Westside Church

June 25, 2010
by Pastor Jeremiah

This week I’ll be preaching from James 2:1-13.  As I’ve been spending a significant amount of time reading through these passages over the last few weeks, I’m aware of a nagging deception that is so easy for me to slip into.  Whenever I come across a scripture warning the rich, I immediately pass over it thinking that somehow it doesn’t apply to me.  After all, I’m a poor man if you compare my wealth to the person down the street.  I don’t have to heed warnings to the rich because I don’t have their problems, or so I tell myself.  

How do we define a word like rich?  How am I to know if I am rich by the standards of scripture?  Of course, I have my own definitions.  From my perspective, if a person’s earnings were over $100,000 a year, they would be rich.  How do I come up with that number?  Well, it’s a significantly larger salary than I earn in a years’ time.  Similarly, if a person’s earnings were $24,000 a year, they would be in the poor category.  After all, that’s a lot less than I earned last year.  How could one even survive on so little?  This attempt to define rich reveals one all-important truth – rich is a relative term.  I discern whether or not I am a rich person by those I compare myself to.  Considering I live in a wealthy city, in the most prosperous nation on earth, comparatively speaking, I’m middle class.  However, if I widen my view and take into consideration the global condition, I realize that I’ve been deceiving myself.

I was first made aware of my ignorance when I took a trip to Kenya 10 years ago.  The poverty that those people live in, opened my eyes to see my own privileged life.  I remember returning from Kenya and purchasing a latte at Starbucks for $4 and realizing that was the equivalent of one days’ wages at a high paying job in Kenya.  That was the worst tasting latte I’ve ever had.  A few years later I came across a website that helped me put my financial situation in perspective.  It’s called the Global rich list.  I would encourage you to check it out.  Plug in your yearly income and see how you line up when compared to the rest of the world.  I guarantee you one thing, you will never read James 2:5-7 the same again.

  5 Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him? 6 But you have insulted the poor. Is it not the rich who are exploiting you? Are they not the ones who are dragging you into court? 7 Are they not the ones who are slandering the noble name of him to whom you belong?