James chapter 2 and reading from verse 8 and once again this is the word of the Lord. If ye fulfill the royal law according to the scripture thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself ye do well But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors. For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law. So speak ye, and so do as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty. For he shall have judgment without mercy, that hath showed no mercy, and mercy rejoiceth against judgment. Amen.

May the Lord bless to us this reading from his word.

There is much that is said and written about law and gospel and the role that each plays in a believer's life. James has been speaking to us about the perfect law of liberty. And now he employs another phrase as he writes about the royal law. I'm sure that many who preach from this delightful little epistle will come at it with an understanding quite different to my own. concerning what the apostle is telling us and teaching us.

Nevertheless, I would like us all at least to begin with two clear statements concerning what our Lord Jesus Christ has accomplished for us by his substitutionary death. And the first is this, our Lord Jesus Christ has fulfilled God's law perfectly. He has satisfied its demands personally and he has borne its curse representatively for all his people for whom he died. There can be no gospel otherwise. If the Lord Jesus has not removed the curse of the law, the condemning verdicts of law against our sin, against all the elect of God, then we have no gospel to preach. We've no good news to set before sinners.

So we believe then that the Lord Jesus Christ by his substitutionary death has fulfilled God's law perfectly on our behalf. He has taken the curse of that law and borne it himself for all his people. The second thing I trust we can all agree upon is this, that all the benefits of God's grace and Christ's death are received, experienced, and enjoyed by faith following our regeneration. We receive all God's goodness, we receive all God's blessings, we receive all God's grace, by faith. It's free grace. It doesn't come to us because of what we do. It is received because that which receives it, faith, is gifted to us by God so that all who receive faith as a gift from God are able to receive all of the benefits and the experience of God's grace.

We believe with the Galatians that Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for us. We believe with the Romans there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in, excuse me, Christ Jesus. We believe with the Colossians that we are in Christ holy and unblameable and unreprovable in God's sight through faith in Christ's death. Because that's what the gospel tells us, because that's what the apostles preached. And we endeavour thereafter to stand fast with the Galatians in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free. and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.

We agree with Augustus' top lady who said, if thou hast my discharge procured and freely in my room endured the whole of wrath divine, payment God cannot twice demand, first at my bleeding surety's hand and then again at mine.

This is the starting point that we take, brothers and sisters. If we are God's people in Christ, if we have faith in the blood of Christ, we are cleansed from all sin. clothed in God's righteousness and as fit for heaven as a new creation. We are fit as the body of Christ. We are as fit as is our head. And all that holds us back is this body of flesh.

soon. In our good God's wisdom and kindness, at his appointed and providential time, we shall lay down this drag upon our spirit in death in order to enter with Christ into his and our eternal glory.

We are fit, it's a lovely word that, fit, the fitness of things. We are fit, we are fitted. In Christ, Paul tells Titus, in Titus 3 verses 5 to 7, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy, He saved us. By the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost, which He shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour, that being justified by His grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

That is our inheritance in Christ. So when James speaks here of the royal law, which he explains to us, he tells us what he means by that. He tells us that it is, thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. He is speaking about how believers in this world interact with one another and towards their neighbours, because the Spirit of Christ, the Holy Spirit, dwells in them.

This law, this royal law of which James is speaking, it derives from the Old Testament law. It comes from Leviticus chapter 19 and verse 18. It is part, therefore, of the Mosaic law, although it's not one of the Ten Commandments in itself. But it is an Old Testament passage that encapsulates the true spirituality of the law, what we might call the tenor of the law.

The Lord Jesus emphasised this duty in his own ministry. He was asked at one point by a scribe, I think, a lawyer, he was asked, what is the greatest commandment? What is the greatest law? And Christ ranked this royal law second only to love for God. He says in Mark 12, verse 30, in response to this question about what is the greatest commandment, he said, And then, for good order, he gave us the second. And the second is like, namely this, thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

So this is what James calls the Royal Law, loving your neighbour as yourself. And what this shows us is that love and care and empathy and kindness are sentiments and motives that are to characterize our dealings with those around us.

But I want us to note this. For believers, there's a difference. For believers, these are no longer duties under the law, but fruit of the Spirit. fruit produced by that new life which has been implanted, or as James before calls it, engrafted into the soul of the believer. That is written on the heart of a believer by the Holy Ghost. It isn't us trying to reach up in order to attain to what the law demands of us and falling far short. It is living out the experience of the perfections of Christ in our soul.

