the rent went up really high

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and you can't do anything to convince the landlord to change it,

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or even that you found out that someone runs into your car

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and for whatever reason the policy isn't covering it because they said you were somehow at fault,

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even with the other person going the wrong way down the one-way street.

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The thing is, is that what's so funny about Martin Luther not liking the epistle of James

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is that Martin Luther was that rejected person time and time again.

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He was the one that was mocked by other theologians as the short drunk monk

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that essentially nobody needed to listen to.

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He was the one who time and time again is laying in his room,

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crying out, thinking that God is about to throw him into hell

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and that Satan is not willing to let him go.

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He knew what it was like to feel poor and downtrodden.

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If anybody could or should have been the one to stand by James too,

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wouldn't it have been him and shouldn't it be us as well?

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But maybe we still need to get back to the gospel.

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Okay.

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But how are we to then give a testimony to the world that God's grace is freely given

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if we're not even willing to give grace to people around us?

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If God of the universe can take a moment to look at you

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and to say, I love you, then how is it that we're going to get anybody to believe that

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if God's people can't even act like that themselves?

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How can we get anyone to hear the gospel if we can't even live it?

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But maybe finally, why would we even want to do what the rest of the world does?

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Think about it.

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The whole world acts like this.

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They give the people who are wealthy more to have.

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They respond to people just because they're pretty.

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They want to time and time again be able to let those who are oppressed be forgotten and ignored.

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Even when maybe all you have to even do is just put in a good word for somebody.

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And we can't even bother to do that sometimes.

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Or even just to sit with them for a few minutes and say,

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I know that you've lost everything.

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Could I at least give you coffee for a few minutes and you could breathe

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and maybe feel safe enough to go and find what you need?

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Do we really want to be like the rest of this world?

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Or don't we want to be a little bit different?

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Don't we want to be unique?

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Don't we want to be changed?

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Do we really want to act like all the other so-called Christians in the world

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that keep doing the same thing as everybody else?

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See, that's the thing about our life is that our whole life is God's.

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Our whole life is not just this one hour where maybe I can squeeze in 20 minutes,

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maybe 21 if you're not noticing, and try to get into your head something worthwhile

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and that maybe something will latch on and maybe you'll catch something.

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And then later you're like, oh yeah, he said something about Robin Hood.

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Yeah, that was great.

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And that's the entire week, 24 hours a day that is meant to belong to God.

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Because that's the thing about this is that believing means trusting God with our whole life

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even when we need to change for it.

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See, that's the thing about this.

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Are we willing to change our minds and our hearts?

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Because that's what it is that God wants from us.

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I was in my first year of college and it was the last week and I was about to head back home.

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And I may or may not have spent, bless you, some of my money that was supposed to go toward food on CDs.

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I may or may not have spent some of that money on other things that were not to feed me.

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And there I was, sitting after church on a Sunday at lunch with one dollar bill in my hand.

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And I was like, I have no idea what I'm going to do this week.

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And what my thought was is I could try to go and beg my parents to let me have some more money

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even though I already had everything in the bank account and I had spent it all.

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And every single day that week,

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there were people who had extra meals, extra food, extra of so many things.

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I ate the entire week, three meals a day.

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And I got back to Sunday morning after church and I sat down like a Steppenwolf song.

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And there I am with that one dollar that had lasted me the whole week.

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And put it in the offering plate.

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Because that's the thing, you guys.

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We've been given everything.

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And the fact that God wants to see our faith, are we willing to trust Him

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to know that we do not need to pander to the people who have everything.

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We can just trust God and say, God, I'm going to love every person you have in my life to the best that I can.

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I must stop trying to pretend with everybody else.

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Are we willing to let our faith have legs and walk us forward by faith?

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Because our whole life is lived in poverty.

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But it's been given everything by the God of the universe.

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May we show that to one another every chance we get.

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Thanks be to God.