Tag Archives: Neighbor

What Mattered to Jesus

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If you could ask Jesus what was the most important thing to do, what do you think He’d say?  What do you think he’d tell you is the most important thing for us to do as Christians?  Lots of choices, lots of options, huh?  Lots of things that He could say.

Well, you know what?  That scenario happened in scripture.  We actually know what He’d say.  Listen to what happened in Mark 12: 28-31:

28 One of the scribes came near and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, he asked him, ‘Which commandment is the first of all?’ 29Jesus answered, ‘The first is, “Hear, O Israel:the Lord our God, the Lord is one; 30you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.”31The second is this, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” There is no other commandment greater than these.’

love-god-love-neighborHe was asked, what is the greatest commandment?  What matters most?  What is most important?

There were a lot of things that Jesus could say, lots of places that Jesus could go.  And what did He say?

Love the Lord with all your heart, your soul, your mind, and your strength.  In other words, love God with all that you are.  Love God with every fiber of your being.  With your intellect.  With your emotions.  With your body.  With everything.  Love God with every inch of who you are.

But that’s not all He tells us.  Love your neighbor as you love yourself.  So there, we see two more loves.  Love your neighbor.  And of course, we’ve seen Jesus tell us that this doesn’t mean our physical neighbor alone, but it means all the folks we come in contact with.

Love.  As Christians, we are called to love.  We have to love the people we come in contact with.  We have to show them that love.  It’s our command as Christians.  Love.

But, there is another love.  As you love yourself.  You matter.  You are important.  God loves you. That means you are to love yourself.  Stop beating yourself up.  God believes in you.  You believe in you.  You are His precious and His beloved.  And honestly, you can’t fully love your neighbor, until you love yourself.

CS Lewis said, “Humility is not thinking less of yourself, it’s thinking of yourself less.”

We are called not just to love God, love our neighbor, but love ourselves too.  Because God does.

So, we see what mattered to Jesus.  And we see what should matter to us.  Today, may we live out that love towards God, others, and ourselves, that He has called us to!

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At the Foot of the Cross

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Our praise team at Asbury sang a song I just love yesterday.  I’ll have to confess it’s a song that I had never heard of before until recently. It’s called “At the Foot of the Cross.”

The basic theme of the song is that we are all equal there at the foot of the cross. No matter what we’ve done, who we are, what we bring to it, we are all equal.  Equal in our sin, equal in our need for grace, and equal in the eyes of God.

And we are all equally loved by God there at the foot of the cross.

Last week in our reflections we talked about “loving God.”  This week we are talking about the Biblical command to “love neighbor.”  And as I was reading a passage today in Proverbs that related back to love of neighbor, I thought about that song.  Listen to what Proverbs 29:7 says:

The godly care about the rights of the poor;
the wicked don’t care at all.

The Godly care about the needs of the poor.  Why?  That sounds nice to say that the godly care about the poor, but why? Why do they and why should they?

Because we are all equal a the foot of the cross.  Rich or poor, doesn’t matter.  Young or old, doesn’t mater.  Black or white, doesn’t matter. Male of female, doesn’t matter. We are all equal at the foot of cross.

So, we care about others, because God cares about them. And we are called to be like He is.

Today, may we care for all the folks in our lives, may we love all the folks in our lives. And may we try to point all the folks in our lives to the power and grace of Jesus Christ.

Because all are equal at the foot of the cross.  No matter what.

Hard to Do

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I had a professor at Mississippi College, Dr. Harold Bryson, that used to tell his students some thing that has always stuck with me – “Jesus isn’t hard to understand, He’s just hard to follow.”

That came back to me this morning as I read these words from Paul in Romans 13:

8 Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet”; and any other commandment, are summed up in this word, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.

Religion can be fun to debate about.  We can passionate conversation (i.e. arguments) about baptism.  Or about communion.  Or about a lot of things within our faith. But, these issues, these conversations, they don’t measure up to the whole of what the faith is about, about what the faith must be producing in our lives.

Love.

We have been loved by an awesome, amazing, holy, righteous, almighty God.  A God is all, before all, and beyond all. A God that is simply amazing, that our minds cannot fathom.

He has given us His son. He has taught us His way. And He wants us to live as He has called us to live.

What is the life?  Perfection?  Nope.  Winning theological arguments?  Nope.  Being better than other folks?  Nope.

Love.  Loving your neighbor as yourself fulfils the law.  That’s it. That’s the list.

That sounds awesome. The only problem is that it is hard. It’s hard to love your neighbor sometimes.  It’s hard to forgive your neighbor sometimes.  It’s easy to talk about, easy to right about, easy to think about.  It’s hard to do sometimes.

We can only do it though God’s grace.  It’s what we are called to do.  It’s what we must do this week. Love.  As we’ve been loved. And we are going to run into someone who we just don’t feel like we can/should love.

What is our response?  Love. That’s the command of Jesus.  Love. But remember that power to love doesn’t come from ourselves, but through Him.

Even when it’s hard to do, through the grace of God, may we love each other as He has loved us.