Transcript: Loving Your Neighbor as Yourself: A Christian Perspective

Music Do I, as a professing Christian, love my neighbor as myself? I begin this word today with a true story of a couple who were missionaries in Africa. And it begins when someone asks a missionary if he liked his work in Africa. He replied, do I like this work? No, my wife and I do not like dirt. We have reasonably refined sensibilities. We do not like crawling into huts through goats' refuge. We do not like the association with ignorant, filthy, brutish people. But is a man to do nothing for Christ he does not like? If not, then God pity him. Liking or disliking has nothing to do with it. We have orders to go. And we go because the love of Christ constrains us. 2 Corinthians 5, verse 14 declares, For the love of Christ controls and urges and impels us, because we are of the opinion and conviction that if one died for all, then all died. Verse 15. And he died for all, so that all those who might live again no longer to and for themselves, but to and for him who died and was raised again for their sake. At first, when reading this testimony as it begins, you might think, what is missing from these missionaries' heart of love for the lost? But reading on, we find that even though these dedicated people were out of their own comfort zone, they were under the sweetest and strongest constraints to do what they did. The scripture in verse 14 tells us that the love of Christ controls, urges, and impels us. Some other versions of the word for the love of Christ constrains us. You see, love has a constraining dignity and honor to excite ministers and private Christians in their responsibility for Christ their Savior. Our love to Christ will have this virtue and Christ's love to us, which was manifested in his great act of love in dying a horrible death on the cross for us, and will have this effect upon us if we in turn love him with our whole heart. I am reminded of the incident in the Bible in Mark chapter 12 beginning in verse 28 when Jesus was confronted by some Pharisees who had approached him and his disciples and said, Then one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all? Verse 29, Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Verse 30 This is the first commandment. And the second, like it, is this. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these. Verse 32 So the scribe said to him, Well said, teacher, you have spoken the truth, for there is one God, and there is no other but he. Verse 33 And to love him with all the heart and all the understanding, with all the soul and with all the strength, and to love one's neighbor as oneself, is more than the whole burnt offerings and sacrifices. Now when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, You are not far from the kingdom of God. The scribes were a class of well-educated Jews who devoted themselves to a systematic study of the law and made its interpretation their professional occupation, which they had made with many rules and, get this, They even added other commandments, which became the tradition of elders and rabbis. These were verified in the account of Josephus' antiquities. This particular scribe came to Jesus because he had been impressed with the way that Jesus had handled the Sadducees on the issue of the resurrection in Mark's Gospel in chapter 12. You see, in their ignorance of the scripture, Jesus emphasized, because of this, they had been led into wrong doctrines and practices of the law. When Jesus gave the answer to the scribe who asked, what was the greatest commandment? He began with the scripture in Deuteronomy chapter 6 verse 4, which says, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one. You see, this announcement stressed the omnipresence of God, that he is Lord. And it also set God apart from the many gods of the pagans that they had grown accustomed to in that day. By repeating the introduction to the first commandment, Jesus was really identifying himself with God in that they were one. He also indicated that God could be known personally when he said, our God. We must understand as Christians that it is a privilege of truly knowing, loving, and possessing God. And we must understand as well and foremost that knowing, loving, and possessing God requires devotion on our part. the scripture and you shone love the Lord your God with all of your heart with all of your soul with all of your mind and with all of your strength for this is the greatest commandment declaring that we should love our God with all of our heart means our devotion to God must be wholehearted with all of our hearts the heart is considered to be the seat of affections, emotions, and passions, all of which are to center around God in everything that we do now. The whole soul constitutes the personality of the man, as distinguished from his body, and the soul distinguishes or signifies a person's conscious state as well as his spirit, which is immortal. Also, God commands us to love him with our whole mind. The word dianoia in Greek indicates mature thought So God commands that our minds also be transformed in addition to our desires and our personal characteristics And finally, our Lord requires all of our strength or capacities in all that we do be directed towards his service. now in stating that in all of our service we tend to think of this as being a service that we do for God to do something for God but in service for him let us first think about our service for him is to worship him so in worshiping God we are doing this with all of our might with all of our mind, with all of our being. This is where everything that we do for him, including and foremost our worship, is vital to the other aspects of service to God. So, in effect, dear listener, we must give Jesus Christ everything because he gave us his all. Apostle Paul said in Romans chapter 12 in relation to giving our all is found in verses 1 and 2. I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies as a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. You know, when Paul uses the word therefore in the opening of the scripture in verse 1, we draw the conclusion that from all that he had presented was so far in the word therefore. So therefore was everything that he had presented thus far. And this is clear from what he continued to say in the subject of making a dedication to God with every aspect of our lives. So this charge really rises out of humankind's universal condemnation by God in Romans chapter 3, verse 20, when he declared, for no person will be justified, made righteous, acquitted, and be judged acceptable in his sight by observing works prescribed by the law. For the real function of the law is to make men recognize and be conscious of sin, not mere perception, but an acquaintance with sin, which works towards repentance, faith, and holy character. You see, the justification that God has freely provided and the assurance