And it's perhaps just worth noting how James frames this lesson for us. He shows us that this is the rule of Holy Scripture. He reminds us that as Christians, our rule of life is the Scriptures and the gospel that the Scriptures teach. It is the Scriptures understood and applied through spiritual wisdom. Some people want to take us back to the Ten Commandments and say the Ten Commandments are our rule of life, that we are to live our lives under the shadow of the Ten Commandments, as if that was the full extent of all God ever wanted from his people, or indeed that that was the perfection of all God ever required of man. Holy and good as the law is, the Lord Jesus Christ has enlarged and enabled his people to live to the glory of God by obedience to Christ through faith. And this is what James is teaching us. We are to live according to the scripture, rightly dividing the word of truth. That is why we encourage one another. And let me say, we encourage the young people amongst us to become familiar with the Scriptures, to read our Bibles, to listen to sound sermons, to hear the gospel preached regularly.

We are to live our lives according to the Scripture. Men and women of the world, the people of the world, they say, I want to be free to live however I want. But believers don't say that. Believers don't feel that. We say Christ has made us free from the law of sin and death that we might live to the glory of God, which we never could do before, so that we have true freedom True freedom is living according to the Scriptures because it enables and allows us to live to the glory of God in a way we never could before.

And believers are happy to bear the yoke of Christ and to acknowledge the Lordship of Christ and to follow after Christ in our daily life, in our daily walk and conversation. And that doesn't mean that we live perfectly as Christ lived or that we are without sin. Far from it. Sin is in all that we do because we are still in this flesh. But our heart's desire is after Christ. the hidden man of the heart, as Peter calls it. The hidden man of the heart in that which is not corruptible. What a statement that is. That which is not corruptible. He desires, that hidden man of the heart, he desires in that which is not corruptible to do as Christ would do. and it grieves us more than we grieve those we offend when we fail to live up to the example that Christ has left us.

The apostle is reinforcing this desire to live to the glory of God by expanding and enlarging this idea of partiality. And he is continuing in these verses that we've read together to reject the presence of bias and bigotry and partiality in our dealings with those around us. He's looking for a generosity. He's looking for a magnanimity in the way in which we engage with and interact with the world around us.

He mentions this royal law, it would appear, in order to clarify, just in case anyone interprets his words wrongly, to clarify that he is not suggesting that it is okay to be prejudiced against the rich. So he told them in the verses we looked at last week with respect to partiality, he says, don't neglect the poor by being partial towards the rich. But now he's saying, but remember, you're to treat everyone as you would have them treat you.

He is saying that we have not to be prejudiced against the rich either. What sometimes nowadays people call positive discrimination. In order to be good to one group, we go against another. That's not what James is saying at all. He would have us deal alike with all men. being neither rude nor implied to rich or poor because of their station in life.

And actually this phrase, the royal law, it's another one of these examples from James of a phrase that is unique to him, and it summarises that second table of the law of Moses. We sometimes think about the law of Moses being written on two tablets of stone and the first tablet or table speaks of our duty towards God and the second tablet or table speaks of our duty to our fellow man.

James calls it the royal law because it is a high law. It is a law of high rank in the estimation of men. It does, of course, have a kingly origin in the law of God. And we might say, too, that Christ granted it a royal charter, speaking of it as he does, as a binding principle for the life of believers.

And James commends those who do it. He is showing us that in loving our neighbours as ourselves, the Lord's people are not at liberty to be partial according to our neighbour's circumstances, their wealth or influence or lack of it. Because doing so would be selfish and self-serving.

And we who live by the perfect law of liberty, recognise that that law is not biased or one-sided. It teaches us to be generous as becomes the children of a king and as becomes the heirs and beneficiaries of Christ. The perfect law of liberty takes the pattern, the example that Christ has left us and says to the church, to believers, to you and me, follow thou me.

Christ's church is under obligation to follow Christ and it is our desire to do so. That's what the engrafting of the Holy Spirit has resulted in. It is honourable for us to be found doing the will of Christ, to be following the example of our Saviour. And it is safe for us, it's safe for our soul to be doing so. It's comfortable, it's good for those around about us if we act with a Christ-likeness. And it is pleasant to our own experience. It does us good in ourselves to be found doing the will of Christ and following his example.

Following Christ brings joy in this world. And it brings Christ's own praise in heaven hereafter. Well done, good and faithful servant.

Now it should seem obvious that the Lord's people cannot choose what examples from Christ we should follow and what we might ignore. That would be foolish to even think that. And this is what James is telling us, that the perfect law of liberty is to be followed completely.

Those under the law of Moses could not pick and choose what laws suited them. And so what we have here in this example that James is now about to give us of adultery and murder is a masterly application of a scriptural example by James the Apostle. Here he is using his apostolic understanding to make this application from the Old Testament to the new and applying to the believer what the Lord had imposed upon the Old Testament Jews.

