The Best Way to Love Others
"Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 22:36-40)
People were always trying to trip up Jesus. This question was laid on Christ by a Pharisee after he saw Jesus “mic drop” (quiet) the Sadducees.
I think Jesus’ response however to this particular “expert” of the law is so profound and relevant to every person who has ever lived anywhere and has ever loved or wanted to be loved.
I used to think as many people do, especially those who grew up in church, that Christianity and “religion” is just a bunch of rules that I do not need and is not for me. (By the way, Christianity is actually a religion by definition, and it is ok to acknowledge that. Jesus during His earthly ministry was religious, and it showed in situations like this that He was able to get to the heart of the purpose and meaning of the Law. If you always say, “relationship and not religion”, you by definition are advocating a form of religion)
I digress…
Anyway, Jesus reminds us (and the self-proclaimed experts) that we are commanded to love God first, not just love. What Jesus is doing here is consolidating the laws into a grand commandment. He is not telling you and I anything new as He says in 1 John 2:7. His laws and commandments (those “rules” we wrongly loath) actually were written to not only show us how sinful we are, but through the blood of Christ lays out a foundation and method for us to show God our love for Him by being obedient BECAUSE we love Him (John 14:15) and also be a light for our paths to preserve our lives and to keep us from those places of destruction and despair that we all know too well.
Proof of this is your life and mine. I want you to take any of the 10 commandments and let me know what good can come out of breaking one of them? Sticking to that point, what love can you possibly show to someone else by breaking one of them?
You picking up what I am putting down here?
Sinning is anything that separates us from a Holy God. “Holy” means here “set apart”. So when we read the laws which consists of over 600 decrees and prohibitions, then consolidated down to the decalogue (10 Commandments) which is then taken down even more by Christ to these two - the first being more important than the second – these are all things that God is warning us will not only separate us from Him if we break them, but by wanting to be obedient to them, they provide us with a way of being holy (set apart) and expressing our love to Him, which then brings us to a way to truly love others - that second commandment.
So, sin is actually “lack of love”, right? Lack of love first and foremost to God and also lack of love to others. We live in a culture where we just want to say, “love is love” and we tend to put this mindset that loving people is a way to love God. Where we often run into conflict with this is when the HOLINESS component is compromised. Are we breaking laws and commandments in order to not really love but avoid being put in uncomfortable positions out of our love for God first, which we know means we will actually love people correctly and deeply?
You can love someone and not support their lifestyle or decisions that are contrary to God because in your loving God first, you know that their sin is the very thing that separates them from a God who knows best. Even your friends who do not believe in God, you know as a Christian that the best way to love them is stand in opposition of what the world says to do so you can act as a beacon of holiness for them. Once again, look at your life and the choices you have made thinking you know what is best and not God. We truly do reap what we sow.
We are a zealous and naive people in assuming that by simply SAYING we need to just love people, we are in fact DOING it. I mean, “love is love", right?”
This is far from the truth.
The act of proclaiming something as powerful as love as described by God does nothing if we do not live to the holy attributes of what that love looks like. Appeasing to sin is not love and in actuality, the exact opposite of it.
When we speak about certain things like sex in particular; love is not sex – but sex should be about love.
Sex is good and enjoyable, given to us by God. But once again, we as a people tend to move things out of their intended holy order or design, we pervert it, and find ourselves participating in something that is supposed to be a consummation or making complete of something where holy love is already present.
We are commanded to love God first, which then allows us to properly love others. The world will try to deceive you in “loving God in other ways” and another order.
Love. God. First.
When we put the cart in front of the horse and do something that can disrupt holy love, in the case of sex and between a man and a woman (or out of intended design regarding homosexuality), we can come to a place where there is no love and the romance is gone, and people feel worthless, confused and lost.
When the holy discipline and obedience of love leaves, the recognition and value of it leaves too.
So, God’s law is actually beautiful and good because He is beautiful and good. He knows and loves you and does not want you to fall into the snare of sin which leads to…well, I am sure you can fill in that blank yourself.
The best way you can love anyone in this world is to love God first.
The world may see it as foolish because they do not know God. But you are a means of His holiness and love to express this kind of love to a world that needs to know about it more than ever.
May the Holy Spirit give you wisdom in reading this and allow it to be planted in your heart, which is where everything you do flows from (Proverbs 4:23).
