POLOKWANE – Jesus calls all believers to a very powerful, but ultimately unselfish, place to live.
In Matt 22:37-40, He commands us by saying “you shall…”, and He then continues to say “You shall love God” and “you shall love your neighbour”. Now for everyone who is looking for a scapegoat, “neighbour” literally includes all people. No exceptions.
In the light of all that is happening in and around our country, we can really find it easy to exclude certain groups and people from the term “neighbour”, but this is not an option to consider as far as Jesus is concerned. He calls us to higher ground in His command to “love your neighbour as you love yourself”.
In Matt 16:24, Jesus makes all believers who follow Him aware of how difficult this task might prove to be. He says that following Him is a choice, and I believe a daily choice at that.
Secondly He calls us to deny ourselves (it sound a lot like Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane praying “not My will, but Yours”). Thirdly He calls us to take up His cross; just to be clear, no cross has ever led to a party but it always led to someone’s dying; fourthly He calls us to follow Him; do what He does; say what He says & love like He loves.
It is strange that we so often see how people of faith are often the first to cast stones, ridicule, or hate when it is us who are called to love the world.
Jesus says, we cannot say we love Him, if we do not love one another.
I do not write this article to judge anyone, but I write this because I believe that Jesus believes that we can love all people. That we can live on the higher ground of loving God and loving our neighbour. He gave His life for us as an eternal example that those who follow Him can also love the world, even to the point of giving our lives away.
