Loving Others; Loving Ourselves—Matt.22: 36-40; I Cor. 13
It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood! Won’t you be my neighbor? I sometimes wonder if Mr. Rogers thought of this verse about loving your neighbor as he sang this tune every show for over 30 years. Being a good neighbor was of utmost importance to him. So, if I were to ask you what is at the foundation of our faith, you might answer a cross, an empty tomb, or if you’re a bit more theology school minded, you may say justifying grace and prevenient grace, or if you grew up Baptist or “bapticostal” like I did, you might have heard, “Once in grace, always in grace.”
We usually fall back on the things we’ve known or learned in our sermon/Sunday School journey. But in the Gospel of Matthew for today, we hear Jesus tell it simply. The foundation of our faith, the most important commandments as Jesus says are these: love God and love your neighbor as yourself. Or as one teacher said to me—"Love God, your neighbor too, and be a little gentle on yourself from time to time.”
Mr. Rogers spent 33 years of his life teaching children…and by extension their parents and adults…how to be healthy, loving, and well-adjusted people in this world. He didn’t thunder from a pulpit, nitpick over theology in a classroom, or anything like that. Instead, he looked right into a camera to thousands of people and said, “I love you just the way you are.” In 1979 he wrote, “When we hear the word that we are not lovable, we are not hearing the Word of God. No matter how unlovely, how impure or weak or false we may feel ourselves to be, all through the ages, God has still called us lovable.” Why is love so important to us as followers of Christ? And how do we practice it as God would have us do?
All throughout the New Testament, the writers stress the importance of love. Here, Jesus teaches that loving God first and foremost and loving our neighbors are two of the most important and consequential actions of our faith. All of the law, the words of the prophets, literally everything known and written in the faith hangs on these two commandments. They are our standardized test for how we live our faith. I Corinthians 13 tells us that all the speaking abilities, prophetic abilities, knowledge, faith, and generosity in the world are all for naught, all useless, if we don’t live in love.
How do we live this? Well, love is patient. Love is kind, never jealous, nor boastful, nor proud, nor rude. Love works in kindness, gentleness, forgiveness, earnest hope, justice, and never giving up. And in particular, we are told, love does not demand its own way. Too often we say, “I love you, but…” A wise English teacher once said that anytime you add however, but, or qualifier like that to a sentence, you plan on negating the first part of that sentence.
Imagine if we say, “I love you, but you have to do this the way I want.” It implies that if we fail or do differently, we are no longer loved. Jesus acknowledged shortcomings, faults, failures, growing places, but Jesus also offer a caveat-free, condemnation free forgiving, redeeming love for all of us. This is why I can’t stand the theologically false statement, “Love the sinner, hate the sin.” It ain’t in the Bible. And it’s wrong. In fact, the Bible says, God did not send his son into the world to condemn it and tells us to judge not or we’ll be judged too. It's not our job to hate sin, judge sin, fix sin. It’s our job to love people, then let them and God worry about what they’re doing. I John 4:8 says that if you don’t know love, then you don’t know God, for God is love. That’s our calling.
In the 1950s and 1960s America went through a rather ugly period on love, gentleness, and race relations. It was the beginning of the end for a system that kept people of different skin colors separate physically and socially. It was a time where white and black people couldn’t even share a pool at a motel. When protestors got into a pool at a motel to show that nothing earth-shattering would happen from sharing a pool, the manager poured acid in the pool as payback
Thankfully, no one was hurt. This kind of hatred, though, wasn’t forever ago. It occurred in 1964. Here’s a photo of the two men who were in the pool. They’re in their 70s now, and still remember the pool, the acid, being jailed wet and in just a bathing suit, but most of all, they remember the hate they felt and could not understand.
Into this tense, unjust, and unloving atmosphere, Mr. Rogers spoke words of love and nurture. He said, “Knowing that we can be loved exactly as we are gives us all the best opportunity for growing into the healthiest of people.” Then on a make-believe hot day on his show, in Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood, he put his feet in a pool. And he invited the police officer to join him. It was the first time people had ever seen a white person and a black person share a pool together on television.
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Love, you see, is connected to justice, patience, kindness, gentleness, and not being demanding, rude, or belittling. I Corinthians 13: 6 says [Love] does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out.” Perhaps drawing upon these words in Corinthians, Fred Rogers said once, "Love isn't a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like struggle. To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now."
How do we practice love as followers of Christ? First, we remember that love is sacrificially giving. The example is that Jesus suffered for us and the world. Second, love is not filled with caveats, buts, howevers, or any other qualifiers. If you qualify your love, then it becomes worthless and a clanging cymbal at best. Love is not a tool (or weapon) to fix people. It’s a disciplined practice of people who claim to follow Jesus—who is, as one hymn said, “The King of Love my Shepherd is.” Love and judgment cannot coexist in the same place. One is redeeming, and other is condemning. We don’t get to do either. Our mission is to love others like God loves them and tell them that God loves them. Period. End of story. Anything else can be worked out between them and God.
In a world of hate, anger, injustice, politics, and irritability, may we be a Mister Rogers, reminding folks that God calls on us to do two things—and these two things are the foundation of all the law and prophets as well as the very fabric of our lives of faith. Love God with all your being. Love others as well. If you want a little glimpse of the power love has to make a difference, we need look no further than Officer Francois Clemmons (which is the actor’s real name) who dared to put his feet in the same pool as Mr. Rogers on national television.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqSBqfDgOsQ
“Love is fragile as your tears; love is stronger than your fears. When you heart can sing another’s gladness, then your heart is full of love. When your heart can cry another’s sadness, then your heart is full of love.” Every moment we live and breathe is an opportunity to share the God’s love. Don’t miss the opportunity.
Worship Video: https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/1059288895906637