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 7, 2013

Monday - A New Idea - Partners To Friends

Last week, I told you story of my old neighbour who helped build a deck. He nicely represented the transition from strangers to neighbours to acquaintances to partners. Today we’ll go one step further. We’ll talk about becoming friends with those we work with, those we help, and those we live around. When I was a volunteer paramedic, I remember one partner in particular. We did several shifts together, and on calls he was always nervous, and second-guessing himself, which could be challenging to work with. One day, he invited me to supper. I met his family, saw his home and farm, and in the process learned about him and his values. The next shift we had together was different. I found we could communicate better, and I could anticipate his moves. Debriefing the call afterwards was easier. I knew this quirks, where they came from, and could work from a place of partnership and friendship rather than tolerance. This has wider application than the workplace, but some good examples of how important this is follow from a few studies: 50 percent of employees with a best friend at work reported that they feel a strong connection with their company, compared to just 10 percent of employees without a best friend at work. (A 2012 Gallup report which found that) People planning to stick with their current job cited “good relationship with co-workers” as the major reason (67%) – above “job satisfaction” (63%), “flexible working arrangements” (57%) and even salary (which ranked seventh at 46%). A 2013 survey of 2,223 business people across Australia In the same way, being a follower of Jesus isn’t just about doing transactions, like dealing with other followers of Jesus because you have to, or caring for others in need simply because it looks good. We’re actually meant to become friends with those we care for, and those we care with. Not every single one to the same degree maybe, but we are actually meant to have a relationship with those we encounter in this life, and not simply use people or tolerate others. We’ll focus this week on those we care for, those we’ve been talking about all along, and becoming friends. Question: When have you unexpectedly “hit it off” with someone at work?

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

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