Can loving your neighbor ever be taken a bit too far? A couple approached the pastor in the
greeting line after church one Sunday: The
young woman said: “Rev. Jones, Toni and I just met during this morning's 'Greet Your
Neighbor' time, we started talking, one thing led to another and we fell in love. We'd like you to marry us.”
Last week we focused upon Jesus' command to love God with
our heart, soul, strength and mind.
Jesus took that command from the Old Testament book of Deuteronomy and
he linked it with another command from the Old Testament book of Leviticus in a
novel way, saying - And a second is like
it: “You
shall love your neighbor as yourself. On
these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”
What is the definition of a neighbor? The dictionary has two definitions. First, someone who lives nearby, someone who
lives next to or near another person.
The second is your fellow man.
The second definition is the one found in the New Testament, for example
in the parable of the Good Samaritan.
Neighbor is not to be interpreted in a limited way or narrow way. My neighbor is any person who is in need of
my love, any person who is in pain, any person to whom I can give encouragement
to or hope through my personal presence or my resources.
Jesus commands us to love our neighbors. Be concerned for them and pray for them and
express active goodwill toward them.
Why? Because one way of
strengthening our love for God is to love other persons and one way to
strengthen our love for neighbor is to love God. The two principles are bound together. When we love others, God’s love can flow in
and through us in a free and powerful way.
God is able to give us greater wholeness of life when we are sharing
life in an unselfish way with others.
It is both a life-enhancing and an extremely demanding command.
Jesus command is clear, but not easy. But who promised that Jesus commands to his
followers would be easy? It’s easy to
give in to hate. It's easy to be
contempuous of those with whom you disagree.
It’s easy to demonize those who see things or think differently. But loving another person, especially one who
holds different values, now that is a challenge. Jesus sets the highest standard. It is Jesus’
radical ethic and one that is daunting for anyone who strives to follow Jesus.
Jesus says: “If you
only love people who love you what is your reward? Anyone, even tax collectors are capable of
that. He says: “If you greet and welcome
only your brothers and sisters, how hard is that? Even Gentiles do the same.”
For instance, loving someone, helping someone can sometimes
become enabling behavior. You find
yourself being manipulated, being used, becoming a co-dependent. In some situations tough love, saying no, is
the appropriate loving response.
Sometimes saying no, not helping someone in the way they request, is the
most loving response. There are of
course no cookie-cutter models for loving one's neighbor. It is case by case. That's why we rely on prayer and the Holy
Spirit.
One way to love a neighbor is to minister to someone who is
hurting. A student sent a note to one of
his former teachers. He received this
reply: “Dear William: I can't tell you
how much your note meant to me. I am in
my eighties, living alone in a small room, cooking my own meals, lonely and in
poor health. I taught school for 50
years and yours is the first note of appreciation I every received. It came on a blue, cold morning and it
cheered me up in a way you can never know.
Thank you with all my heart.” Bringing consolation to the lonely, food to
the hungry, comfort to the grieving are ways of ministering to those who are
hurting.
Loving one's neighbor implies taking some action. I recall years ago when I was living in San Diego and attending
my home church. One of the members of
our young adult group had been beaten in a random attack and sent to the
hospital. Our group prayed for him. We were very concerned. When he returned to church, I said we were
sorry it had happened and I hoped it didn't negatively affect his faith. He said:
“My faith is fine. But I was in the hospital for a week, and not
one of you came by to visit, no one called to see how I was, or sent me a card,
or showed any concern at all. My faith
is fine, but I wonder about the faith of this group.”
Another way of loving our neighbors is to work to correct
social conditions which cause suffering and injustice. Jesus preached that the Spirit of the Lord is
uon me, he has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and to set at liberty
those who are oppressed. It is working
to change or correct social conditions of our society which victimize and
oppress people. It is loving our
neighbors by working for social justice.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is a prime example of this form of loving
neighbor. I think also of whistle
blowers, who are never popular, people like Frank Serpico, and Karen Silkwood
and Erin Bockovich.
Jesus in this command said further: “As you love yourself.” A preacher tells this story. “One
day I was reflecting on last weeks’ sermon.
I will never forget it. I think
it was my finest hour in the pulpit.
Unequalled eloquence seemed to roll off of my lips. My brilliance even surprised me. Afterwards he commented rather modestly to
his wife, “I wonder how many great preachers there are living today?” She replied, “Well, there is one less than you think there is.”
