And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ Matthew 2:39.
Our Holy Father, we thank You for Your everlasting watch-care over us. Teach us to love the way we ought to love. In the name of Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.
When we were kids we were taught to spell the word Joy: as Jesus, Others, You. That was the way we were told that we would experience real joy, by loving Jesus first and most; loving others second, and ourselves last.
If we love this way we are breaking the second greatest commandment! We are not loving the way we were taught by the greatest Lover of all times, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!
His commandment teaches that in order to have a pattern for loving others, we must first learn to love ourselves. Because in the measure that we love ourselves we would learn how to love others. This has been proven true time and again. Some of the sweetest, kindest people I know, have a very healthy self-love!
The opposite is also true. Some of the meanest and bitterest people that I have ever met, are self-loathers. And in the same measure that they hate themselves, that hatred overflows to others. How blessed we would be, if we would trust God enough to build our relationships according to His blueprint!
If you want to know if your method of loving others is healthy, measure it by the yardstick of the second and great commandment – love your neighbor as yourself! This may not measure up to the standard of society, or even the church’s standard, but it proceeds from the mouth of God, and that is what you and I are to live by!