{"id":33197,"date":"2005-08-26T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2005-08-26T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermons\/how-to-treat-people\/"},"modified":"2005-08-26T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2005-08-26T00:00:00","slug":"how-to-treat-people","status":"publish","type":"sermons","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermons\/how-to-treat-people\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Treat People"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-audio\"><audio controls src=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/19\/2005\/08\/19099.mp3\"><\/audio><\/figure>\n\n<p>What would you do if it were up to you to determine the\nproper punishment for a convicted car vandal in Singapore? Would you insist on\nfour lashes with the cane on bare flesh, or would you propose some alternative\npunishment? What would you do if you were the pastor who was offered $1,000 by\na Minnesota atheist not to mention God or heaven at his teenage son&#8217;s\nfuneral? What would you do if you had\nbeen Princess Diana driving back to London with a friend and a van went off the\nroad and went into deep water, endangering the lives of the passengers inside?<\/p>\n    <p>What would you do if you were state auditor, Mark Dayton,\nwhen Minneapolis council woman Hillary called and asked for a $50,000 loan to\ncover gambling debts? Or if a telemarketer called you at dinnertime? Do you think you would be irritated and\nrude, or would you, with compassion say, &#8220;Here&#8217;s someone who&#8217;s making a low\nwage, may have difficulty getting another job, and may be uncomfortable making\nthe call. I ought to treat this person decently.&#8221; <\/p>\n    <p>More important than what any of us would do, is how we\ndecide what to do in these situations. All of these situations get at an issue everyone deals  is,\nhow do we treat other people? For each situation there is a Christian approach,\nand it is written in James 2, verses 8 and 9 which says, &#8220;If you really keep\nthe royal law found in Scripture, &#8216;Love your neighbor as yourself,&#8217; you are\ndoing right. But if you show\nfavoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers.&#8221;<\/p>\n    <p>These verses raise two questions, and the way we answer\nthese questions determine how we handle almost every situation of life\ninvolving interpersonal relationships. <\/p>\n    <h2 class=\"wp-block-heading is-style-article-subhead1\">Question one: Who sets the rules? <\/h2>\n    <p>In the original version of what is commonly called the\nGolden Rule, we are told we should treat others as we would like to be treated.\nBut there is a modern corruption of the Golden Rule that says, &#8220;He who has the\ngold sets the rules.&#8221; <\/p>\n    <p>In some respects, I think both versions of the Golden Rule\nare true and right. The original\n we should treat others as we would choose to be \nI imagine myself in the other person&#8217;s circumstances, and then I imagine how I\nwould like to be treated if I faced what he or she faces. And then, of course, because I&#8217;m not in that\ncircumstance, I should turn it around and do what I would like to have done\nunto me. It&#8217;s the Golden Rule.<\/p>\n    <p>The new version of the Golden Rule, that he who has the gold\nsets the rules, is also good and true. It refers to the person who has the greatest wealth and the greatest\npower, and implies, because somebody has great wealth and great power, that\nperson sets the rules by which everyone else lives. <\/p>\n    <p>Who does have the greatest wealth and the greatest power?\nIt&#8217;s God. God has all the gold that there can be; he owns everything, and to\nuse a long, somewhat antiquated word, God is <em>omnipotent<\/em>. He is  and can do absolutely anything. He&#8217;s\nbigger, smarter, and stronger than anybody. <\/p>\n    <p>I may choose to disagree with him; He may say, &#8220;Don&#8217;t\nsteal,&#8221; and I steal anyway; He may say, &#8220;Tell the truth,&#8221; and I lie; He may\nsay, &#8220;Don&#8217;t commit adultery,&#8221; and I\ncommit adultery. But what I say and what I do doesn&#8217;t change the rule in any\nway, because God sets his rules independent of me. <\/p>\n    <p>He is the ultimate boss. It is he who decides who goes to\nheaven and who goes to hell. It is God\nwho determines what is right and what is wrong. He is the one who makes the\nrules, and there is nothing that any of us can do to change those rules. <\/p>\n    <p>Fortunately, God