It is crucial to have a healthy attitude about
yourself? We recognize that there are
many depersonalizing forces in life, events and experiences, which threaten our
self-esteem, which call our self-worth into question. We are tempted for example to compare
ourselves with others. I recall a
speaker who said: “If you compare
yourself with others, you will be vain or bitter, because you will always find
there are persons lesser or greater than yourself.” One writer said: “Self-esteem
is that deep-down inside the skin feeling you have of your own self-worth. It’s how you truly feel about yourself even
when no one else is around or regardless of what others say.”
As children our identity and self-esteem is profoundly
influenced by others: parents, grandparents, friends, neighbors, relatives,
etc. But what about when we become
adults? A writer said: “It’s what we believe about ourselves that
counts. Whether we were treated rightly
or wrongly as children, our self-esteem is now our responsibility.” Do you
agree?
Growing to appreciate one-self is a process. We all need to be told and shown from time to
time that we’re loved, appreciated, and valued.
But at the same time it’s true that loving-ourselves is our
responsibility. You can be told you are
wonderful, but ultimately you must believe it deep-inside your skin. Self-love means to appreciate your worth, to
have self-respect. Eleanor Roosevelt
said: “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”
Loving yourself is not narcissism. It's not being egotistical. It's not feeling superior to others. I’m speaking about a healthy attitude toward
yourself and about yourself. A woman
whose husband had died years earlier and who raised her teenage children alone
tells of how difficult it was when her children had all grown and left home. She writes:
“I felt so lonely and the house
was so empty. I didn’t know what to do,
where to turn. I felt worthless and
confused; my life didn’t seem to have any value, because I was no longer
focused on raising my children. When I
was away from the house I didn’t want to return home and when I was in the
house I could hardly stand the thought of leaving. I felt like I was living in a cocoon. So I began to pray, to pray as I had done
throughout my life. And as the days
passed, I began to feel some stirrings inside of me, a kind of inner
restlessness. I began to see in my mind
options for my life that I had never before considered and for the first time
since the children had gone, I began to look ahead with some anticipation. I didn’t know what was to happen, but I
sensed God’s Spirit leading me and calling me out of myself, and I knew that I
was about to break out of the cocoon I’d been living in and begin a new and
meaningful chapter in my life.”
The challenge is to not allow what others say about you to
change your opinion about yourself? Are
you going to give them that kind of power?
Jesus didn’t allow what others said about him to change his opinion of
himself. Jesus was slandered. He was falsely accused. They said he was possessed with devils. Countless accusations were hurled like stones
against Jesus every day of His life, but it didn’t change what Jesus believed
about himself and what he believed about His mission. Jesus taught people to love God and to love
their neighbors and to love themselves.
Jesus reminds us that there is the sin of thinking too highly about
yourself and the sin of thinking too lowly about yourself.
So why should we love ourselves and respect ourselves and
believe in ourselves? God created
you! God made you in His image. Psalm 8, a beautiful psalm says: “When I look at your heavens, the work of
your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established; what are human
beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them, yet you
have made them a little lower than angels and crowned them with glory and
honor. You have given them dominion over
the works of your hand and put all things under their feet.” God breathed life into you. Knowing and believing this truth gives value
and worth and meaning to our lives.
Why love yourself?
Our lives are new in Christ! God
is making us new people. II Cor. 5:17: “So if anyone is in Christ, he is a new
creation, everything old has passed away, so everything has become new. All this is from God who reconciled us to
himself through Christ.” God sees
us and through our faith is transforming us into a new being, a new creation, a
new creature.
Why love yourself?
God forgave you and me! God forgave your
sins and mine by dying on the cross. Our
sin is forgiven, erased forever. Christ
is the atoning sacrifice for our sins.
Christ took the consequences for our sin upon himself, our guilt, our
punishment, our judgment our death and restored us to a right relationship with
God. Knowing and believing this truth
gives value and worth and meaning to our lives.
Why love yourself?
Because God truly, fully, enthusiastically and passionately loves
you. Clearly, God’s will is that we have
a healthy attitude toward ourselves.
Jesus’ greatest command is something we should believe in, remember,
trust in and stand on everyday of our lives.
Love neighbors and love self. As one writer put it: “Without
love, all that you say is ineffective, all that you know is incomplete, all
that you believe is insufficient, all that you give is inadequate, and all that
you accomplish is insignificant. God's greatest aim for your life and ministry
is love.” Amen!
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