During the month of October, I have been exploring our call as Christians. What does it mean to be a follower of Christ? What is it we are called to do and to be as followers of Christ?
Over the last three weeks, we have looked primarily at the letters of Paul. As the earliest Christian writings that are part of our Bible, they represent a look at how the earliest Christian leaders understood what it meant to be followers of Christ. For this final reflection, we will actually look back to the Hebrew scriptures, specifically the book of Leviticus (Leviticus 19:1-2 and 15-18).
As a Jew himself, Jesus was thoroughly grounded in Hebrew teaching and belief. So if we want to understand his teachings, we should also look at the source and grounding of his teaching.
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Today we wrap up this focused look at four of our primary responsibilities as Christians that we have been exploring this month. We started the month by exploring our call to become more like Christ rather than seeking perfection as the world defines it. Then we looked at our call to serve with gentleness all the people that we encounter along the way. Last week, we remembered those who have been an example to us as we considered our own call to be an example to others.
This week we return to a call that is a touchstone for many of us who are Christians, but we have a different text than usual as our jumping off point. Most if not all of us are familiar with the so-called Great Commandment story. This story appears explicitly in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. When Jesus is asked about the greatest commandment in the Law, the answer comes back that the greatest command is to love God and that there is another like it, which is to love our neighbors as ourselves.
According to Jesus, everything written in the Hebrew scriptures, all of the Law and all of the Prophets, can be summed up in these two statements. For Jesus, everything that he did is best seen through the lens of this two-part command. When we look at the way he moved through the world and interacted with others, we can see this at work. And he instructed those he taught to follow the same rules.
Looking at our present world, I cannot help but remember that the mission of the local congregation that I serve is based on the Great Commandment. On my first Sunday with them this past July, I shared with them the importance of this teaching to my own approach to ministry. The Great Commandment is both familiar and important to many of us who follow Christ still today.
We all know this story, so I don't feel the need to completely rehash something so familiar Nor will I cover the same ground I covered on this topic back in July. I intentionally opened my time in this new community with the Great Commandment story knowing it would appear in the lectionary readings again this fall. So today, though it may at first seem difficult to understand, we turn instead to Leviticus.
You see, there are two important things I want us to consider today as we think about what it means to love God and neighbor. First, we must remember that Jesus was not a Christian. I’ll give you a moment to think about that. On the one hand it should be obvious, but at the same time it feels strange to say. So I’ll say it again. Jesus was not a Christian. He was in fact a Jewish man. He grew up in the synagogue with occasional trips to the Temple in Jerusalem. His teachings show us that he had a very thorough understanding of the Hebrew scriptures.
This last bit leads to the second related point. Jesus and most of those he was ministering with were thoroughly rooted in Hebrew beliefs and teaching. So to best understand what it was Jesus was telling us and showing us, we have to look at it in light of what came before. Often there are nuances and understandings we miss since we don’t always know the background.
This is one of the things we are exploring in the Bible study that some of us are doing on the Sermon on the Mount right now. How do these teachings of Jesus connect to and flow from the Hebrew scriptures? What do we miss in reading the scriptures because we approach them without the other background that Jesus and his hearers would have known?
When it comes to the Great Commandment, we know that Jesus tells us that these two statements sum up all the Law and the Prophets. What we sometimes miss is that this two-part commandment that Jesus names quotes almost word for word verses from the Hebrew scriptures. The first part comes from Deuteronomy and is a core tenet of Jewish belief - “Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might” (Deuteronomy 6:4-5, NRSV). The second part of the Great Commandment comes from the end of today's reading from Leviticus.
As we consider this section of Leviticus, what do we learn about what it means to love God and neighbor?
Knowing that Jesus is quoting from this section of Leviticus as he speaks of the Great Commandment, we can look here to help us flesh out what love of neighbor looks like.
- Love of neighbor means fairness in legal matters.
- Love of neighbor means not bad mouthing others and spreading lies about others.
- Love of neighbor means we do not stand idly by while others are being hurt or killed.
- Love of neighbor means not holding hatred of others in our hearts.
- Love of neighbor means we speak out and seek change when someone has done wrong or been wronged.
- Love of neighbor means we do not seek revenge.
As we consider these points straight out of the reading from Leviticus, I am sure that some of you feel some of the same tension that I do as I look around our world today. Perhaps right in the communities where we live, we see places where the love of neighbor is not quite what it could be. But as we consider the command that Jesus highlights and it’s source here in this section of Leviticus, there is no getting around what we are called to do.
Of course, Jesus also extends the commands we find here in Leviticus, as he so often does. In our Bible study, one of the things that has been highlighted is that Jesus often extends the commands found in the Hebrew texts (cf. Matthew 5:17-48). Rather than overturning them, he actually builds on them. In Luke’s version of the Great Commandment story, he does the same thing with this section of Leviticus.
You see, in our reading today, Leviticus identifies only other Isrealites as neighbors. Part of the purpose of Leviticus is to identify for the Israelites what it means to be the people of God. It sets them apart, helps them see how they are distinct from all the other peoples they encounter. And so the rules set here about their interactions with neighbors apply only to other Israelites.
But as you may recall from the Gospel of Luke, the discussion of which commandment is the greatest is followed immediately by the question of who is our neighbor. And so Jesus tells a parable to make it clear that in fact there are no distinctions when it comes to identifying our neighbors. He might have used phrasing similar to what he does in the Sermon on the Mount, “you have heard it said” that only other Israelites are to be treated as neighbors, "but I say to you that" all people are God’s children.
The other thing our reading today helps us make clear is that one of the ways in which we show our love for God is by loving our neighbors. The second verse of the reading tells us to be holy because God is holy. Then this command is immediately followed with a series of rules about loving our neighbors and what that looks like. As we consider the way that Jesus connects the command to love God and neighbor through this section of Leviticus, it makes this clear. Part of what it means to be holy as God is holy is to show love for all God's children. In other words, our neighbors.
By pointing to the Hebrew scriptures in this way, Jesus makes it quite clear that he knows the scriptures exceedingly well. He makes it clear that those who were hearing him also understood the scriptures. They would have known the sections of scriptures that he was quoting from. They would have understood the implications of his use of these particular texts. Considering the Pharisees of his time were often trying to trip him up or catch him out in his understanding of scripture, Jesus shows that his understanding of God is thoroughly rooted in his understanding of Hebrew sacred writings. Not only that, he was willing to go further in his understanding, to extend the meaning so that the Law had even wider implications.
The Pharisees of his time (as well as those who fill a similar role in our own day) seem at times to look to scripture as a way to define who is in and who is out. They want to know the limits of the rules, and, in holding to the letter of the Law, they feel justified in excluding those who do not follow the Law in the same way.
But Jesus says that misses the point. And he points to the scripture itself to back that up. Rather than reading the scripture text to figure out who is in and who is out, Jesus looks at the text to figure out how he is meant to treat everyone he meets. He interprets the Law through this command to love God and love neighbor, a command that comes out of the Law itself.
As we what it continues to mean for us today to love God and neighbor, I have chosen a song for reflection that some may have heard before. Like the scripture it is based on, this song frequently appears in weddings. As you listen to this song, I am sure it will not be hard to see why. But just as Paul was not thinking of romantic love in his First Letter to the Corinthians, this song is also not about romantic love.
Instead, this song reminds us that love should be the basis of all that we do in the world. Without love, no matter what else we intend, it is meaningless. Without love, though we gain all the world has to offer, it is as nothing.
So let us go forth today, guided by the command to love. And let that love be the basis for all that we do in the world.