Love your neighbour as yourself. Lev 19:18, Luke 10:27
Jesus expanded the meaning of the word neighbour, when he defined it by telling the parable of the good Samaritan. Mostly it had meant what we mean in English today – someone who lives down our street, in our community (if we have one). It was linked with the people you knew, your kin, clan or village, with someone whose wife you might be tempted to covet or whose boundary stone you might move in the night. (Although, to be fair, Leviticus 19 also directs the people to love the alien as themselves, when he comes to live with them.)
Jesus’ revolutionary story makes absolutely everyone and anyone a neighbour – anyone you happen to meet, or by extension, hear about, or see on the news. So how do we love anyone and everyone as ourselves? What part should I be playing in encouraging human flourishing in the ways that I want to flourish? What makes me flourish at work? How do I contribute to good working practices so that others flourish too? Can I make a difference to people I will never know?
Those are the kinds of questions that are raised by Jesus’ story and the command that followed – Go and do likewise. We might need to stop and help someone who has been beaten up, using our resources and our time, but there are a lot of other very ordinary ways in which we can make the world we live in a better place for neighbour human beings. If we love our neighbours as ourselves then what do we do? Pay taxes happily to build the social infrastructure of society (paramedics for the man beaten up on the way to Jericho?); buy and use cars in an environmentally friendly way – and keep to speed limits; carry donor cards and give blood; support aid and development agencies; buy fair-traded goods. There is a counter-cultural element in living with the good of others in mind. The bible identifies obedience with joy, for the precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart. Go on enjoy yourself – be a good neighbour!
Margaret Killingray
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