How's Your Love Relationships?

 TEXT:  Matthew 22:34-40

TOPIC:  How’s Your Love Relationships?

Pastor Bobby Earls, First Baptist Church, Center Point, Alabama

Sunday morning, November 27, 2005, and Sunday morning, Feb. 15, 2009

            Oscar Thompson, former professor at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary often said, “The most important word in the human language is ‘relationships.’”  The older I get the more I realize just how accurate Dr. Thompson’s statement really is. 

The most important word in the human language is relationships.

            Henry Blackaby says in Experiencing God, “a love relationship with God is more important than any other single factor in your life.”

            Jesus spoke of love relationships as well.  In Matthew’s gospel we are told of one of the many encounters Jesus experienced with the cynical scribes and Pharisees.  In this chapter the Lord Jesus is quizzed as to which is the greatest commandment found in God’s word. 

(Read text - Matthew 22:34-40, NLT)

34But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees with his reply, they thought up a fresh question of their own to ask him. 35One of them, an expert in religious law, tried to trap him with this question: 36"Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?"

    37Jesus replied, "`You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.' 38This is the first and greatest commandment. 39A second is equally important: `Love your neighbor as yourself.' 40All the other commandments and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments."

            When our Lord was asked, “What is the greatest commandment to be found in the scriptures?”  His response was, “loving relationships.” 

            I believe the Bible gives us at least three love relationships that we all need and need to practice.  They include:

1.     Loving God

2.     Loving others

3.     Loving yourself

I.      HOW’S YOUR LOVE RELATIONSHIP WITH YOURSELF? Matthew 22:39

Did you notice that little word in verse 39?  In fact, it’s the last word, “yourself.”

Love your neighbor as you love yourself.  Quoting Leviticus 19:18, Jesus is telling us here that it is important that we learn to love ourselves.

Jesus knew that we would never be able to love others until we learn to love ourselves.  Paul understood this.  In Ephesians 5:28-29, Paul instructs Christian husbands to love their wives even as they love themselves.  (Read the text)

So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. 29For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church.

If men could learn to love their wives as much as they love themselves then marital abuse would end overnight.  (I’ve never known a man to smash his fist into his own face.  I can see it now.  A man shows up to work on Monday morning with a shiner.  A buddy asks him, “Where you’d get that black eye?”  He says, “I gave it to myself.”  What do you

mean you gave it to yourself?  “I didn’t like the way I looked at myself so I just hauled off and punched myself, right in the eye.  That’ll teach me!)

No man does that.  You know why?  Because he loves himself.

You know some people have a hard time loving themselves.  They don’t bruise their eye, but they’re constantly bruising their own self-worth and self-esteem. 

Somewhere along the way we just have to accept the fact that we need to play the hand God gave us!  (Illustration of Joni Eaickson-Tada learning to love and accept herself)

How’s your love relationship with yourself? 

II.   HOW’S YOUR LOVE RELATIONSHIP WITH OTHERS? Matthew 22:39

            In that same verse 39, our Lord says we are to love our neighbors. 

The question is, “Who’s our neighbor?”  Not just the next-door neighbor or the folks down the street.  Our neighbor includes “everyone.”  Everybody!

That means:

A.   We are to love our spouses as we love ourselves.

B.    We are to love our children as we love ourselves.

C.    We are to love our parents as we love ourselves.

D.   We are to love our teachers as we love ourselves.

E.    We are to love our friends as we love ourselves.

F.     We are to love our work associates as we love ourselves.

G.   We are to love our bosses, the garbage collector, the bill collector, everybody as we love ourselves, as well as our neighbors.

Didn’t Jesus say, “love your enemies and pray for those who dispitefully use you.”

(Look at Matthew 5:43-44)

The bible says to give honor to one another, (Romans 12:9-10).

I once heard Coach Bill McCartney, co-founder of the PK men’s ministries tell a group of pastors to go home, and love their families.  If you want to be a good coach, a good businessman, a good teacher, salesman, accountant, engineer, machinist, or whatever, go home and love, honor and prefer your family.  He said it like this, “When you pull into your driveway after 8, 10, 12 hours, before you cut off your car, take a moment to reflect.  Take a deep breath and then go in and give the very best of who you are to your wife and kids.

            What’s the coach saying?  He’s telling us that the most important love relationship we have begins at home with the family.  Yet that part is so often neglected. 

            Most of us use up the best of us outside the home.  We give our best to those who love us least.  We give our leftovers to those who love us most.

            Long after you’ve been replaced, your family will still be there for you. 

(Too many are looking for the Ideal wife or husband.  Share the story of the man who stood to testify about how good God is.  He gave me three wives.  1st – a wonderful  mother to our children, but the Lord took her, the 2nd – a great cook, but the Lord took her, the 3rd – up in the choir, The Lord can take her anytime He wants her.)

 Finally,

III. HOW’S YOUR LOVE RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD?

            In verse 37 Jesus says we are to love God with everything we’ve got, “heart, soul, and mind.”  Love God with our total being. 

            This is the first and most important priority for life.  Until you love God you cannot love yourself nor others as you should.

            A healthy life is one who has a proper relationship vertically and horizontally.

Listen to the following scriptures:

Matthew 6:33  Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness

John 14:15 If you love me, keep my commandments

John 13:34-35 A new commandment give I unto you, that ye love one another

I John 3:16 By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.

I John 4:9-11 In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. 10In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

            God created you for a love relationship with Himself.  Sin in our lives breaks that love relationship with God and often with others. 

Never question God’s love for you.  (Share the story of E.V. Hill’s sacrificial love for her husband.)

How’s your love relationships today?  With God, with others, with yourself.