The first commandment is, Thou shall love the Lord thy God ...



A New Command to Love – John 13

By John F. Murray

In John 13:34-35 speaking to his disciples Jesus said, “A new commandment I give to you that you love one another just as I have loved you. And this will be the mark by which other people will know that you are my disciples.”

A new command to love! NEW? That must mean that there are some old commandments concerning love. Do we know any old commandments about love? Yes, there are two. The first commandment is, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind.” The second commandment is like the first, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:37-39)

The first command directs our love toward God. This love is to come from within us - from our heart, soul and mind. Our heart is the center of our desires and will. Our desires and will are to be pure and centered on God and the things of God. Our soul is our innermost being. It is the center of our attitudes. Our attitudes toward God and the things of God should be pure, joyful, and encouraging. Loving God with our mind is centering our thoughts on God. Our thoughts should be God-centered, not evil-centered, for what we think about most is what we do. So the first commandment calls us to love God with our total being.

The second commandment is like the first – “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Today people have a tendency to say that people in the whole world are our neighbors. That’s true in a way. But let us not overlook the fact that our neighbors are really “the people next to us,” even members of our own household. It is in today’s households and neighborhoods that much violence is inflicted upon spouses, children and friends.

This love for our neighbor is supposed to come from within us. We are to love “the people next to us” as we love ourselves. When we love ourselves, we don’t harm, nor abuse, nor lie to, nor cheat, nor kill ourselves. One problem in loving our neighbor as ourselves is that sometimes we don’t love ourselves. We may hate and despise ourselves and even kill ourselves. When this happens, we often treat the people next to us in the same way. To really love and respect our neighbors (the people next to us), we need to have a healthy love and respect for ourselves for we are to love our neighbor like we love ourselves.

Now this new command to love in no way replaces or nullifies the two old commandments. Rather it gives us an additional focus to our love. As stated above the first focuses our love on God, the second on our neighbor and this new commandment is Jesus calling his disciples to love each other. In today’s language this is a call to fellow believers, disciples of Jesus, brothers and sisters in church, to love each other.

This new commandment also gives a new focus as to how we are to love. While the first commandment calls us to love God with our heart, soul, and mind and the second to love our neighbor as we love ourselves, this new commandment challenges us to love as Jesus loved his disciples. This command to love follows the story of Jesus washing his disciple’s feet. So I believe that in that act Jesus is calling us as his followers to lovingly serve each other in concrete humble ways. And what is more, Jesus said that our love for each other in the church proves to the world that we are really disciples of Jesus.

Have we, who claim to be followers of Christ Jesus, forgotten this commandment? What do the people of the world learn about the church when they listen to the daily news and read their newspapers and news magazines? Is it our love for our fellow believers? NO! They learn about clergy involved in sexual immorality, disagreements over doctrines and biblical interpretations, congregational splits, the use of rituals of the church to manipulate and control members, members vying for authority as to who can and should exercise leadership in the congregation and denominations and bus loads of so called Christian who show up at natural disaster sights to help clean up but stay only as long as the TV news media cameras are present there. The world doesn’t listen to nor watch so called “Christian radio and TV” because many of these programs have simply become methods to fill the moneybags of the organizers.

As Christians we need to learn what a “Judas Kiss” is. A true kiss is a sign of affection and loyalty. But a “Judas Kiss,” while pretending to show loyalty and affection for Jesus, is really a betrayal of Jesus, so that he, Judas, could fill his own moneybag. Today many appeals for money are disguised as appeals to help the poor and suffering of this world. Many of these appeals are wrapped in Bible language and pious prayers but they are really “Judas Kisses” designed to fill the pockets of the organizers and give only token help to those who need help.

Here is a true story. One of the congregations that I served as pastor annually collected funds for a certain relief organization that promised to forward to MCC the full amount that we gave them. As a congregation we gave annually 8 to 10 thousand dollars to MCC through that organization. One day a member of the congregation asked me, “How do we know that this organization is forwarding this money to MCC?” I replied, “I’ll call MCC and see if they received that amount.” I called and MCC checked their records and found no such amount. So I called the office of the organization and they told me this: “We keep all moneys collected for one year and the interest we earn is used to run our office and pay our salaries.” They had collected over 10 million dollars and in those days saving accounts earned 10 to 12 percent interest which gave them over one million dollars for their operations. At my request they immediately sent our contribution to MCC and that was the last time we supported their organization.

From that day on my wife and I give our tithes and offerings though our local congregational budget that gives money to local and world missions. We also give directly to missions that we know personally. In addition we give directly to our Mennonite colleges where family members have attended. My siblings and I started a scholarship in our parent’s name at the Mennonite College where our father and two of his sisters earned teaching certificates. This scholarship is to encourage and help our descendents and other persons in need to attend this college.

Yes, we should love God and our neighbors as the first two commandments say. And let us not overlook this third command of Jesus to love our brothers and sisters in the church because as Jesus said, “By our love for each other in the church, everyone (this includes our children and grandchildren) will know that we are his disciples.” I’m convinced that if we really want our children, grandchildren and other people to love the church, we must act upon this third command of Jesus in every way we can. Further if we want God to affirm, honor and multiply our services and our gifts, these must be genuine; they must not be a “Judas Kiss.”

True love builds relationships:

• With God by loving him with all our heart, soul, and mind.

• With our neighbors by loving them as we love ourselves.

• With our brothers and sisters in the church by loving each other with the humble serving love of Jesus.

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