Love
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The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet”; and any other commandment, are summed up in this word, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law. -Romans 13:9-10
The gospels of both Mark and Luke include a passage in which Jesus states the summation of the law. In these passages, Jesus says that the most important law is love - we are to love God with everything we are and love our neighbors as ourself. Paul quotes this in his letter to the Romans today, saying that love does no wrong to a neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.
This Sunday’s readings are all in some way focused on being in right relationship with one another. And as followers of Jesus, love is what right relationship looks like. This is the simplest of teachings. Love your neighbor as yourself. And yet, it often turns out to be one of the most complicated practices. Some others are not always that loveable, as you likely already know. Loving those we don’t like is indeed a challenging practice - heck - sometimes loving those we love is challenging enough! Not to mention that loving ourselves can also sometimes be a challenge. And just how are we really supposed to love God?
Jesus seems to be saying in this Sunday’s Gospel that in order to be in right relationship with one another, we need to bind ourselves to certain things and loose ourselves from others. And I’m not sure it’s always clear which is which. Thankfully, whenever two or three of us are gathered, Christ is there with us to guide and show us the way. We can best love others when we know the love we’ve already been given.
And in this season of creation, we are reminded that we are also called to be in right relationship and love this earth and God’s whole creation as a neighbor - as a holy thou, to which we owe dignity and respect. How can we be in right relationship with God’s whole creation? What might we need to bind ourselves to? What ought we loose ourselves from?
This Sunday we’ll be moving inside our building once again, and although we cannot see through the thick walls or the stained glass to see the earth and sky and trees, may it not allow us to forget our call to right relationship with God’s Creation - with everyone and everything God has made.