of that acceptance that the believing sinner can have is expressed in Romans 8, verse 1. Therefore, there is now no condemnation, no adjudging guilty of wrong for those who are, hear this, hear this please, in Christ Jesus. in Christ Jesus who live and walk not after the dictates of the flesh but after the dictates of the spirit and because of all this it is only reasonable that we present our lives to God as living sacrifices as Apostle Paul has exhorted us to do in order to be in right standing with God Paul did not want his followers even in our day to comply because he had commanded them to do so, but because they wanted to do so in response to what God had done for them. What we are talking about is reciprocal love, dear listener. Paul made his appeal as strong as possible without commanding. He had previously commanded this conduct when he said, I beseech you. so we must know that this is an astonishing word to come from our great God remember God spoke through those who were used in penning the whole Bible from the beginning to the end and these words from God against whom we had sinned and under whose judgment we are still under until the very end of our lives just think about it this word to we believers a race of sinners and enmity with God he says I beseech you and this is saying I implore you or I plead with you or I beg you Paul is pleading with the hearers that they offer their whole body as living sacrifices to God and the body is the representation of the whole person. You see, Paul was urging the presentation of the whole person here, not just the outer shell. The believer slash priest, whole life as a Christian, needs to be given over to the Lord. We need to really stress that in our own lives. The reality here is that we need to separate from sin and give our precious Savior our all, not just a part of us. This is the essence of holiness, dear ones. This kind of sacrifice is acceptable to God, and it pleases Him. The Holy Spirit helps us in this whole supernatural change, this process. it's not an overnight occurrence but it is a lifelong process by which our thinking is to resemble more and more the way God wants us to think and to act so not only do we give complete possession of ourselves to our Lord and Master but there was a second part of Jesus' command in our opening scripture in Mark chapter 12 verse 31 which says, and the second like it is this, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these. So we see that we must practice love to others as ourselves. And this comes after our relationship with our Savior begins to blossom in our life of love for him. When one loves God fully, one cannot help loving their neighbor. In 1 John 3, verse 10, the word declares, By this it is made clear, who take their nature from God and are his children, and who take their nature from the devil and are his children. No one who does not practice righteousness, who does not conform to God's will, purpose, and thought and action is of God. Neither is anyone who does not love his brother, his fellow believer in Christ. Verse 15. Anyone who hates abominates detests his brother in Christ is at heart a murderer And you know that no murder has eternal life abiding preserving within him And verse 18 little children let us not love merely in theory or in speech but in deed and truth, in practice and in sincerity. I'm sure many who are hearing this message today remember well the parable of the Good Samaritan in this account of Jesus' sharing this parable defines our neighbor as anyone we are in a position to help you see, our love for other people should equal to the love we instinctively have for ourselves How many of you know that if we love our neighbors, we won't covet what they have, or steal from them, or lie about them, or be jealous of them, or do any of the other things God prohibits in his word? And this is why love is the fulfillment of the law. Only God can change our sinful hearts and give us the love we need to obey him and to have love and care for others and yet love ourselves as the scripture teaches. Now, love described in the Bible is quite different from love as embraced by the world. biblical love is selfless and unconditional whereas the love of the world is generally characterized by selfishness and selfish gain in the following scriptures we see that love does not exist apart from God and that true love can only be experienced by one who has experienced God's own love firsthand Romans chapter 13 verses 9 and 10 The commandments Do not commit adultery Do not murder Do not steal Do not covet And whatever other commandment there may be are all summed up in this one rule Love your neighbor as yourself Love does no harm to its neighbor Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law And John chapter 13 verses 34 and 35 A new command I give you, love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples if you love one another. And the third scripture, 1 John chapter 4 beginning in verse 16 and so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God and God in him. In this way, love is made complete amongst us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment because in this world we are like him. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. We love because he first loved us. We must know that the scripture states, love your neighbor as yourself is not a command to love yourself. It is natural and normal love for yourself. It is not like our default position in ourselves. There is no lack of self-love in our world today. We all sitting here today and those hearing this message at another time know that we were all well invested and steeped in selfish love of some kind when we were in the world before our relationship with Jesus Christ. The command is to love your neighbor as yourself is essentially telling us to treat other people as well as we would like to be treated ourselves. The scripture never commands us to love ourselves. It assumes we already do. In fact, people in their unregenerate condition love themselves too much, and that is our problem. The big word behind loving oneself too much is called selfishness. Think about it. In your present state of mind and your place in the Lord Jesus Christ today, a good question to ask ourselves actually comes from the title of our message today called, Do I as a professing Christian love my neighbor as myself? You see, we are to take our eyes off ourselves and to care for others. Christian maturity demands that we do so. The Bible says we are to do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility, value others above yourself, not looking to your own interests, but each of you to the interests of others. According to this passage, loving others requires humility. Did you ever think about that? It is valuing others more than yourself. Did you know that it takes conscious effort to put others' interests first? Anything less than this is selfish