SUNESIS MINISTRIES
Stuart and Andrea Pattico
Loving God, Our Neighbour, and Our Self
Written by
Stuart Pattico
© 2007 Stuart
Pattico. All rights reserved. No part of this document may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form without permission from the author.
This article
looks at what it means to Love God, and to love our neighbour as our self. Let
us begin by looking at Mark 12v28-34:
28 Then one
of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, perceiving that
He had answered them well, asked Him, “Which is the first commandment of all?”
29 Jesus
answered him, “The first of all the commandments is: ‘Hear, O
32 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. 33 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.”
34 Now when
Jesus saw that he answered wisely, He said to him, “You are not far from the
But after
that no one dared question Him.
In the above
passage of Scripture, Jesus sets forth two commandments, upon which the law and
the prophets hang. The law and the prophets are built upon these two
commandants, and when we understand this, we are not far from the
Before we can
love God, we must first understand something about God. We must understand that
He is one. When this commandment was originally given, the surrounding cultures
believed in many gods. These ‘gods’ had different powers and purposes, and
could even fight each other. There was, for example, the god of harvest, and
the god of fertility etc. However, God wants us to know that He is not many,
but one. He alone is sufficient for all our needs and does not require the
assistance of any other ‘god’ to help Him.
There is so much
joy and liberty when we understand that God is one. Even today, we can observe
the growth and popularity of supermarkets. The convenience of them is that you
can get everything you need in one place, and usually a lot cheaper too! They
are also aggressive in their business advancement strategy. They are not
content to sell food, but they also sell car and home insurance, and much more.
They are seeking to become the all sufficient resource for the customer. Even
so, God wants you to experience His all-sufficient grace. Jesus said to Paul, “My
grace is sufficient for you” (2 Corinthians 12:9). When God appeared to
Moses, He revealed His Name to be ‘I AM’.
14
And God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And He said, “Thus you shall say to the
children of
In other words,
God was saying ‘whatever you need, I AM it’. In fact, the original language
could also be translated as ‘I SHALL BE’, and thus carries the sense of
something being ALWAYS. Therefore, when we read of God being…
Jehovah-Jireh,
God is saying ‘I AM ALWAYS seeing to your provision’
Jehovah-Rapha,
God is saying ‘I AM ALWAYS your Healer’
Jehovah-Shalom,
God is saying ‘I AM ALWAYS your Peace’
Jehovah-Tsidkenu,
God is saying ‘I AM ALWAYS your Righteousness’
Jehovah-Shammah,
God is saying ‘I AM ALWAYS there for you’
Jehovah-Mekaddishkem,
God is saying ‘I AM ALWAYS sanctifying you’
And when the
enemy presses in, we can remind ourselves of Jehovah-Nissi – ‘I AM ALWAYS your
Victory’.
We are commanded
to love this one God, with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength.
With our heart
we must believe in Him and fear Him.
With our soul we
must bless Him and set our affections upon Him.
With our mind we
must focus and think of Him.
And with our
strength we must obey and live for Him.
Why should we
love God? We have already looked briefly at who God is, and His character
certainly warrants our love and adoration. However, the Bible declares why we
love Him:
19 We love
Him because He first loved us. (1 John 4v19)
The reason we
love God, is because of His unfailing love towards us.
16 For God so
loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in
Him should not perish but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)
God has always
been called the Father. If someone has always been a father, it means that they
have always had a son or a daughter. God has always had a Son. This Son is
called Jesus Christ. God sent His Son into the world because He loved the
world. Jesus came for two main purposes:
1. To reveal the Father to mankind
2. To receive the blame and punishment for
all the bad things we have done, so that we could be reconciled to the Father.
Jesus revealed
the Father to us by His words, actions, and life. He received the blame and
punishment we deserved by dying on the cross. Therefore, to love God requires
at least two things on our part:
1. Since Jesus came to reveal the Father,
we are now to have deep, intimate fellowship with the Father through the Son.
2. Since Jesus laid down His life for us,
we are to lay down our lives before God and make Him our number one priority
This boils down
to two things: affection and priority. In order for us to love God, God must
have our affections, and God must be our priority. In order to evaluate our
love for God, we must ask ourselves how affectionate we are towards God, and
whether or not God really the priority in our lives.
