LOVING OUR NEIGHBOUR GENUINELY BY Jeff Gatdula

36Teacher, which one is the greatest of the Laws?37Jesus said to

him,You must love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.38This is the rst and greatest of the Laws.39The second is like it, You must love your neighbor as you love yourself.40All the Laws and the writings of the early preachers depend on these two most important Laws. (Matthew 22, New Life Version) Why can't we love our neighbour genuinely? Is it because of their looks, thoughts, speech, actions, associations, beliefs or preferences? Have you imagined your neighbour having the same eyes, nose, ears, lips, hips, hands and feet as yours? The Creator of the universe did not imagine minion-like creatures when He thought of us -- where the only difference are our clothes, colour of skin or hair (or the lack of it). Surely God's omniscience is put into question if this is the case. However, our differences (in all aspects) is a clear manifestation of His imagination and a reection of His greatness and goodness. So we go back to the question -- why do we nd it hard to love our neighbour genuinely? Neighbour, in this case, is a person other than yourself. Here are some clues we can ponder upon: WE DO NOT LOVE GOD. How can we love if we do not know the source of love? How can we love if we ignore or even dismiss the One who is love? Sadly there are those who deny even the existence of God. As a result we deny the existence of love. Then we justify our violent, hurtful and oppressive actions. One can never genuinely love without rst loving God -who Himself is love. His is the greatest kind one can ever experience here on earth and in heaven. And nothing can compare to the love that He shared and the love that He willingly offers to all. WE DO NOT LOVE OURSELVES. There are those who love God, yet they do not love themselves. The truth is some individuals hate their lives (for

whatever reason) that they want the life of another person to suffer the same situation. The problem lies within. We consider ourselves as secondclass. We are not good enough. Says who? Denitely it is not the opinion of the Almighty. His word tells us that we are marvelouslyand wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14). When God made us, He carefully thought about every single detail of our being and when He saw us even before the foundations of the world -- He said 'It was very good!' You see the problem lies when we compare. The problem lies when another person becomes the standard -- a TV celebrity, a fashion model on the magazine, a friend whose image you see on the newspaper daily, or worse, your enemy on FB. The truth is, you are beautiful and glorious the way God made you. Rest on this truth that is declared on His Word. Do not be swayed, be inuenced or even be discouraged by popular opinion. Love yourself because Jesus loves you the way you are. But He loves you more that He desires, through the power of His Spirit, to bring you from beauty to beauty, from glory to glory. If we are able to assess ourselves based on these two things, I strongly believe that we can successfully move on to the next step of loving our neighbour (even when they happen to be our very enemies). Simply because we will always look at the situation based on the truth that -- God loves them and they are also special before the eyes of Jesus. If God can love them, then so can we. So the next time you are faced with the challenge of genuinely loving your neighbour, think again. Look through the eyes of God. Look through the eyes of Love.