How to Love Your Neighbor as Yourself for the Love of God (part 15, the end)
This will be the final reflection in our series on what is commonly called “The Great Commandments” of Jesus, from Mark 12:30-31.
The second of the commands says to “love your neighbor as yourself.” We have explored the question: What does this expression “as yourself” mean?
What we have seen is that we only truly love ourselves properly when we see ourselves and our lives within all that we love about God.
We love God for many things. And there, in the fine print, of all that is lovely about our Lord, is you and me and our lives. We are His creations. Our lives are His works. Our stories are subplots within His plan.
That we must, somehow, properly love ourselves, in holiness and fear, is evident. How to do this? First, we must view ourselves, our stories, our lives, differently than we had.
I love Paul’s rebuke in Colossians 3:9, which I attach to the verses that follow it: “Do not lie to one another! …Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian or Scythian, slave or free—Christ is all (that matters) and Christ is in all (of our lives).” (Col 3:9, 11)
Paul is saying, Don’t lie to each other about who you really are and what your story really is. You use labels and put yourselves and others into categories. You say, I am this type of person and you’re that type… I’m from this kind of place and you’re from that kind of place… Paul says, Who cares!? When we understand the God and His love, in Christ, every idea we have of ourselves and every story we tell ourselves about our lives is reframed and remade.
Then, second, we must embrace practices that steward ourselves and our stories.
We are, truly, hearts and souls and minds and strengths, all woven together to be a kind of basket designed to hold delight in God. We are to love God with all these parts of what every one of us is, and so we must steward those parts God-ward—in His direction, toward delight in Him.
This, then, is how we are to love our neighbors—our spouses and families, our siblings and friends, our coworkers, bosses, and clients, our next-door neighbors and even anyone we might consider an “enemy.” We are to love them for what they truly are, made by God for His glory, that they might know His love and worship Him.
And this must remake our relationship with them. We want to love them—heart, soul, mind, and strength—into the same delight in God that we ourselves have come to experience in Christ.
This, so far, we are already discussed. Allow me to conclude with a bit of inspiration and encouragement.
TRY
Trying to love is love.
Trying to love is all the love we can for sure deliver. We are not often sure that we love in ways that truly deliver our love—so that the love we feel is truly felt by others. But we can try.
To try to love is, first of all, to actually love. And second, it is to commit to growing in love. To try is to say, I will do this again.
Proverbs 24:16 says, “The person doing it right still falls seven times—just, they get up again.” (my paraphrase)
In other words, they always try. Again. To say, I will try, is to be committed to hope from a place of humility, to seeking joy from a place of security, to loving with a love like Christ’s.
“The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning.” (Lam 3:22)
In other words, the LORD always tries again with us.
Try because, in the wonderful and strange works of God, we ourselves and our lives are part of His ways, works, plans and purposes—which means this attempt, and the last one, and the next one, are part of what He is doing to convey His love.
CONCLUSION
My hope is that, through these reflections, we might come to see something large and glorious.
To see that the place God wants us to live in, and to live from, is only obtained by loving God more and more and more, understanding His loveliness and His love more and more and more, until we discover that it actual contains us, includes us, and we are in it with our lives and whatever it is that we are.
And then. Then we know that we are His. We are the Beloved. And life is love. And all is His love. And His love is the most beautiful thing to behold in all the universe. And He is the most worthy object of all our heart’s love and affection. And His Word is like honey to our hearts. And His Works fill us with awe and praise, and His Will is beautiful and we long for it, and the mystery of His Ways are not only endurable but experienced with a kind of confident joy.
And so we are drawn to love the LORD with more and more of our heart, soul, mind, and strength—and we find more and more heart, soul, mind, and strength by loving Him! As His love grows in us, we grow within His love.
And so we find ourselves loving God in all things, with all people, in many ways, with patience, gentleness, faithfulness, goodness. And no one is our problem, no one is our enemy, no one is a chore, but all are for us, seen within God, as children, as friends, as beloved for His sake.
And so it is as if God abides in us, and His love achieves His purposes in us. And so the world will fill up with the knowledge of God’s glory, like waters covering a sea. (1Jo 4:12; Hab 2:14)
And in the end, “God is glorified in us, and we in Him.” (2Thes 1:12) And in the end, as at the beginning, God says, “Good.” And in the end, we will all agree and cry “Holy!”
The tears which heaven will dry, may be wiped today, as we rest in the fullness of the love of God, in the goodness of our lives and selves, and in the beauty of life lived with Him, with others, in love, in worship, in peace, in joy.
This is Christ’s invitation when He says, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
PRAYER
Lord, thank You for Your love. We ask that You would continue to direct our hearts to the Love of God and to the steadfastness of Christ, that we might learn what is the height depth length and breadth of Your love, that Your love might abide in us, that our love might abound still more and more, that You might be glorified in us and we too might come to live within a sense of Your glory, blessing and keeping us, drawing us to Your heart; our Shepherd, all our life long to this day and on to the house of the LORD forever. Amen.
(2Thes 3:5; Eph 3:18-19; 1Jo 3:17; Phil 1:9; 2Thes 1:12; Num 6:24; Isa 40:11; Gen 48:15; Psa 23:6)