Affection
The spiritual
union we have with Jesus is compared with the physical union between a man and
a woman.
16 Or do you
not know that he who is joined to a harlot is one body with her? For “the two,”
He says, “shall become one flesh.” 17 But he who is joined to the Lord is one
spirit with Him. (1 Corinthians 6v16)
Therefore, the
relationship we have with Jesus is one of spiritual affection. Although we
cannot physically see Him, our spirits can see Him all the time. We would do
well to often be still, and hear what the Lord is saying to our spirits. God is
Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth (John
4v24).
After Jesus rose
from the dead, He assured His disciples, saying:
and lo, I am
with you always, even to the end of the age. (Matthew 28v20)
God, through the
Lord Jesus is always with us. Though invisible, He is our Unseen Companion,
ever with us by His Spirit. He walks with us, and talks with us throughout the
day. It is therefore a shame that so many of us ignore Him. How would you like
it if you were with someone for 24 hours, and they only said a few words to you
in the whole day? I am sure that Jesus doesn’t like being ignored either. He
wants us to acknowledge His presence in everything we do. In the Bible, we are
exhorted:
6 In all your
ways acknowledge Him,
And He shall
direct your paths. (Proverbs 3v6)
We are to
acknowledge God in everything we do. When we are in the car, or on the bus, or
at school, or at work, we should get in the habit of constantly communing with
the Lord in our hearts. This is all part of loving God, for the command is to
love Him with all our heart. Throughout the day, we should be inwardly thanking
God for His presence, for who He is, and for the great things He has done. In
this way, we fulfil the command to pray without ceasing (1 Thessalonians 5v17).
In addition to
communing with Christ throughout the day, we must also separate ourselves from
everyone and everything else, to have quality time with God, to adore Him, to
pray, and to hear His voice. Jesus said,
6 But you,
when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to
your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will
reward you openly. (Matthew 6v6)
In so doing, our
affection toward God and our experience of God is taken to new heights, as we
learn what it is to be lost in His Presence.
God has provided
a beautiful illustration of the relationship Jesus wants to have with us. This
illustration is none other than the divine institution of marriage. Within
marriage, Paul explains to us how that the husband and wife are not to withhold
themselves from each other.
3 Let the
husband render to his wife the affection due her, and likewise also the wife to
her husband. 4 The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the
husband does. And likewise the husband does not have authority over his own
body, but the wife does. (1 Corinthians 7v3-4)
A man and woman
become one flesh. Even so, we have seen that when we are saved, we become one
spirit with the Lord Jesus. Even as married partners are not to withhold their
bodies from each other, we are not to withhold our spirits from Jesus. And, if
I may say so, Jesus is not to withhold His Spirit from us (for He will not
violate His own command!)! This is why we do not need to struggle to get into
God’s presence. We do not need to struggle in order to receive or to experience
His Spirit. He simply invites all who are thirsty to come! This begs the
question, are you the thirty for Him? Or are you filled with other things? As
mentioned earlier, God must have our affection, and also our priority.
Priority
Loving God means
that we put Him first. God must be the priority in our lives. This means that
God must come before everything else in our lives. Jesus said:
seek first
the
I would like to
suggest that there are three things that God must have priority over in our
lives. They are as follows:
1. Material things
2. Relationships
3. Our own self
Material Things
When Jesus
taught us to ‘seek first the kingdom’, the context of his discussion was the
pursuit of material things. In order to truly love God, He must be more
important to us than any material thing. This includes our homes, clothing,
money, food, education, career and more. We must be willing to forsake all
these things, in order to follow Christ. This is well illustrated in Jesus’
encounter with the rich young ruler in Mark chapter 10:
17 Now as He
was going out on the road, one came running, knelt before Him, and asked Him,
“Good Teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?”
18 So Jesus
said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. 19
You know the commandments: ‘Do not commit adultery,’ ‘Do not murder,’ ‘Do not
steal,’ ‘Do not bear false witness,’ ‘Do not defraud,’ ‘Honor your father and
your mother.’”
20 And he
answered and said to Him, “Teacher, all these things I have kept from my
youth.”
21 Then
Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “One thing you lack: Go your
way, sell whatever you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in
heaven; and come, take up the cross, and follow Me.”
