This week we begin worship with:
And God, who knows the heart, bore witness to [the Gentiles], by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us, and he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith.
It is a beautiful play on words that the word used here for distinction (diakrinō) is often translated as “doubt”, such as when one is divided in one’s own thoughts. When doubt is erased by faith, we are cleansed.
God’s title in this verse is “Knower of the Heart” (kardiognōstēs). When the Gentiles were also cleansed, God bore witness not “to” them, but of their transformation, by also giving them the confirming presence of the Holy Spirit.
When God unifies us by faith, James calls out any attempt to divide us as sin. Sin that is sufficient to have broken the whole of the Law.
If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well. But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it.
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