How will you show your neighbor love today?  Jesus was good with words.  He was clear when he wanted to be; his command to love God and love our neighbors is straightforward.  It’s like he was trying to sum up the Ten Commandments, simplify everything, and phrase them in positive language.  Here’s what you do: love.  In Matthew 5, Jesus goes into greater detail with the Ten Commandments and raises the bar.  Reflecting on this, Martin Luther writes in his Large Catechism:

 Secondly, under this commandment not only he is guilty who does evil to his neighbor, but he also who can do him good, prevent, resist evil, defend and save him, so that no bodily harm or hurt happen to him, and yet does not do it.  If, therefore, you send away one that is naked when you could clothe him, you have caused him to freeze to death; if you see one suffer hunger and do not give him food, you have caused him to starve. So also, if you see any one innocently sentenced to death or in like distress, and do not save him, although you know ways and means to do so, you have killed him. And it will not avail you to make the pretext that you did not afford any help, counsel, or aid thereto, for you have withheld your love from him and deprived him of the benefit whereby his life would have been saved.

Two points are successfully made here.  1.  No one is perfect or keeps God’s commands perfectly.  Everyone sins.  And, 2. Keeping God’s commands isn’t just about refraining from killing and stealing or doing wrong; it’s about actively loving.  It’s about helping our neighbor when we see a need. It’s about making the world a better place.  It’s caring about what happens to other people and treating them as God’s beloved.  When we see injustice, it’s about working to bring justice and equality.  When we hear the world is threatened, it’s about doing our part to recycle, conserve energy, and help to reverse pollution and bring healing.  It’s visiting the homebound, working with the at-risk youth, and bringing hope and healing to a world that is broken and hurting.  So again, I ask you: how will you show your neighbor love today?

Read Luke 10:25-37, and remember: God loves YOU unconditionally!

Annie

Today’s Reading: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+10%3A25-37