Love Our Neighbor

We are continuing our sermon series where we are focusing on our mission and vision and the impact they can have on our lives and the lives of those within our communities. Last week we looked at the importance of loving God and it is through loving God that we are led to “Love our neighbor.” That will be what we will be looking at this week.

Our scripture comes from Mark 1:14-20. The words will be on the screen.

14 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, 15 and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”

16 Passing alongside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. 17 And Jesus said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” 18 And immediately they left their nets and followed him. 19 And going on a little farther, he saw James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, who were in their boat mending the nets. 20 And immediately he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed him.

Please pray with me…

Growing up there was a program that many if not all of us have heard of called “Mister Rogers’ neighborhood.” The show spread the importance of moral and ethical values in such a way that it would lead those watching the program to emulate the message that Mr. Rogers’ offered to us.

His Theme song can offer insights on how we should view our relationships with those around us. It says…

It's a beautiful day in this neighborhood. A beautiful day for a neighbor. Would you be mine? Could you be mine? [Verse 2] It's a neighborly day in this beautywood. A neighborly day for a beauty Would you be mine? Could you be mine? [Bridge] I have always wanted to have a neighbor just like you. I've always wanted to live in a neighborhood with you [Verse 3]

So, let's make the most of this beautiful day. Since we're together, we might as well say Would you be mine? Could you be mine? Won't you be my neighbor?

Some of us who grew up watching the program probably had the song in our minds as I was reciting the lyrics. Won’t you be mine; won’t you be mine; won’t you be my neighbor? Important words for us to remember as we speak with and interact with those that we run into in our lives.

You could say that in our sermon scripture that is what Jesus is asking these fishermen. He is saying to them that he desires to have them become connected to him. In this case he wants them to become his neighbors by becoming his disciples.

Scripture makes it clear that our neighbor is not only the person that lives next to us or even in the same neighborhood. We should consider our neighbor to be anyone we run into throughout our time on earth.

This means that when Jesus says a part of the greatest commandment is “love your neighbor as yourself” that there is no one that we should unwilling to treat with love and compassion. All people are loved by God and should be loved by us.

This doe snot mean that we don’t have different relationships with those around us. We each most likely have close friends that we interact with. We have other friends that we might see once in a while.

We have what I call Facebook friends in which we are interacting never in person and only are watching each other’s lives play out online. Meaning that unless they tell us we know nothing about the struggles that they are facing.

“Love” looks different depending on the relationship that you have with an individual person or group. That is the problem with the word “love” within the English language. It offers us many ways for this single word to be used. We have to interpret what kind of “love” a person is speaking of.

The original language of the New Testament helps us some because it has four words for the word we express as “love.” These four words let us understand that a specific scripture is speaking of romantic love, family love, friendship love, or a God like love.

When we look up what is meant by love your neighbor when given to us by Jesus, we find that he uses the word “Agape” which relates to a God type of love. John 3:16 tells us that God loved the world. This should inform us that there is no one that we should not choose to love.

Our first reading makes this clear. Jesus is asked who “is my neighbor?” and instead of offering an easy answer he uses a parable to make his point. He tells of a story about a Jewish man who was robbed and left for dead by the side of the road.

Jesus in his parable has two people walk by and choose to do nothing. The first person was a priest and the second a Levite. These would have both been people that worked within the Temple.

They would have been considered spiritual and would have been expected to know their scriptures based off of their positions within Jewish society. These two chose not to stop and help their fellow countryman.

We can come up with excuses. Most likely these men chose not to help because it would have made them unclean. This would have meant that they would have had to perform some sacrifices and spend some time away from the Temple if they had gotten this man’s blood on themselves.

They weren’t very neighborly. They didn’t want to inconvenience themselves by becoming involved in the situation. They would have let this man die before they were willing to possibly make themselves unclean.

We can find ourselves in situations in which we can face backlash for not choosing to help those around us. We may find ourselves having someone around us make racist or derogatory statements toward a specific group of people.

We can end up seeing people treated in such a way that we know that how they are being treated is wrong. We know that we should do something but as we look around us, we decide that helping them isn’t worth the reputation it may give us.

We have a choice. Are we going to stay quiet or are we going to tell this person that they are wrong in what they are saying? Are we going to choose to keep the peace while hearing hatred or seeing mistreatment.

