Love God and Love Neighbor
Introduction
- We have in today’s gospel two most important commandments. Which of these is easy to follow? I thought in my childhood days that it is “Love God”, since it is a personal matter without any external signs. There is no external proof whether a person loves God or not. But later I understood that it is the most difficult commandment after reading 1Jn 4:20, (“if anyone says ‘I love God’ yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen cannot love God, whom he has not seen”), and 1Jn 2:4 (“the man who says ‘I know him’ but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him”).
Content
- Three dimensions of Love
o Love God
§ "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind." Quoted from Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18, this is the first and most important Commandment.
§ Giving first preference to God in our life always. “with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind”.
§ When we obey this commandment by giving first preference to God, everything else would fall in its exact place in our lives.
o Love Neighbor
§ In the first reading (Ex 22:20) “you shall not oppress an alien, for you were once aliens yourselves in the land of Egypt”. Who is this “alien”? They are the nameless and faceless people in our society. It can be my aged mother…. Father…. Daughter or son…. Or anybody who feels alienation in our houses.
§ When we love God as our father we have to accept all others as our brothers and sisters.
§ (1Jn 4:20) “if anyone says ‘I love God’ yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen cannot love God, whom he has not seen”, and (1Jn 2:4) “the man who says ‘I know him’ but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him”.
o Love Self
§ We begin the lessons of love by loving ourselves. For eg; the baby love itself very much. The baby cries and gets the things that are necessary for him/her. Whenever there is a pain in the body the baby cries – love of the physical body. When the baby feels that nobody is paying attention to him/her the baby cries – meeting the psychological needs.
§ Later when grown up, we attribute all the above said traits to our fellow brethren, that they are the people with material and psychological needs, and self respect.
Conclusion
- True love of God and true love of self would guide us to the “love of our neighbor”.
- Let us measure our love of God by looking at our approach towards others.
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