“If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself,’ you do well; but if you show partiality, you commit sin, and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all. For He who said, ‘Do not commit adultery,’ also said, ‘Do not murder.’ Now if you do not commit adultery, but you do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law” (James 2:8-11).
Partiality based upon superficial criteria like personal appearance, income, nationality, or social standing is sin. It is a violation of the royal law which commands you to love everyone as yourself. Being a respecter of persons is irrefutable evidence which conclusively proves you are living as a spiritual criminal in the eyes of the King.
You do not have to be an adulterer or a murderer to go to hell. All that is needed is to violate the royal law by using worldly standards to show partiality toward some and against others.
Just as one illicit night with Bathsheba made David an adulterer and just as one dead brother made Cain a murderer, so one violation of the royal law makes you a transgressor of it.
The seriousness of the sin of partiality is sobering.