is kind. God is good. He&#8217;s fair, and he&#8217;s\njust. But if he weren&#8217;t, there is still\nnothing we could do to change the rules. So, if God were bad, and if God were unjust, he set up the rules, he is\nstill the ultimate boss and we&#8217;ve got to go along with those rules. He has the\n he has the ability and the strengthhe sets the rules and we have to\nfollow them. <\/p>\n    <p>Now, as ChristiansChristians who are convinced that God is\ngood, fair, just, and generouswe have decided to live for God. We are the ones\nwho have decided to keep his rules. It\nis the smartest commitment any person could ever make. To decide otherwise is to turn against God\nand his rules. It is deciding to waste life and to lose eternal life.<\/p>\n    <h2 class=\"wp-block-heading is-style-article-subhead1\">Question two: Do I want to do what&#8217;s right?<\/h2>\n    <p>This is a question we must ask ourselves in every\nrelationship and every situation. When\nraising children, do you want to do what&#8217;s right? When facing temptation, do you want to do what&#8217;s right? When choosing a church, when spending money,\nwhen facing a  you want to do what is right? <\/p>\n    <p>However, that is not the only choice that we have, because\nwe can also choose between doing what will make us happy, or doing what other\npeople would like to have us do, or doing what is  doing is what is right. Sometimes, doing the right thing makes us\nhappy, but not always. There are times when doing the right thing is very\nunpopular, very difficult and very sad. <\/p>\n    <p>While we should be concerned about making these choices,\nthere is something that scares me more than people who make bad choices. What\nscares me is that fewer and fewer people are even <em>asking<\/em> what the right thing is. Most people are saying, &#8220;I&#8217;m going\nto do what makes me happy. I&#8217;m going to do what&#8217;s easiest. I&#8217;m going to do what other people tell me to\ndo.&#8221; <\/p>\n    <p>But this is not how we as Christians are to be. Christians\nlive for Jesus Christ, and the reasons for our behavior should be very clear.\nWho sets the rules? God sets the rules. And do we want to do what is\nright? Absolutely, we want to do what\nis right. So, based on these answers, God gives to us what he calls the Royal\nLaw. <\/p>\n    <h2 class=\"wp-block-heading is-style-article-subhead1\">The royal law<\/h2>\n    <p>The law is royal for several reasons: it comes from God, and\nhe&#8217;s the king, the King of kings, and in terms of human relationships, it is\nthe most important law. And, it&#8217;s the best way to live. To understand the royal\nlaw, one must also understand the terms that are in the law. The Royal Law is to love your neighbor as\nyourself. Love is not, at least in this case, primarily an emotional concept,\nbut is primarily a behavioral principle. It means doing something good for somebody else that is in that person&#8217;s\nbest interest. So, it may be giving\nthat person $50,000, but it also may be withholding money from someone. Upholding God&#8217;s royal law may be a tough\nthing to do. <\/p>\n    <p>Following the royal law means always saying, &#8220;What is in\nthat person&#8217;s best interest?&#8221; And if we\nare serious about loving others, we will always try to think through our\nactions and say, &#8220;What would accomplish God&#8217;s best, God&#8217;s good, in his or her\nlife?&#8221; So, if I lose my temper with my\nwife because of something she has said or done, I have to ask myself, &#8220;Is that\nreally going to help her be all God wants her to be?&#8221; Or if a friend does\nsomething downright stupid, and I support and encourage him, is that the right\nthing to dodoes that help to accomplish God&#8217;s best within his life? <\/p>\n    <p>All of this is very theoretical. What we need to do is try it. We need to translate this into our own lives. So, think of someone you know, some person in your set of\nacquaintances, or remember a relationship or a decision you had to make in\nterms of that relationship. <\/p>\n    <p>What would be the loving thing for you to do for this person\nor in this situation? What would be the\nright thing that would be in his or her best interest? What action would best accomplish God&#8217;s\npurposes in his or her life? Love. <\/p>\n    <p>We also need to define neighbor. It could be said that just\nabout anyone we encounter is our neighbor, but it especially applies to those\nwe would be least likely to love. It is\nnot primarily those we like or easily get along with, but often it is people we\nnaturally dislike or hurt.