22 But he was
sad at this word, and went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
We would do well
to observe that this young man came running to Jesus, and knelt before Him. To
me, this indicates that he was serious about inheriting eternal life. Clearly,
eternal life was important to him. However, as we will soon observe, it is not
enough for eternal life to be important to you. The real question is how
important is it to you?
It is interesting
to note that as Jesus listed the commandments, He does not mention the most
important one – to ‘love the Lord your God’! The commandments that Jesus listed
were all to do with our relationship with each other, and not our love for God.
‘Do not commit adultery,’ ‘Do not murder,’ ‘Do not steal,’ ‘Do not bear
false witness,’ ‘Do not defraud,’ ‘Honor your father and your mother.’ The
one commandment that the young ruler did not have was the most important –
loving God. This is the reason why he could not forsake his possessions. You
see, when you love God, God is more important to you than your possessions.
This man lacked the love of God, and was thus not able to forsake his
possessions.
What about you?
Are you ready to forsake your career, your education, your finances, or your
home if God should so call you? Not many people are, which is why many are
called, but few are chosen!
Relationships
In order to
truly love God, God must also have priority over all our relationships, whether
it is with friends, the church, or our family. In order to convey the full
force of this, Jesus said:
26 “If anyone
comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children,
brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. (Luke
14v26)
Theses are
strong words, and ought not to be ‘explained away’ or watered down. So then,
how do we understand this ‘hard saying’? You see, all things are relative. For
example, compared to the North Pole,
34 “Do not
think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace but a
sword. 35 For I have come to ‘set a man against his father, a daughter against
her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law’; 36 and ‘a man’s
enemies will be those of his own household.’ 37 He who loves father or mother
more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me
is not worthy of
Our Lord’s point
is very clear: we cannot love any other human being more than we love God. Our
love for God must exceed the love we have for any other. This is not just
limited to family members. In fact, we must let God have His way in all our
relationships. Many of us are in relationships God does not want us to be in.
Many of us are in friendships that are not good for us. Do you love God enough
to leave these relationships?
Each of us must
ask our self: Is Jesus really more important to me than my wife, husband,
children, friends, partner, mother, father, brothers, and sisters? If not, then
you cannot be His disciple. You must first choose to make Jesus your priority,
and only then can you follow Him.
Our Own Self
Finally, God
must be more important to us than our own self. Practically it means that His
will, must be more important to us than our own will. Ultimately, it means that
we physically lay down our life for God if need be.
38 And he who
does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. 39 He who
finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find
it. (Matthew 10v38-39)
24 Then Jesus
said to His disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny
himself, and take up his cross, and follow
In order to
follow Christ, we must deny our self. The will of self is all too often contrary
to the will of God. His thoughts are not our thoughts, and His ways are not our
ways (Isaiah 55v8-9). Too many of us come to God full of ideas and opinions.
However, God is not interested in these things. We must empty ourselves, by
humbling ourselves before Him, confessing our own wisdom as utter foolishness.
As the apostle Paul wrote:
18 Let no one
deceive himself. If anyone among you seems to be wise in this age, let him
become a fool that he may become wise. (1 Corinthians 3:18)
Each person must
decide to lay down their own will, and obey whatever God tells them to do, even
to the point of death. When we love God, we are no longer our own person. We
exist for one purpose, and that is to do His will. We loose our life, and find
it again in Him.
Passion For His Glory
Ultimately,
loving God means that we are filled with passion for His glory. Jesus taught us
to pray in the following way:
9
In this manner, therefore, pray:
Our Father in heaven,
Hallowed be Your name.
10 Your kingdom
come.
Your will be done
On earth as it is in heaven.
(Matthew 6:9)
The first
request mentioned in this prayer is ‘Hallowed be Your name’. This means that we
are to reverently ask God that His name be feared and regarded as holy by all
men. Jesus is not saying that when we pray we are to begin by saying that God’s
name is hallowed, rather Jesus is saying that we are to pray that God’s name
will indeed be hallowed on this earth. This is to be the passion of the
Christians life. The following quote encapsulates this thought very well. It is
taken from the Founders Journal, Fall 2000 (http://www.founders.org/FJ42/article3.html):
“Real Christianity is God--centered.
