Tehillah. More about connection.

Every person is worth the best another person has to offer, because every person is created in the image of God. This is a Truth that is fundamental to our understanding of the Christian faith.

Jesus didn’t say to love God with everything you are and just kind of be nice to the people you sort of like a little bit!

No. Instead, He told us to love God with everything we are and to love others as we love ourselves. He went to great lengths to illustrate this concept for us, from telling the parable of the good Samaritan, to the way in which He dealt with the everyday and the mundane people around Him, to His death and resurrection. (Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. - John 15.13, RSV)

Jesus reached out to the people He encountered during His ministry because He loved them. He didn’t look at broken, sinful human beings - His creations, sullied and dirtied as a result of their own willfulness - but the people He created them to be.

In teaching children the truth of these two most precious commands, I often tell them that we are to “be Jesus” to others. Small children understand the concept of playing pretend so much better than adults, and they are literalists, to boot. They understand that “being Jesus” to other people means pretending that they are Jesus, just for a little while, so that they can find out what it is that Jesus wants them to do. And then they do it.

It’s the action that means the most here. Jesus was a man of action, remember. Everything He did can be summed up in a list of verbs: He noticed; He touched; He forgave; He welcomed; and He obeyed His Father.

Love is both a noun and a verb. It describes a feeling, an emotion, but it also describes our actions towards others - regardless of whether those others are human or divine.

Love is patient, love is kind, no eyes of envy, true love is blind.
Love is humble, it knows no pride, no selfish motive hidden inside.
Love is gentle, makes no demands, despite all wrong, true love still stands.
Love is holy, love is pure, it lasts forever, it will endure.

Chorus:
Love knows when to let go…
Love knows when to say no…
Love grows in the light of the Son
and love shows the world that the Son of love has come.

Love is loyal, believes the best, it loves the truth, love stands the test.
Love is God sent is His Son, love forgives all we have done.

Repeat Chorus.

In this world where hatred seems to grow, true love goes against the flow and becomes so hard to show.
In this world where push turns into shove we have strength to rise above
through the power of His love, Lord, we need to know the power of Your love.

Chorus:

Love knows when to let go…
Love knows when to say no…
Love grows in the light of the Son
and love shows the world that the Son of love has come.

Petra, Love (Beyond Belief) - 1989

When Jesus gives us these two commands - to love God and to love others - He lists them in order of importance. I believe that this illustrates not only the relative importance of who we are to love, but the order in which we are to love.

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself.

Luke 10.27 (NRSV)

1. Love God.
2. Love yourself.
3. Love your fellow man.

Looks simple, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, most people get the order mixed up, or think that the order has to do with the amount of love that is to be bestowed upon others.

True love is the same quality all the way around. Whichever way you look at it, if you love someone - or something - the quality of that love is the same. What is different is the intensity, and the degree to which you allow your love to overtake you.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart.
What is in your heart? It should be taken up with the pursuit of God. Your deepest desire ought to be the wish to please Him, to obey Him.

Love the Lord your God with all your soul.
The piece of you that is the very image of God is also the piece of you that needs Him the most. It is what drives the search for spiritual wholeness, what links us to our Maker.

Love the Lord your God with all your strength.
A tall order. To love someone with all of your physical abiilty. To give all that you are, in this earthly form, over to the service of Him who created you. Yet that is what He asks of us.

Love the Lord your God with all your mind.
Do you remember what it’s like to be newly in love? You can’t keep your thoughts on track. Every chance you get, you’re thinking about the person you love. All of your mind is focussed on the next conversation, the next meeting, the next touch. This is how we ought to be with God - thinking about Him constantly.

Love yourself.
I suppose some would take issue with me on this one, but it comes next because if we love not ourselves, we cannot expect to be able to love others.
It is next to impossible to love oneself if there is not love in one’s life. The acceptance of God’s love is the beginning of self-love. Understanding that He sees us as we were created to be, and that we were meant for His greatness, is vital to our ability to love ourselves - and, ultimately, to love others.
Do you truly believe that you are deserving of God’s love? If not, why?
Really seek the answers to this question. Be as honest and transparent as you can be.
God doesn’t make garbage… people do.

Love others as you love yourself.
Once you know that you are loved, and once you love yourself, it’s time to begin showing others that they are worthy of love, too. Everyone is worthy of love. Everyone needs to be shown - not just told - that they are loved, by other people as well as by God.

You can love others without feeling “love” for them. If you act in love long enough, you will begin to feel love. It’s a funny trait we humans have - actions often generate emotions. (Take, for example, the act of smiling when you are not feeling happy - smile long enough, and you actually will begin to feel happy.)

But what are loving actions? Check out 1 Corinthians 13.4-7:

• Love is patient.
• Love is kind.
• Love is not envious.
• Love is not boastful.
• Love is not arrogant.
• Love is not rude.
• Love is not selfish.
• Love is not irritable.
• Love is not resentful.
• Love rejoices in the truth.
• Love bears all things.
• Love believes all things.
• Love hopes all things.
• Love endures all things.

Loving actions build up their subjects. Loving actions keep their subjects safe. Loving actions meet the needs discussed in the earlier series about connection.

God is love. Jesus is God.

Go be Jesus to someone else.