Life lessons from Jesus. Loving Others…
In these times we are going through right now, it seems almost impossible to love others. Everyone is taking offense to anything and everything that people say and are doing. We do hear the message from some people that we do need to have more love to combat the hatred that is going around. But what does that love consist of? Is it love as the world defines love or is it the love that Jesus shows us in the Word of God?
We see in Matthew 22:39, “We are to love your neighbor as yourself”. We also see in the Old Testament in Leviticus 19:18, “Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.” We see that these verses include all people that we meet, whoever our neighbor may be. We are not to discriminate as we see in various points of Jesus ministry how he always loved all people and always looked for ways that he could show them His great love. (Example would be of the Samaritan women at the well).
In Luke 6:27, “But I say to you who hear; Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you.” I heard so many times growing up that God loves the sinner but hates the sin. Part of the difficulty of loving others is that we often try to do it on our own, whipping up feelings of love where none exist. This can lead to hypocrisy and “play acting” the part of loving person when our hearts are cold toward them. We must understand that we cannot love apart from God. It is when we remain in Jesus (John 15; Vine and branches) and the Holy Spirit remains in us that we are able to bear the fruit of Love. * (Galatians 5:22-26)
When we love difficult people or choose to love even when we do not feel like it, we demonstrate our reliance on God and allow His power to be displayed in and through us. Loving others is difficult because they are human as we are human. But in this difficulty, we come to better appreciate the quality of God’s love for us. And when we love others in spite of their lack of lovability, God’s Spirit shines through, He is glorified, others are edified, and the world sees Christ in us. I hope that as we live our lives that we can be examples of God’s love. That we can genuinely love our neighbor and those we meet.
Timothy Howells Sr.
*Used Gotquestions.org for information for help in this devotional