<\/p>\n    <p>A questioner came to Jesus one day and tried to trick him\nand asked, &#8220;Who is my neighbor?&#8221; and that&#8217;s when Jesus told the story of the\nGood Samaritan. It is the story of a\nman who was mugged, and one traveler after another ignored his plight along the\nside of the road, until along came a Samaritan who was part of a discriminated\nagainst ethnic group of the first century. And the Samaritan, the person least likely to help, intervened, helped\nthe individual, actually saved his life and paid his tab to stay and get the\nrecovery that he needed. <\/p>\n    <p>Most of us will never meet a Samaritan, but daily we\nencounter his modern counterparts. I think the easiest way to check out our\nthinking on this is to say, &#8220;Who would it really surprise if I helped\nthem?&#8221; So, today the answer may be the\nemployer or the employee who ripped you off. Wouldn&#8217;t that be a surprise to everybody if that was the person you\nloved? Or maybe it&#8217;s someone who sued\nyou, someone of a different color or a different sexual orientation. Or maybe it&#8217;s a family member with whom you\nhave been feuding for a long time. <\/p>\n    <p>You may think the Bible&#8217;s command to &#8220;love your neighbor as\nyourself&#8221; sounds like an invitation to selfishness, but understand the Bible is\nnot suggesting we kiss the mirror. Scripture recognizes that we naturally take\nan interest in ourselves, and challenges us to extend that interest out to\nother people. So it&#8217;s back to the Golden Rule one more time, of thinking how we\nwould like to be treated and then treating others that way as well. <\/p>\n    <p>In western Colorado there is a road called &#8220;The Million\nDollar Highway,&#8221; and my guess is that both tourists and even people that live\non the western slope often don&#8217;t know how the road got its name. They assume it got its name because it was\nexpensive to build. That&#8217;s not correct,\nalthough it probably was expensive to build because it&#8217;s through difficult\nterrain and at a high altitude. The\nreal reason it&#8217;s called the Million Dollar Highway is that waste material from\nthe ore in gold mines was used as the bed for that highway, and not all of the\ngold dust and nuggets were removed by the mining processes available at the time. And so, there is a partial roadbed of gold\nthat is probably worth a lot more than a million dollars. It isn&#8217;t the cost that gave it its name, but\nwhat is inside it. The same is true for\nthe Royal Law of love. Sure, it&#8217;s costly, but what gives it the name is what it\nis made of, and it is made up of Godthe God who is love.<\/p>\n    <h2 class=\"wp-block-heading is-style-article-subhead1\">What not to do<\/h2>\n    <p>James 2:9 tells Christians not only what to do, but what not\nto do. James says, &#8220;Don&#8217;t break this\nRoyal Law by showing favoritism. If you\nshow favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers.&#8221; It is\ninteresting that favoritism is mentioned here, because James addresses the\nproblem of favoritism earlier in the text, and it seems repetitious for it to\nappear here. <\/p>\n    <p>I realize by the standards of most of the people in the\nworld, all of us here are counted among the rich and powerful, so this text is\nsaying that we, those among the rich and powerful, should not receive the\nfavorable treatment of others nor should we express favoritism to others. Why does James have to keep saying it?<\/p>\n    <p>A couple blocks from our house there is a traffic light, and\nthe law states that people can turn right on red, so thousands of cars do that\nduring the rush hour in the morning. So\nwe in the neighborhood can hardly get out. You have to wait until it&#8217;s too late in order to get out on that road,\nso the city put up a traffic sign that said, &#8220;No turn on red,&#8221; which made\nabsolutely no difference whatsoever. A\nfew weeks later they put a thin rectangular sign on top of the &#8220;No turn on red&#8221;\nsign, and it is a  color, and it grabs your attention. The hope is that you will look in that\ndirection, and the brightly colored sign will attract your attention, and you\nwill see the &#8220;no turn on red&#8221; sign. But\nthis still didn&#8217;t make any difference. <\/p>\n    <p>Shortly after that, the city came back and put up two wooden\nsticks coming from both sides of the &#8220;No turn on red&#8221; sign, with red