Sermon Tone Analysis

It’s the last Sunday of January, and Lord willing the last Sunday we’ll be in Mark 12, reflecting on the command to love.

The main verses we’ve been reflecting on are 30-31, where Jesus answers the question about what is the greatest commandment: “Hear O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.

And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.

The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”

As you turn there, I want to say that this text has been difficult for me to prepare to preach.

And the reason is not because it’s hard to understand.

It’s actually simple.

It’s easy to understand.

But easy to understand does not mean easy to obey.

As I meditated and reflected on these commands, I have had to repent.

I have had to confess sin.

I have had to ask for grace to change.

And I have had to proactively seek to change.

As I’ve prayed through this passage, I have been praying for you.

I have been praying Philipians 1:9 for you: “And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more…”

My prayer for you is that you would have abounding, overflowing love for God that would radically reorient your lives so your highest joy is to pour your life out for the good of people.

My prayer is that you make everything in your life oriented around loving God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and that you would delight to sacrificially love your neighbors.

That your love for God and people is the decisive factor in how you talk, how you spend your time, where you live, what career you pursue, what friends you have, how you spend your money, how you raise your kids.

And that we would be a people known by our love.

This morning our focus is on loving our neighbors.

Mark 12:31 “The second is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

This command is tied to the greatest commandment.

You cannot separate them.

When Jesus was asked about a single greatest commandment, he offered two commandments.

In other words, Jesus wanted to make it clear that you can’t have one without the other.

The summary of the law is to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself.

Romans 13:8 “Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.

For the commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,’ and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’

Love does no wrong to a neighbor, therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.”

Galatians 5:14 “For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”

Love is the wind of every Christian’s sails; love is the fuel in every Christian’s engine, love drives us, love moves us, love directs us.

This is the ethic of every Christian: it is the ethic of love.

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”

True believers in every age have been marked by love.

They’ve started orphanages, hospitals, foster care programs, crisis pregnancy centers, homeless shelters, humanitarian efforts.

But it is not a given that every church will rise up to its call to love.

There are also far too many churches that, like the church mentioned in Revelation 2, have drifted from love.

It is entirely possible that we drift from our calling to love.

Thus, we must be vigilant to cultivate love in our hearts.

And that is our goal this morning - to remind ourselves of God’s call to love and to consider what it might look like in our lives.

This morning, I want us to hear God calling us to love our neighbors.

Whatever your schedule, however your calendar looks, whatever your budget is like, wherever you live - I want to help you see that God has called you to prioritize love for your neighbor.

To do this, we’re going to ask a few questions: What is a neighbor?

2) Why does it say, your neighbor, and 3) what does it mean to love your neighbor as yourself?

What is a neighbor?

The Jews of Jesus day likely understood the word neighbor to be referring to other Jews.

The Old Testament commands related to how one should treat one’s neighbors were given in the context of Israel.

The Jews were God’s people, and they were supposed to treat one another (their neighbors) with love.

A closer reading of the OT would have revealed that while they were in fact commanded to treat fellow Jews with love, the command also extended to sojourners and strangers.

In fact, Lev 19:33-34 says, “When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall do him no wrong.

You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.”

The command to love others as yourself was not only for Jews, but for strangers and sojourners also.

They were to extend neighbor love to strangers who were among them.

But many Jews of Jesus day didn’t act that way, which was why Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10.

The lawyer knew that the greatest commands were to love God and to love your neighbor.

Jesus says, “Then do it.”

And he says, “Well, who is my neighbor?”

Jesus tells the story of the Samaritan - a Samaritan who would have been hated by the Jews.

Jews wanted nothing to do with Samaritans.

A man from Jerusalem gets beat up by robbers and left for dead.

A priest comes by, and leaves where he is.

A Levite passes by, leaves him where he is.

Finally, a Samaritan comes and has compassion and binds him up and takes care of him and pays for his care.

Then he says the Samaritan was the true neighbor - that’s how true neighbors should treat each other.

In doing this, Jesus makes it clear that your neighbor is not some technical word, narrowly defined as a certain group of people.

No, your neighbors are the fellow human beings God has put into your life who are in need.

They are sitting all around you this morning, and they live all around you when you go home, and they’re working all around you when you go to work.

Whether that’s physical need - like the brutalized man on the side of the road, or spiritual need, like your non-Christian friends and family - they are your neighbors.

Your neighbors might be kind, they might be cruel, they might be Christians they might be Buddhists, they might be activists or atheists.

But they all are made by God, they all bear his image, and they all are worthy of dignity and respect, and even self-sacrificial love.

Why does it say, “your neighbor”?

The command includes the word “your” neighbor.

Certainly, there is a kind of love we ought to have for everyone, since all people are made in the image of God.

But the word “your” localizes the love; it becomes real, right here - right now.

It is possible for us, with our incredible ability to delude ourselves, to convince ourselves that we love people, without actually loving any real flesh and blood people.

We love people in theory, we love a vague, amorphous, nebulous idea we call people.

But we don’t love any actual, messy, broken, irritating, people.

That’s why this word “your” is so important.

In other words, this command doesn’t command us to simply feel loving thoughts about all people everywhere all the time.

That’s not what this means.

What this means is that you have a specific obligation to your neighbors.

The verse doesn’t say, “Love the king’s neighbors.”

It does not say, “Love their neighbors.”

It says “Love Your neighbor.”

In other words, you have a unique and special obligation to your neighbors because God has specifically and strategically put them in your life.

I cannot love your neighbors like you can, I cannot fulfill this obligation like you can.

You’re close to them, you see them, you can meet their needs.

I can’t.

In other words, you are uniquely commanded to love the specific neighbors God has put in your life.

Acts 17:26 says that God determined the boundaries of every person's dwelling place.

In other words, God is sovereign over when you were born, where you were born, what family you were born into, what house you purchased, what street you live on, and what neighbors he put around you, what coworkers you see every day.

There is no such thing as luck.

These people were sovereignly and strategically placed around you, on purpose.

They are your neighbors.

And you are to love them.

One pastor put it this way: “When we feel that our job is to witness to everybody, then we tend not to witness to anybody.”

You can’t possibly demonstrate real, tangible, sacrificial love to every person on the planet.

That’s unrealistic, and that’s actually not what God requires.

But you can love your neighbors - the people God sovereignly and strategically puts in front of you.

Think about this.