God's Love Makes us Special

James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a

Mark 9:30-37

Take a few moments to think about someone who you think of as living a holy life; it could be famous person or someone you know personally.

Now I have two questions for you – 

What is it that makes that person’s life holy?

What would you need to change in order for your life to be holy?

We are called to live holy lives. Lives dedicated to the worship and service of God. The ever practical James talks about it like this:

 Show by your good life that your works are done with gentleness born of wisdom. But if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not be boastful and false to the truth. Such wisdom does not come down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, devilish. For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for those who make peace.

Holiness starts in our hearts as we learn to let go of the judgments, the anger and the criticism that get in the way of our own serenity and which hold other people in bondage to our beliefs about them.

The disciples in this morning’s gospel got into a heated discussion about which one of them was the most important. This is typical human behavior. We all want to be special. We come up with all kinds of reasons why we are special – because we’re good at what we do – because we’ve made something out of our lives – because we have special gifts or talents – because we help other people – because we have particular ideas that set us apart - or even because our problems are more complex than anyone else’s.

None of these make us special. We are all special because we are loved by God. We are all special because God loved us so much that God became human and experienced everything that it means to be human and limited.

Any other reason for specialness separates us from other people, because we are judging them and comparing them with ourselves. If I am special because I can sing well then that suggests that someone who doesn’t sing so well is less special. The need to constantly compare ourselves with other people is the basis for what James calls “bitter envy and selfish ambition.” It is difficult to be peaceful when we are comparing ourselves to others all the time, but it’s difficult to stop doing it.

Yet it is completely unnecessary. It is God’s love which makes us special. That is really the basis of the gospel. God loves us so much that once we enroll in the kingdom of God, we can know that we don’t have to be as clever or as successful as anyone else. We no longer have to prove ourselves because we are already the daughters and sons of God.

I think most of us associate holiness with an inner peace. That peacefulness that comes from knowing that we are completely loved and that we no longer have to prove anything.

We no longer have to compare ourselves with others and wonder who is the most important. Each one of us has a different part to play, and its one that changes as we grow and as we age. Each one is equally valuable.

Holiness starts with the certain knowledge that God loves each one of us passionately and unconditionally. Holiness is a response to that love – we can let go of needing to be special and instead, throw ourselves into loving God passionately and dedicating ourselves to God’s service. Holiness is a habit of the heart:

the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for those who make peace.

Amen