flags\nhanging down the side, and a parked a police car at the intersectionthat was\nreally helpful, actually. The reason\nthe city did this is because they considered it important. That&#8217;s why the multiple reinforcement was\nthere. And James, and the Holy Spirit\nbehind what James writes, apparently considers it important to get our\nattentionthat favoritism is wrong. <\/p>\n    <p>Not primarily because it means showing nice treatment to\nsomeone who has a lot. But when we play\nfavorites, we demean those who have less. I think that the best test of our own behavior is to ask ourselves the\nquestion, &#8220;Do I treat someone well because I expect to get something in\nreturn?&#8221;<\/p>\n    <p>When the Good Samaritan helped the man mugged on the side of\nthe road, the man was nearly dead. He\nhad no money, and the Samaritan would never get anything for his work. But he did it anyway. <\/p>\n    <p>Favoritism is saying, &#8220;Ah! If I&#8217;m kind to you, then you&#8217;re\ngoing to owe me, and I&#8217;ll get something back. But those who cannot give me\nsomething in return, well, I&#8217;m going to treat them in a shabby manner.&#8221; <\/p>\n    <p>Now let&#8217;s be honest about this: We all do it. I do it. You see people who look better, who have power, that are famous, that\nhave influence, and we treat them in a different way. And it&#8217;s wrong, but we do\nit. <\/p>\n    <p>James uses a special verb tense in this verse and I think he\ndoes it because he showed favoritism himself. In the original Greek he chose a particular tense that, in English would\nsay, &#8220;Don&#8217;t keep on doing this.&#8221; James recognizes we all play favorites, we all\nbreak the Royal Law of love. But, he\nsays, &#8220;Come on. As a Christian, quit\nit. Don&#8217;t do this anymore. Just stop.&#8221;<\/p>\n    <p>\n      <span style=\"\" class=\"\">&#8220;If you really keep the Royal Law as found in\nscripture to love your neighbor as yourself, then you&#8217;re doing right. But if\nyou show favoritism you sin and are convicted by the law as law breakers.&#8221; <\/span>\n    <\/p>\n    <p>\n      <span style=\"\" class=\"\">When Princess Diana and her friend were driving\nalong and they saw the van go off the road and into the water, they stopped.\nThey stopped, and the crown princess of Great Britain jumped into the water and\npulled the man out of the van and saved him from drowning and waited with him until\nthe police arrived to help. And the press followed it up and found out who the\nman was. And discovered that he was a homeless vagrant. <\/span>\n    <\/p>\n    <p>\n      <span style=\"\" class=\"\">Princess Diana, herself royalty, lived by the\nroyal law of God. We can do it too. You don&#8217;t have to be a prince or princess\nto do the same. Because God calls us all to live royally, and to love others as\nourselves.<\/span>\n    <\/p>\n    <p>\n      <em>\n        <span style=\"\" class=\"\">Leith Anderson<\/span>\npastors Wooddale Church in Eden Prairie, Minnesota. His most recent book is <\/em>Leadership\nThat Works<em>.<\/em><\/p>\n    <p> Leith Anderson<\/p>\n    <h2 class=\"wp-block-heading is-style-article-subhead2\">Preaching Today Tape\n# 198<\/h2>\n    <p>\n      <a href=\"http:\/\/www.preachingtodaysermons.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"\">www.PreachingTodaySermons.com<\/a>\n    <\/p>\n    <p>A resource of\nChristianity Today International<\/p>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tax_ctp_audience":[306],"tax_ctp_authors":[2283],"tax_ctp_categories":[165],"tax_ctp_field_guide_subcategory":[],"tax_ctp_field_guides":[],"tax_ctp_format":[170],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[412],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[],"tax_publications":[140],"tax_ctp_sermon_series":[],"tax_ctp_tags":[],"tax_ctp_topics":[],"class_list":["post-33197","sermons","type-sermons","status-publish","hentry","tax_ctp_authors-leith-anderson","tax_publications-ct-pastors"],"acf":{"scripture_references":[{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null}]},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How to Treat People - CT Pastors<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermons\/how-to-treat-people\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How to Treat People - CT Pastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"What would you do if it were up to you to determine the proper punishment for a convicted car vandal in Singapore? 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