Real Christianity recognizes, as Jesus Himself said, that the first and
greatest commandment is to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, soul,
strength and mind. Those who have glimpsed the greatness, the grandeur, the
majesty and the excellence of our God through the eyes of trust in Jesus never
get over that vision. An obsession with the glory of God is the hallmark of
true knowledge of God.
What is the glory of God? The
original meaning of glory has to do with weightiness. The glory of God
summarizes the seriousness, the perfection, and the infinite significance of
all of the attributes of God. It sums up who He is, in the awesome brightness
and weightiness of all His perfections. What does it mean then for us to
glorify God? We cannot add to His glory, for He is already perfectly and
infinitely glorious. Rather, for us to glorify God means for us to ascribe the
glory that is due His Name in worship. It means that we acknowledge His glory
by living as though His perfections are as serious and significant as they
really are, so that we reflect His glory through a pure mirror. It means that
nothing horrifies us more than the thought of bringing dishonor to His glorious
Name, and nothing delights us more than to feel His pleasure as we live to the
praise of His glory. It also means that we declare His glory among the nations,
inviting others to join us in our love affair with His glorious perfection.
Glorifying God thus consumes and defines every aspect of our life and witness
as well as our worship.”
The Second Commandment
The second
foremost command is to love our neighbour as our self. This begs the question,
‘who is our neighbour?’ On a certain occasion, a Jewish lawyer asked Jesus who
our neighbour is. Jesus answered this question by telling the story of the Good
Samaritan:
30 Then Jesus
answered and said: “A certain man went down from
37 And he
said, “He who showed mercy on him.”
Then Jesus
said to him, “Go and do likewise.” (Luke 10v30-37)
In order to
appreciate the full force of what Christ says here, we need to understand that
in those days, there was great hostility between the Jews and Samaritans,
insomuch that the Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans (John 4v9). In fact,
the Jews used the term ‘Samaritan’ as a derogatory insult (John 8v48). The Jews
and Samaritans were thus enemies.
Through this
story, Jesus communicates to the Jewish lawyer that his neighbours are in fact
the Samaritans. The ‘neighbour’ he is to love as him self is his very enemies!
The message for us is clear: we must demonstrate self giving love to those who
hate us. On another occasion, Jesus said:
27 “But I say
to you who hear: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, 28 bless
those who curse you, and pray for those who spitefully use you. 29 To him who
strikes you on the one cheek, offer the other also. And from him who takes away
your cloak, do not withhold your tunic either. 30 Give to everyone who asks of
you. And from him who takes away your goods do not ask them back. 31 And just
as you want men to do to you, you also do to them likewise. (Luke 6v27-31)
The phrase
‘spitefully use’ could also be translated as ‘to insult’, ‘to revile, ‘to
threaten’, or ‘to treat abusively’. When people go out of their way to hate us,
we are to go out of our way to love them.
Why are to do
this? When Jesus was born on earth, and the heavenly host appeared to the
shepherds, they praised God, saying:
14 “ Glory to
God in the highest,
And on earth
peace, goodwill toward men!” (Luke 2v14)
The birth of
Christ means peace on earth and goodwill toward men. As Christians we are to
demonstrate this peace and good will toward men by loving our enemies. In the
Sermon on the Mount, Jesus pronounced a blessing on the peacemakers. We saw
earlier, that Jesus said to the scribe who understood the two foremost
commandments that he was not far from the
Do you realise
that when Jesus returns He will reward His saints, and render to each one according
to their works? If we only love those who love us, then we will have absolutely
no reward. The
What about us?
Do our acts of kindness and love leave such an impression upon our neighbour?
Such love is
beautifully demonstrated to the wounded man by the Samaritan. When everyone
else passes him by, the Samaritan assumes the responsibility of those who
should have helped. Is there not another wonderful lesson here? Instead of
complaining that the priest and Levite did not fulfil their duty, the Samaritan
humbly fulfilled what was lacking. Many today complain that the church is not
doing enough, or that leadership is not doing this or that. However, the one
who walks in true love humbly fulfils what is lacking.
Of course,
loving our neighbour is not just limited to loving our enemies. For indeed,
some of us are not even aware that we have any! The Bible exhorts us to love
everyone!
12 And may
the Lord make you increase and abound in love to one another and to all,
just as we do to you, 13 so that He may establish your hearts blameless in
holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with
all His saints. (1 Thessalonians 3v12-13)
Notice that it
is love toward all that establishes are hearts blameless, and qualifies us as
holy.