Paul gives us an example of how we should react when we see mistreatment among those around us. In Galatians chapter 2 we have Paul telling the story of how Peter treated the Gentiles, those that weren’t Jewish. He treated them one way when other Jews weren’t around and ignored them when there were other Jews present. And because of the important figure that he was, others were following his lead.

Paul reacts by calling Peter out for his behavior. He was not showing his love for his neighbor by the change in the way he treated the Gentiles when other Jews were around. He was telling them that they were lesser than. They were unimportant. This is one Christian leader calling out another Christian leader for not loving their neighbor.

It will often not be easy but when we see or discover information concerning the mistreatment of those that do not have a voice at all or a limited voice within society, we need to be willing to speak up. We need to be willing to use our voice to express how what is happening is not showing love to our neighbor.

Jesus makes it clear; you might be helping someone who is like you or someone who might even hate you but loving others should be what is most important for you to do. We have that shown to us in our first reading.

One man ends up stopping and helping, that man was a Samaritan. This might not mean much to you but to a Jewish audience hearing this story it would be evident to them what Jesus was trying to say. The Jewish people mistreated the Samaritans and therefore there was no love lost between these two groups.

The Samaritan not only stops to help but eventually pays for the man to be able to rest and recuperate. The Samaritan showed he cared about the man who was robbed both physically and monetarily. He becomes an example for us to follow.

We are called to help those around us with our whole being. It might only be physical but at times we also may find ourselves needing to help someone out by listening to them and allowing them to tell us their struggles. Other times a person may need our financial assistance.

We are called to meet a person where they are and do for them what they need done. This does not mean we just do these things without discernment. We don’t give a drug addict money to buy drugs. But we should try to see if we can help him in other ways. We do unto others as we would want them to do for us.

Jesus follows this parable with asking a question to the lawyer. “Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” The man’s answer becomes what we should try to do. He says, “The one who showed him mercy.”

Mercy and compassion are two of the most important elements of the church. Some would say it is why the church exists. We are called by God to love our neighbor. This will often mean that we are to show grace and compassion.

Another way that it could be said is that we are to have empathy for them. We are to place ourselves into their situation and be willing to believe that they are doing the best that they can. Empathy should lead to compassion which should lead us to love and serve those that God places before us.

This can lead us back to our sermon text. We have Jesus offering fishermen the chance to become his disciples and follow him. He also chooses a tax collector and others that we don’t know their professions, but they would most likely not be professions that should lead to someone become a disciple of a Rabbi.

Jesus knows that often the best way for someone to be able to help a person believe in something is to have a way for them to be able to relate to each other. He knew that the religious elite would struggle in believing his message and choosing to become believers that he was the Messiah.

It was the everyday people such as fishermen and those that were disliked within Jewish society, the tax collectors, that Jesus hoped would hear the message of how their lives were changed and be willing to believe and follow him.

You have people in your life right now who need to hear the message of Jesus. You have those like you or that live near you that are missing out on the opportunity to have a Savior that will never leave them. They are missing out on the hope that you are able to find in Jesus.

The church is to be a place in which all people, no matter who they are, should be welcome. The church is to be a place where a person can come broken and disheartened and be made whole through the love, we show them because of the love of Jesus.

· We also should be the ones who tell those around us about the one that loves them who first loved us: the Great Commission-Tell about Jesus in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, to the ends of the earth

· Our Jerusalem is our communities and our neighborhoods.

· We are to create relationships so that we can have opportunities to tell them about Jesus.

· Our Judea are those like us.

· This maybe they look like us, talk like us, work with us, share our hobbies, etc, etc..

· Our Samaria are those that we don’t like or don’t like us.

· These are people that we may be in conflict with or are in conflict with us.

· Political differences, Social concerns, different opinions,

· We are to show them love and communicate with them.

· The ends of the earth are those that don’t look like us.

· Different races, different languages, different backgrounds

· There is no one that we are not to love and share God’s love with.

We live out the great commission through our mission where we desire to have each one of us that are here today become followers and disciples of Jesus. We are to let those around us know about the one that first loved us and also first loved them.

Our vision helps us discover how we can accomplish these goals using the gifts given to us by God. We will be spending the next three weeks focusing on how we and those we meet can be formed into or become better believers. Can develop into Jesus followers and can go into our communities and share the love of Jesus through our words and actions.

Let us be open to being the people of God that God wants us to be at Kirkersville UMC. Let us be open to what he wants to say to us to help us be people of God that shows our love to God and also shows the love of God to our neighbors.

Please pray with me…