Yesterday I asked you to define love.  One common way people today define love is to be as tolerant and permissive as possible, as long as the other person does not to hurt others.

See what a low standard that is?  Jesus defines love to a much higher degree, he says to love one another as oneself.  He knows we are self-centered…and Jesus uses that to teach us love for others.

Between loving God with everything, and loving neighbours as ourselves, Jesus has declared self-salvation to be impossible.  We may love God to one degree or another.  But with everything?  We can and should try, but we reach our limits since we are only human, and separated ourselves from God in sin.   We need help.

Equally true, we may make ourselves harmless and never say a word to anyone who isn’t harming another, but we can’t make ourselves completely  love others as ourselves – we always want more for ourselves than to be tolerated and put up with.  We can and should try to love others as ourselves, but we need the help of another to do this.

Jesus made himself harmless, and willingly sacrificed himself on a cross in the ultimate action of love for God and others.  He led the way, and did what would be impossible for humans, so we could follow him in love for God and love for others, rather than trying to trailblaze ourselves.

We’ll look at this more in this upcoming series on neighbours.

Challenge: How do your actions “hang’ under love of God or love of neighbour?  Is there anything you’ve done in the last week that doesn’t fit one of those loves?

Ryan Sim - October 2, 2013

Wednesday - Change It - Acquaintances to Partners

Won\'t You Be My Neighbour?

Yesterday we saw Jesus saying the way we treat a hungry, thirsty, stranger, naked, sick, or imprisoned person says something about our desire to join his kingdom. What is the consequence of this story? The story makes it clear that Jesus’ kingdom is based on generous sacrifice. Our motivation for compassion and care is not to be someone else noticing, or that we’ll get thanked, paid back or will otherwise benefit. It’s not even entirely about the other person’s benefit. It’s simply the right thing to do, and it’s the overflow of a relationship with God in Jesus. The deck-building neighbour I described on Monday was also married to a great neighbour. She was a nurse, and one day she came over to check on my wife, who’d fallen asleep laying on the grass resting from gardening. This was part of that nurse’s vocation, it’s not just a job to help people in need, it’s actually part of who she is, and what she is called to do. Christians have the same kind of vocation to love our neighbours, with friendship, words, and also our actions not because there’s something in it for us, but because it is who we are as citizens of the kingdom of God. Sometimes this isn’t as easy as checking on a friendly neighbour – not everyone finds visiting prisoners easy, it can be scary. Serving the thirsty can mean travelling places we’d rather not see. Helping those with no clothes can be awkward! But this is how Jesus challenges us to dispay kingdomliness. He calls us to overcome our fears, prejudices, anxiety for the sake of his kingdom and its values. Q: List the six needs Jesus wants his followers to meet: + The hungry + The thirsty + The stranger + The naked + The sick + The imprisoned. Who do you naturally have the most compassion for? Who do you find most challenging to show compassion for? Why? Remember, we meet for coffee every Wednesday night at Starbucks in the Chapters Store in Ajax, in Durham Region just East of Toronto. Maybe we'll see you there?

From Series: "Won't You Be My Neighbour?"

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