How Jesus Frees Us to Love Our Neighbour

by Gloria Furman

A few years ago our family stayed in a church’s guesthouse for two wonderful, jet-lagged, rainy weeks. We always enjoy our visits to that city and look forward to the refreshing fellowship we have with our friends. Plus the tamales at the restaurant down the road from the church are to die for!

On one gloriously overcast afternoon I was loading our kids into the rental car when I noticed a station wagon pull into the driveway next door.

Feeling pressed on every side to get errands done during the baby’s jet-lag-induced nap, I was strongly tempted to pretend I didn’t see them. I wanted no distractions during my strategically planned window of time. And besides, I reasoned to myself, we’re only here for a short while. Who has time to say hello to people at a time like this?

Then as I was clipping the last seatbelt the Holy Spirit used my preschooler to remind me of my Father’s redeeming love. Waving and pointing she cried out, “Look, Mom! We have neighbours! Neighbours!”

Neighbours are people and people are God’s image bearers. There is so much delightfully effusive potential for treasuring Christ when you have the privilege of being anyone’s neighbor for however long the Lord wills.

I’m grateful for the way the Holy Spirit pointed out the sinful self-orientation of my heart through my child’s chubby finger pointing out my neighbors. What kind of a wreckless life would I be living without the Spirit’s ministry of convicting me of my sin? (John 16:8)

But that’s not all!

The Holy Spirit also pointed me to heaven where Jesus is because God raised me up with Christ and seated me with him in the heavenly places (Eph. 2:6). What kind of a dismal life would I be living without the Spirit’s ministry of comforting my heart? (Rom. 5:5)

Remember those two cosmos-altering words: But God.

“But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8). Jesus has carried the burden of fulfilling God’s perfect law of love for us. God credits Christ’s righteousness to us by our faith in him (Rom. 4:5).

We don’t have to whip our consciences with all the times we’ve failed to be missional neighbors. We don’t have to try to redeem our own sin through a works-righteousness-driven “making up for lost time.”

Instead, we can rejoice in Christ and glory in his death on the cross that atoned for our sin. We look to Christ and we see him as he is—raised from the dead victorious over our sin!

The ripple effect of having been raised with Christ is that we have a new calling. We are free to stop living for ourselves. We are free to live for Jesus because he died for us (2 Cor. 5:14-15)! We’ve been made new creations in Christ and given the ministry of reconciliation (2 Cor. 5:17-19).

Our salvation is cause for personal rejoicing and public reveling in the grace of God, inviting more people to join the feast. Jesus can use our strategically planned windows of time in whatever way his holy will pleases because he’s made us ambassadors for him (2 Cor. 5:20).

Just as we are controlled by Christ’s love we are equipped with Christ’s power to love others. Our Father will supply what we need for any and every need we have according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus (Phil. 4:19). God gives us the strength we need to serve in such a way that he gets the glory (1 Pet. 4:11).

For the sake of his name among all the nations, Jesus frees us to love our neighbour.

For more articles by Gloria, please go to her blog http://www.domestickingdom.com