and vain and falls short of the standard of Jesus Christ. Please know as well that none of this should be taken to mean that we should see ourselves as worthless. God's word teaches that we were created in the image of God, and in that fact alone gives us great worth in the eyes of the Lord. Luke chapter 12, verses 6 and 7 declare, Are not five sparrows sold for two copper coins? and not one of them is forgotten before God but the very hairs of your head are all numbered do not fear therefore you are of more value than many sparrows hallelujah the balanced biblical view is that we are God's unique creation loved by God in spite of our sin and redeemed by Jesus Christ in Christ's love we can love others we love others based on God's unchanging and everlasting love for us in his precious son Jesus Christ in response to this love we share it with all whom we come in contact with our neighbors who are our neighbors? our neighbors are those who live with us those people across the street and those in other parts of the world. Possibly another question might be, well, how do I treat those in my own household? Am I loving and kind and helpful, or am I irritable, divisive, and argumentative? How often do I think about my brothers and sisters in the church or around the world? Do I have a heart of prayer for them? Do I show love and concern for those who are hurting and dying? I would like to comment on those who are worrying that they don love themselves enough Simply said these have the wrong focus His or her concern biblically should be their love for God first and then their love for their neighbor next. Self is something we want out of the way so we can truly love others as we ought to. There is a wonderful testimony. I believe it will impact you as it does me. And it is concerned with loving our enemies. And it begins by saying that an Armenian nurse had been held captive along with her brother by the Turks. Her brother was slain by a Turkish soldier before her very eyes. Somehow she escaped and later became a nurse in the military hospital. One day she was so stunned to find that the same man who had killed her brother had been captured and brought wounded to the hospital where she worked. Something within her cried out, Vengeance! But a stronger voice called for her to love. She nursed the man back to health. Finally, the recuperating soldier asked her, Why didn't you let me die? Her answer was, I am a follower of him who said, Love your enemies. Do good to them who hate you. Impressed with her answer, the young soldier said, I never heard such words before. Tell me more. I want this kind of religion. You see, dear listener, we have an overwhelming commandment to love our neighbor. We can say it is overwhelming because it demanded first that I love the Lord my God with everything that is within me. And then it commands that I love my neighbor as myself. This last part of the commandment to loving my Lord and my God is an absolute astounding commandment. It means that something unbelievable, supernatural, and powerful, and reconstructing, and upending happens in the soul that has found genuine divine love in the Lord Jesus Christ. It is supernatural. It is something well beyond what self-advancing, and self-enhancing, and self-exalting that we can do in our own efforts. the greatest commandment is to love God and it is the greatest and foremost commandment in the word of God the second can only precede from the first and greatest commandment and that again is to love the Lord your God with all that is in you I summarize that it is everything, all of our strength, all of our mind, our soul our everything now we would be remiss if we didn't depend upon the Holy Spirit, our teacher, our guide, and our comforter, to help us in this journey throughout our lifetime. Galatians chapter 5, verse 22 declares, But the fruit of the Holy Spirit, the work which his presence within accomplishes, his love, joy, gladness, peace, patience, even temper, forbearance, kindness, goodness, benevolence, faithfulness. Verse 23, gentleness, meekness, humility, self-control, self-restraint. Against such things there is no law that can bring a charge. And those who belong to Christ, Jesus, the Messiah, have crucified the flesh, the godless human nature, with its passions and appetites and desires. Verse 25 If we live by the Holy Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. If by the Holy Spirit we have our life in God, let us go forward walking in line, our conduct controlled by the Spirit. Let us not become vainglorious and self-conceited, competitive and challenging and provoking and irritating to one another, envying and being jealous of one another. Praise the Lord. We were not left helpless in our journey as a believer in this sick and dying world. Precious Holy Spirit in our lives makes all of the difference. Dear ones, let us always be mindful of demonstrating our love and compassion to those around us through our prayers, our words and actions, which are, remember, a result of our deep and abiding, ongoing relationship and fellowship with our precious Lord Jesus Christ. You know by now, I like to include testimonies, which is like putting a painting before your eyes, so to speak. And you know the saying which says, a painting is worth a thousand words. Well, this story, true story, begins by telling of a Christian grocer was in financial difficulties because his customers thought they could run up their bills indefinitely. They felt that such a saintly man would never pass them for payment or take them to court. Their ready excuse was, we don't have money to pay our bills. How can I pay my creditors if the people I have trusted do not pay me, puzzled the grocer. What should a Christian do in such a case? Believe all things and all men and go bankrupt? A novel idea came to him. He posted the following notice on the bulletin board in front of his store. On this bulletin board, 30 days from now, will appear the names of all persons who have been indebted to me for one year or more, and who after repeated requests have refused to pay. Some have told me they were unable to pay, but they were able to build homes, drive cars, and have other things that I could have if I had the money due me. I hope I don't have to put any names on the board, but I won't be put off any longer. Results followed immediately. Many paid their old accounts, while others promised to do so on the next payday. This grocer's action was wholly, totally consistent with Christian love. He refused to believe the falsehood of others, and by doing so he didn't allow them to continue in deceit and dishonesty. Love believes all things. That encourages honesty and virtue in others. Love does not believe lies, but endeavors to correct them. what a wise and generous Christian man may we all arise to the occasions that are presented before us that allow us to show our love to the neighbors all around us Hallelujah .