You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord. Leviticus 19:18 NASB
Look what I found buried in a list of sundry laws: Love your neighbor as Yourself. Tucked in near the end of a sentence, at the bottom of a list of do’s and don’ts, is God’s true intention. Love your neighbor. Jesus made these words famous, but He is quoting them right out of Leviticus.
Each time Jesus quoted these words, He is being tested by the religious leaders of that day (Matt.22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27). How well did Jesus know the Old Testament Law? Of course, He knew it better than they did; Jesus IS “The Word.” Not only that, Jesus obeyed every aspect of the Law which is something they had no power to do. Don’t miss the irony here: The religious leaders were testing The One through whom they would finally be able to keep those laws.
The religious leaders where actually trying to trap Jesus in a statement because they were seeking to seize Him (Mark 12:13). He had exposed their hypocrisy and threatened their authority. So they wanted to kill Him. But before we are too hard on those religious leaders, we must examine ourselves. When Jesus comes to expose our hypocrisy and ask us to surrender to His authority, what is our response?
God knew that those religious leaders couldn’t keep the Law in their own strength. God knows that you and I can’t love our neighbor out of our own nature. That is why we needed a Savior. From His death on the cross as the perfect Son of God, we were given a new nature. We are now free to choose to follow Jesus’ Law of Love. We now have His Spirit to help us Love our Neighbor. Praise God!!!