Leviticus 19:18: “Love Your Neighbor as Yourself”

INTRODUCTION

A man named Joe posted this story on the Internet. It is about his wife Beth.

Joe and Beth had moved from the suburbs to a warehouse loft in the middle of the city.

There were parking problems, sirens in the night, and homeless people all around.

The homeless people made Joe nervous but Beth learned their names.

She enjoyed life in the busy heart of the city.

The only neighbors who bothered her were the guys who hung out at the tattoo parlor across the street.

The rough men who hung out at the tattoo parlor got into fights that stopped the traffic. They harassed women on the sidewalk. They intimidated men.

Beth avoided walking on their side of the street.

Sometimes she would look out her window at the men sitting in front of the shop and fantasize about shooting out their tires.

One day Beth called Joe at work and told him she was getting a tattoo.

Joe was surprised because Beth had never approved of “body art,” but he said, “Okay.”

When Joe got home she showed him the delicately inscribed words “Love thy neighbor” on her wrist.

She told him how she had marched across the street and gone into the tattoo parlor. The walls were covered with drawings of skulls, bloody knives, naked women, and the Virgin of Guadalupe.

A tattoo artist named Manuel was working on somebody’s backside.

Beth told Manuel she was his neighbor and asked if she could watch. He said, “Sure.”

After a while she went outside and sat in front with the guys. One of them asked what she was going to have done.

“Love thy neighbor,” she said.

“Why?” he asked.

“Well, you guys are my neighbors, and I’m having trouble loving you. You kind of scare me—you know, with all your fighting and all.”

He led her back into the shop and announced: “Manuel, dude, we’re scaring our neighbors! We’ve got to stop fighting.”

Manuel wanted to argue, but Beth told him she didn’t want to change him; she just wanted to get this tattoo.

After they had agreed on a design, Manuel set to work. “How do you spell ‘thy,’” he asked. I didn’t go to school

The other tattoo artist piped up, “Dude, it’s not because you didn’t go to school. It’s because you don’t read the Bible!”

So Beth got her tattoo—“Love “ Love thy neighbor”—and from then on Beth would wave to the tattoo artists as if they were old pals. No more fights broke out. The sidewalk felt safe.

Four months later, Beth took the car in for an oil change and saw Manuel talking to the repairman behind the counter. Manuel gave her a warm hug and said to his friend behind the counter, “Hey! This is my neighbor, the one I was telling you about.”

This little sentence: “Love your neighbor as yourself” occurs eight times in the Bible.

The first time we read it is in Leviticus 19:18.

Seven times the command is repeated in the New Testament:

In Matthew we read two times that Jesus quoted it.

We find it again in Mark, and in the story of the Good Samaritan a scribe quotes it to Jesus.

Paul quotes it in Romans and again in Galatians, and we find it also in the book of James.

“Love thy neighbor.” Probably it’s one of the first verses you learned in Sunday school.

Today I want to talk to you about what it means to love your neighbor as yourself.

I. First of all, how do you love yourself?

A. It doesn’t mean, “Love your neighbor as much as you love yourself.” Sometimes you don’t love yourself very much at all.

When I do something I’m ashamed of, I don’t love myself.

Some people have such a poor opinion of themselves that they don’t love themselves at all. They need to be taught that they are dear to God, and valued as bearers of God’s image in our world.

And some people love themselves so much that they are obnoxious to be around.

When we say things like that, we are thinking of love as “fondness.”

Jesus isn’t telling us to be fond of our neighbor, or to have warm affectionate feelings about our neighbors when he says to love them as we love ourselves.

It’s hard to generate feelings of affections. Love, in the Bible, isn’t something you feel. Love, in the Bible is a way of behaving.

We aren’t told that the Good Samaritan had affectionate feelings for the man he found wounded and dying on the Jericho road.

The priest and the Levite had seen the man and passed by. We don’t know that they didn’t feel sorry for him and wish him well. But they passed by on the other side.

But the Samaritan saw him and was “moved with pity” and went to him and bandaged his wounds and poured oil and wine on them. He took him to the innkeeper and paid for his keep. The good Samaritan loved him by taking the risk of attending him, even though he was putting his own life in danger. And he loved him by taking him to the inn and paying for his keep.

B. To understand what it means to love our neighbor as our self, we need to think about how we love ourselves.

We love ourselves because we look out for our own best interests.

We think about what is good for us. We try to meet our needs.

We are concerned about what other people think of us.

Our problems concern us. We pray for ourselves.

So if we love our neighbor, the problems of our neighbor concern us.