And the Apostle reminds his readers that those who broke one of God's laws under the old dispensation were guilty of breaking them all. That's part of the weight and the burden of the law. It didn't matter, in this sense, it didn't matter which law was broken because the principal sin was disobeying God the lawgiver. And that's still true today.

Not all men and women in the world commit the same sin. But all men and women are equally guilty before God as lawbreakers and sinners. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. It doesn't matter which law they've broken.

James uses the example of adultery and murder. and he shows how the adulterer and the murderer were each judged as lawbreakers and condemned without mercy. There was no credit given for obeying some of the laws. There was no allowance granted for breaking only one or two as long as you kept all the others. Should a man keep the whole law, says James, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. And that, of course, puts the lie to all those people who think that they are not as bad as someone else because they haven't committed the crimes that that other person has committed. People will say, oh, I'm not a sinner, I haven't killed anyone. Our Saviour exposed that misconception by pointing out in Matthew 5 in his Sermon on the Mount, how being lustful is tantamount to adultery. How being angry is tantamount to murder. And it is all a breach of God's commandments. It isn't just the act, it's the will that sins against God.

and there's no getting away from the sinfulness of sin. If not by our hand, we have in our heart committed every sin and it is only by the grace and mercy of God that we are not already consumed. And it's by such passages as this in James that believers learn the true extent and dimensions of Christ's saving grace because we see the huge weight of sin that we are guilty of in ourselves.

So applying this analogy, James shows that converted saints who serve their saviour according to the perfect law of liberty are equally, equally, as with the Old Testament believers under the law of Moses, they are equally obliged to maintain Christ's honour and follow his example to the full. We don't pick or choose what laws of Christ to follow or what duties to obey. We don't relieve ourselves of one obligation by perfecting another. The perfect law of liberty being written in the heart and engrafted by the Holy Spirit cannot condone lukewarm service. Christian obedience under the perfect law of liberty requires full allegiance to Christ, full commitment to his word, just as rigorously as ever the Mosaic law required obedience from an Old Testament Jew.

James says in verse 12, so speak ye and so do as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty. So speak ye. This is how you are to speak. So do ye. This is what you are to do. This is how you are to act as those that will be judged by the law of liberty. So speak ye, so do ye, not speaking and doing out of dread and fear of being judged under the law anymore, which is passed and gone in Christ, rather speaking and acting in gratitude and praise, motivated by the marvellous grace we have received, motivated by the boundless love that we have been shown. and the mercy we possess in Christ.

William Gadsby, whom we mention from time to time, he wrote this. Has Jesus made you free? And I just love how these men were able to put such sublime thoughts into just a few words, well-chosen words. Gadsby says, has Jesus made you free? then you are free indeed. Ye sons of liberty, ye chosen royal seed, walk worthy of your Lord and view your glorious head in all you do. That's the answer. You are royal seed, a royal priesthood. Walk worthy then of your Lord and view your glorious head in all you do, in all you say, says James, and in all you do. Walk worthy of your Lord and view your glorious head in all you do.

James is not inciting this example from the Ten Commandments about the adultery and murder. He's not taking us back to the commandments and saying this is what you are to be thinking about, this is what you are to be doing in order to appease God. Imagine that James is bringing believers back under the law's condemning power in any way. God's elect, James amongst us, know that that judgment is passed. They know the curse of the law has been carried by another and that the price of our liberty has been paid in blood. By Christ's death, our redemption and recovery is certain and sure. and conversion will follow and eternal glory will follow after that. It is ours by faith.

And yet, from the workings of our own heart, the children of God know the need of preserving grace. We know with Paul, in Romans 7 verse 18, that in us, that is in our flesh, dwelleth no good thing. But we know, too, with Peter in 1 Peter 1, verse 5, that we are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time.

When James tells us he shall have judgment without mercy that hath showed no mercy, he is reminding us that judgment awaits all those outside of Christ who shall bear their own condemnation. And at the same time he is rejoicing in mercy because mercy overcomes judgment. for God's elect in Christ. Mercy rejoiceth against judgment. God's mercy overcomes, it defeats, it reigns victorious and dominates his judgment because the Lord Jesus Christ has satisfied justice and answered every holy demand for his people.

The child of God thus holds these two distinct facts to be equally true. By faith we understand first that God's holy law is objectively satisfied and fulfilled by our Saviour's sacrifice. We believe there is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. We believe that. Nevertheless, we discover, secondly, that the will to follow Christ, though present, is weak through the flesh, and but for the continuing grace of God, it could never be sustained and it could never prosper if it was left up to us.

And in knowing those two things, by this knowledge, God the Holy Spirit, who makes us wise unto salvation, daily shows us how essential and precious the Lord Jesus is to us for our complete justification and our continuing preservation.

May the Lord bless these thoughts to us today. Amen.