All You Need Is Love?

The song title is appealing and seems so simple, but what does "All you need is love" really mean? I know this is a topic that I feel is constantly on my mind as I fail to truly love people each day. I know I'm not the only one who struggles with this, so I am going to go ahead and post this blog. Loving your neighbor requires more than just letting everyone else do their thing while I do mine. It's doing life together. It's messy. Many times, it requires honesty that looks beyond false encouragement and empty words.

How to love people is something that I have had the opportunity to look at with a few friends of mine recently. How does one truly love the people all around them? We all step on each other's toes from time to time and we all feel hurt from people even when they don't intend to hurt anyone. How do we love the people that hurt us whether they wanted to harm us or not?

Christ is the perfect example of loving people beyond the extent of their love for him. He was a man and he was God; he suffered trials and temptations like we do, yet, he lived a holy and blameless life. He still chose to love us by doing nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility he counted others more significant than himself. he looked not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross (Philippians 2:3-8). The cross was a painful, humiliating, gruesome death meant for criminals. The very ones Jesus came to save crucified him:

"Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was wounded for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his stripes we are healed.
All we like sheep have gone astray;
we have turned—every one—to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all." -Isaiah 53:4-6

"For our sake [God] made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Corinthians 5:21). How humbling is it to know that we are not perfect and the only one who lived a life without sin, took our place in death? Yet death could not contain him! He rose again proving that he was life and the giver of life. "For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life" (Romans 5:10). GOOD NEWS!

So what is it that keeps me from loving others when they appear to be my enemies? Everyone has many expectations and these include our expectation to be treated with a form of respect. I feel entitled to or feel that I deserve to be treated a certain way. Many of these expectations seem reasonable (even biblical) of the other person and a few are ingrained in me by family or cultural values, but all of them are expectations of imperfect people to treat another imperfect person by a certain standard.

What's worse is that it is easy to feel no need to love/forgive people who do not treat us well by this set of standards unless they somehow make themselves right by asking forgiveness. What causes me to be this way? Well, as usual, pride gets in the way of the desire to be more like Christ so it's easy to feel justified in anger. Yet, followers of Christ are held to a higher standard and have the opportunity to be refined by these types of situations. When I give in to the temptation to be bitter and angry toward a fellow Christ-follower, I am allowing disunity to enter into the body of Christ. When I do that same to a non-believer, I am denying them the opportunity the see/hear the gospel and myself the opportunity to share it with them.

When I refuse to forgive someone, I am also forgetting that I, too, need grace daily because I am not perfect; I sin against a holy God and his people regularly. I mess up. I cannot cast the first stone; I am not without sin. It is important to be reminded that I am a sinner and of what Christ did on the cross. I was dead in my trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1). Without the cross, I would have no hope in this world.

We, also, have the opportunity to become more like Christ when we choose to love those who do not treat us well. "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing" (James 1:2-4, emphasis mine). This does not mean that we do not share truth with these people, but it does mean that we do not react from hatred and bitterness. We have the opportunity to help a fellow Christ follower to grow or the opportunity to show compassion on the person who does not know Christ. God may even allow these things to happen to us "so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ" (1 Peter 1:7).

Christ warns about anyone who is angry toward their brother: "But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire" (Matthew 5:22). Jesus even likens holding onto this anger toward a brother as being the same as murdering that brother. Christ recognizes that it is not always possible to be at peace with everyone even when we try, but he gives direction for that:

"Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight
of all. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved,
never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written,
“Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” To the contrary, “if your enemy
is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing
you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but
overcome evil with good."
Romans 12:17-21

I have been reminded a lot recently of my need to let go of my own expectations and to choose to see people as Christ would see them. Not that I should not confront them with truth, but that I should keep my mind pure by not allowing myself to be affected by the anger and bitterness that can easily arise when I am not treated well. Christ's love for me should be example enough, but sometimes I need a slap in the face from God in order to really see that this feeling of being justified in my anger harms my relationships with God and his people. My challenge to every Christ-follower who reads this is to: "Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you" Ephesians 4:31-32.