We consider the needs of our neighbor. Our neighbor’s happiness is important to us—as important to us as our own happiness. (Now, that’s a revolutionary idea!)

C. To love my neighbor as myself is treat my neighbor as I would like to be treated.

I like people to notice my good qualities. So I notice other people’s good qualities, and compliment them on the good I see in their lives.

I like for people thank me for favors, so I say “thank you” when it’s appropriate.

I like for people to listen to me, so I listen to others. I don’t always want to be the one doing the talking. I read somewhere: “Talking too much is the disease of old age.” Some people are like old shoes—all worn out except the tongue.”

I like for people to pray for me, so I pray for others.

I don’t like it when people criticize me behind my back. So I don’t criticize people behind their backs.

Just as I like for people to see the good in me, I try to see the good in other people.

So often we notice what’s bad and not what’s good. Almost everyone you know or meet has some good and praiseworthy quality. We just need to notice.

II. Some people think they have fulfilled the law of love when they feel love for their friends. Some people think they have fulfilled the law of love if they love their children and grandchildren.

A. Jesus said, “Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who abuse you” (Luke 6:27).

I don’t have any enemies, so I translate “enemies” as those who irritate me, those who make me uncomfortable, those who have annoying habits.

In Sunday school last Sunday someone said, “We can love someone and not want to be around them.” No, the test of real love is to be willing to be with someone we find difficult and make the effort to sympathize with their predicament.

To be a friend of some people is the test of the reality of our faith.

It’s easy to love those who love us. It feels good and may even make us feel virtuous, but it’s perfectly natural—nothing to take credit for.

Jesus also said, “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is it to you? For even sinners do the same” (Luke 6:32-33).

B. My “neighbor” is whoever is next to me, whoever crosses my path, whoever I may be able to help or encourage.

My neighbor may have bad manners. He or she may irritate me…or talk too much.

My neighbor may be the person I find boring.

How can I love such people? Jesus tells me to find a way.

C. Some people worry because they can’t make themselves like certain people.

But love isn’t warm, happy feelings.

Love isn’t fondness.

It’s not in our power to be fond of people.

But it is in our power to do people good.

Suppose there’s someone in your life who grates on you.

Don’t try to make yourself like them.

Just be nice. Pray for them. Listen to them. Don’t avoid them.

Try to encourage them if they are downhearted.

Be kind.

If you act lovingly toward people you don’t naturally like, you may find that you begin to appreciate them and enjoy their company.

Acting with kindness changes you—and it changes them.

D. Anyone I can help is my neighbor, even if I have never met him.

That’s the reason some of us support missions that feed the hungry and heal the sick and preach the gospel on the other side of the globe.

That’s why we pray for refugees and homeless people, and people whose lives have been devastated by war.

CONCLUSION

A woman was seen wearing a button on which was lettered: “Act like you’re glad to see me.”

That is how we all feel. Part of loving is acting like we’re glad to see each other.

The story is told of a grandmother, a mother, and a little girl who were shopping and stopped for lunch.

The waitress asked the grandmother what she wanted, and the mother instantly ordered the daily special for all three of them.

The waitress looked toward to grandmother, who nodded.

Then she turned to the little girl, who shyly looked at her mother and said, “I want a hamburger, fries, and a coke.”

The waitress went to the window and called in the two daily specials to the cook, and then in a very loud voice ordered a hamburger, fries, and a coke.

The little girl turned wide-eyed to her mother and said, “She thinks I’m REAL!”

That waitress had put herself in the place of the little girl.

A woman told about an act of compassion she had experienced many years ago.

When she was in the fourth grade, her teacher asked the children to bring a dime to school for a folder in which to place their work.

This little girl’s parents were divorced and there was hardly any money in their home. She didn’t have the nerve to ask her mother for the dime.

When she got to school and saw that all the other kids had their dimes ready on the edge of their desks as the teacher walked up the rows, taking the dimes and putting down the folders.

A classmate named Karen saw her distress, and at the last second put a dime on the corner of her desk.

The woman says of the experience: “Even though I never said a word, Karen saw my quiet anguish and only wanted to relieve it. She said nothing and I was too embarrassed to say thank you. It was the most genuine, authentic act of kindness I’ve ever experienced.”

Most of us can do no big, fine things that make us feel like we are really wonderful, spiritual Christians. Our love is shown in the little things we do every day—maybe not even realizing that we are showing love.

So let’s pray that we will be loving people, people who instinctively respond to the needs of others.

Long ago a great saint (St. Augustine) wrote these words:

What does love look like?

It has hands to help others.

It has feet to hasten to the poor and needy.

It has eyes to see misery and want.

It has ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of people.

That is what love looks like.