In particular,
the Holy Spirit commands…
- Husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the
church (Ephesians 5v25)
- Wives to love their husbands (Titus 2v4)
- Mothers to love their children (Titus 2v4)
- The Church to love one another (1 Thessalonians
3v12)
- The Church to love the lost (Matthew 8v12)
According to 1
Corinthians 13, the Love we are to demonstrate to all is…
- Patient
- Kind
- Not Envious
- Does not brag
- Not arrogant
- Does not act unbecomingly
- Does not seek its own
- Is not provoked
- Forgets past failures and sins
- Does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but
rejoices in the truth
- Always covers and keeps confidence
- Always believes
- Always hopes
- Always perseveres
- Is always there
Love Overcomes Fear
One thing about
walking in love is that it overcomes fear. In Paul’s exhortation to Timothy, he
says:
7 For God has not given us a spirit of
fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. (2 Timothy 1v17)
We should
observe that a vital ingredient in overcoming timidity is the spirit of love.
When we love, the Bible says that we fulfil the righteousness of the law
(Romans 8v4, 13v8). The scriptures also teach us that the righteous are bold as
a lion (Proverbs 28v1). In relating to people, when our primary objective and
mission is to walk in love, and we have no other purpose, we are supernaturally
released from fear.
The Healing of Our Self
Image
The commandment
is to love our neighbour as we love our self. This commandment pre-supposes
that the individual loves his or herself. It also implies that unless we love
our self, we are incapable of loving our neighbour. Herein lays the problem for
many. Many cannot love others, because they do not love themselves. Many do not
like themselves. Many consider themselves to be ugly, too skinny, too fat, too
short, too tall and so on. Many do not like their personality. However, God
loves you with an everlasting love. You are eternally precious too Him, in so
much that He gave His Son so that you might be adopted into His family. We need
to renew our minds with God’s Word, and begin to see our self the way God sees
us.
We saw earlier,
that before we can love God, we need to know something about Him. Even so, in
order for us to love our self, we need to know something about our self. In this
respect, there are two important things that we must know:
- We are made in God’s image: “So God created
man in His own image” (Genesis
- God has crowned us with glory: “For
You have made him a little lower than the angels,[b] And
You have crowned him with glory and honor.” (Psalm 8:5)
The word
translated ‘honor’ can also mean ‘magnificence’ and ‘beauty’. So why then do so
many not see themselves as full of glory and beauty?
The root cause
of man’s disappointment with himself is the sin of Adam and Even in the Garden.
Before sin, Adam and Eve were naked in the Garden, and not ashamed: “And they were both naked, the man and
his wife, and were not ashamed.” (Genesis 2:25)
However, after
they sinned by eating of the tree that they were commanded not to eat of, they
all of a sudden became ashamed. “Then the eyes
of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and
they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.” (Genesis 3:10).
When Adam
sinned, their glory was changed into shame! As it is written:
“You are
filled with shame instead of glory.” (Habakkuk 2:16)
“I will
change their glory into shame.” (Hosea 4:7)
It is this root
of shame that causes man not to be able to love himself.
The good news is
that on the cross, Jesus bore our shame and crucified it there. In exchange for
our shame, He offers His glory, to all who will freely receive it by faith.
looking unto
Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set
before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at
the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrews 12v2)
“And the
glory which You gave Me I have given them…” (John 17:22)
On the cross,
Jesus took our shame. For that, He is worthy of all the praise. May the Holy
Spirit open our eyes to see the glory our Lord has given us. When we were
saved, not only were we cleansed from all unrighteousness, we actually entered
into a coronation ceremony in which we were once again crowned with glory! With
God’s help, we can now once again love ourselves and also our neighbours by the
same standard.
Heavenly Father,
In the Name of Jesus, may you open the eyes of everyone reading this message.
May they see the glory that you have given them. May they love You, with all of
their heart, soul, mind, and strength. May they love their neighbour as
themselves. Amen.
END TIMES - Are You Prepared?
CLICK HERE TO BUY STUART PATTICO'S NEW BOOK!
BUY NOW FOR JUST £7.99, for a limited time only. (The normal selling price is £8.99 in other stores)
Please click here to be added to our mailing list and to receive regular ministry updates.
