Who is My Neighbor

Memory Verse: James 1:27 “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.”

Think of the person you most dislike in the world – someone who is mean to you or picks on you all the time. Maybe it is someone at your school or someone in your neighborhood. It could be the school bully. Maybe the person you are thinking of is someone as horrible as Hitler or evil like Sadaam Hussein. This person could be a mass murderer or a serial killer. Guess what! That person is your neighbor. Your neighbor is anyone other than yourself.

Jesus COMMANDS us to love our neighbor as ourselves. How do you love yourself? Do you feed your body and clothe it? Do you treat yourself with respect? Are you nice to yourself? Jesus tells us we are to treat ALL other people in the world just like we treat ourselves. If you are sick, do you take care of yourself? If you hurt yourself accidentally, do you bandage or take care of your wound? Most people are much nicer to themselves than they are to other people around them – even people in their own families.

Matthew 5:43-48 “You have heard the law that says, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy. 44 But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you! 45 In that way, you will be acting as true children of your Father in heaven. For He gives his sunlight to both the evil and the good, and He sends rain on the just and the unjust alike. 46 If you love only those who love you, what reward is there for that? Even corrupt tax collectors do that much. 47 If you are kind only to your friends, how are you different from anyone else? Even pagans do that. 48 But you are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect."

Love your enemies? What does that mean? Exactly what it says. We are to do good to everyone – not just our friends and family. We are not to get even, take revenge or get back at those who hurt us or those we love. That is NOT normal human behavior. That is hard! Our natural reaction to being attacked is to attack back. Jesus gave us an awesome example in His life here on earth. He is our pattern for how we are to live our lives. We need to learn as much about Him as we can so we can pattern our lives on the example He gave us.

God says He will take revenge. Revenge is not for us, revenge is for God.

Romans 12:9-20 9 "Don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. 10 Love each other with genuine affection and take delight in honoring each other. 11 Never be lazy, but work hard and serve the Lord enthusiastically 12 Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying. 13 When God’s people are in need, be ready to help them. Always be eager to practice hospitality. 14 Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them. 15 Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep. 16 Live in harmony with each other. Don’t be too proud to enjoy the company of ordinary people. And don’t think you know it all! 17 Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable. 18 Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone. 19 Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, “I will take revenge; I will pay them back,” says the LORD. 20 Instead, “If your enemies are hungry, feed them. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals of shame on their heads.” 21 Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good."

We can conquer evil by doing good. Who better to repay or get even with our enemies than the Creator of the universe, God Himself?

Romans 8:31 “…If God is for us, who can ever be against us?

Jesus told us if we want to receive eternal life we are to keep His commandments.

Matthew 19:16-19 “Someone came to Jesus with this question: “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?” 17 “Why ask me about what is good?” Jesus replied. “There is only One who is good. But to answer your question—if you want to receive eternal life, keep the commandments.” 18 “Which ones?” the man asked. And Jesus replied: “‘you must not murder. You must not commit adultery. You must not steal. You must not testify falsely. 19 Honor your father and mother. Love your neighbor as yourself.”

He tells us that all the law is summed up in the command to love God and love our neighbor. The ten commandments give us ways to show that love to God and to our neighbors.

Matthew 22:34-40 34 "But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees with his reply, they met together to question Him again. 35 One 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?” 37 Jesus replied, “‘you must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind. 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. 40 The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”

Jesus said these two commands are the most important ones He has given us.

Mark 12:29-33 29 "Jesus replied, “The most important commandment is this: ‘Listen, O Israel! The LORD our God is the one and only LORD. 30 And you must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength. 31 The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. No other commandment is greater than these.” So the scribe said to Him, "Well said, Teacher. You have spoken the truth, for there is one God, and there is no other but He. And to love Him with all the heart, with all the understanding, with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love one's neighbor as oneself, is more than all the whole burnt offerings and sacrifices."

Jesus says that obeying these commandments fulfills the requirements of God’s law.

Romans 13:9-10 “ For the commandments say, “You must not commit adultery. You must not murder. You must not steal. You must not covet.”] These—and other such commandments—are summed up in this one commandment: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”] 10 Love does no wrong to others, so love fulfills the requirements of God’s law”

Galatians 5:13-14 “ For you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters. But don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love. 14 For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself”

Luke 10:26-29 “ Jesus replied, “What does the law of Moses say? How do you read it?” 27 The man answered, “‘You must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind.’ And, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 28 “Right!” Jesus told him. “Do this and you will live!" 29 The man wanted to justify his actions, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

In the story about the Good Samaritan we see two characters described by Jesus as a Priest and a Levite. A Levite is a Temple assistant – someone chosen to assist the priest in the temple. Both the priest and the Levite were considered to be holy, religious men. The Samaritan was considered to be less than worthless. Yet, the Samaritan stopped to help a man who probably would not have had anything to do with him if he had not been attacked and helpless, even taking him to an inn and paying for his care and leaving money with the innkeeper to make sure the man would continue to be taken care of. He even promised that if the amount he left was not sufficient, he would make up the difference on his trip back through there.

Why did Jesus use this example to answer the man who asked, “who is my neighbor”? (To show ALL other people are our neighbor – we can’t pick and choose who is worthy or not) God has no favorites.

How did you feel about the Levite and the priest’s reaction to the injured man? Wouldn’t you think that of all people the priest and the Levite would have taken care of the man? Leviticus 22:4-7 4 “If any of Aaron’s descendants has a skin disease or any kind of discharge that makes him ceremonially unclean, he may not eat from the sacred offerings until he has been pronounced clean. He also becomes unclean by touching a corpse, or by having an emission of semen, 5 or by touching a small animal that is unclean, or by touching someone who is ceremonially unclean for any reason. 6 The man who is defiled in any of these ways will remain unclean until evening. He may not eat from the sacred offerings until he has bathed himself in water. 7 When the sun goes down, he will be ceremonially clean again and may eat from the sacred offerings, for this is his food."

Did this law prevent the priest and the Levite from helping the man? (They could have helped him. Helping him did not make them permanently unclean)

Did the priest and Levite have more of an obligation to help the man than the Samaritan? Why or why not?

What does it mean to love your neighbor? Romans 13:10 10 Love does no wrong to others, so love fulfills the requirements of God’s law”

What are some things you can do to show love to your neighbor? (Never make fun of them, don’t talk behind their back etc)

Does this command by Jesus make you look at other people differently than before? Will it make you treat them differently than before? Why or why not?

If someone is in trouble how are we to help him or her? (We can pray for God to intervene, we can call the police, and we can find someone stronger than us to help if we can’t help the victim directly)

Think of ways you can show love to your neighbor. 1 Corinthians 13 (the whole chapter) 1 If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. 3 If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing. 4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. 8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! 9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! 10 But when full understanding comes, these partial things will become useless. 11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly as in a cloudy mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely. 13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love."

The two greatest commandments sum up all the other 10 – love God and love your neighbor as yourself.

Matthew 25:31-40 “ 31 “But when the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit upon his glorious throne. 32 All the nations will be gathered in his presence, and he will separate the people as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will place the sheep at his right hand and the goats at his left. 34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. 36 I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.’ 37 “Then these righteous ones will reply, ‘Lord, when did we ever see you hungry and feed you? Or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 Or a stranger and show you hospitality? Or naked and give you clothing? 39 When did we ever see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 “And the King will say, ‘I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!"

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