THERE’S NOW A WORLDWIDE PHENOMENON regarding (loving) helping the less privileged. Young people are now looking for something that is beyond them. Volunteerism is on the rise. Sort of like our REAL Life-feeding program every Saturday morning. Habitat for Humanity. Gawad Kalinga (Philippine version). And many more.
After examining the first and the greatest commandment, let’s now look at the second great commandment.
Matt. 22:39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
Matt. 22:40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
These must really be highly classified commandments because ‘all the Law and the Prophets HANG on these two’.
‘LOVE the Lord…’ and ‘Love you neighbor…’
The other aspect of fulfilling the greatest commandment, besides the ‘love for the Lord’ -vertical relationship, is the ‘love for one’s neighbor’ –horizontal relationship. The Scriptures tells us that,
1John 4:20 If anyone says, “I love God,” yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.
1John 4:21 And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.
Rom. 13:8 Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law.
Rom. 13:9 The commandments, “Do not commit adultery,” “Do not murder,” “Do not steal,” “Do not covet,” and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Rom. 13:10 Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
As a movement, we express this important law through our desire to ‘make disciples’. Despite of the current anti-discipleship attitudes of the age.
a disciple. One of the ways to find out the theme of a certain passage of Scriptures is through the Principle of Repetition. So if you look at these words below, you won’t be so far off from the truth.
* Christian/s – 3x
* believers- 28x
* saints – 69x
* disciple/s – 296x
God is looking, not just for a Christian, a believer, or a saint; He is on the look out for a disciple. A disciple; a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Ezek. 22:30 “I looked for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found none.
be a disciple. How can one become a disciple of Christ? Well, let’s ask Him. It’s self-explanatory in red letters.
John 8:31 “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples.
John 13:35 “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
John 15:8 “This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.”
be a disciple-maker. Many stop short of just becoming a recipient of heaven. Just a recipient, but not a conduit. But Jesus, in red letters again, said,
Matt. 28:18 “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
Matt. 28:19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
Matt. 28:20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Being a disciple-maker has something to do with first commandment ever mentioned in the Bible.
Gen. 1:28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”
When we fulfill what He is asking us to do, we are actually following God.
So I say,
“Following God Entails Helping Others Follow Him.”
But as much as it is impossible to love God apart from Christ, so it is to love our neighbor as ourselves.
1John 3:16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.
1John 4:19 We love because he first loved us.
Only through the cross that we can love God (vertical line) and love others (horizontal line).
When these lines crossed each other, that would give us a glimpse of HOPE.
"It's All About Discipleship, Genius!" 