Episode 72 - Who is our neighbor?

Thru the Spirit we see that we are all neighbors thru Christ - despite what our common definition of a neighbor is that man has created 

Transcript

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This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine. Hello, welcome back to Shine. I'm your host, Nicole Florence, and this week we are talking about loving our neighbor. So I think we should really start with thinking about who really is our neighbor. I know in the parable that we spoke about yesterday, there was a sense of proximity. You know, we had the the man who was beaten and robbed on a road, and um how many passers by on that same road encountered him and how the first two did not show him mercy, but the last did. And I think for many of us we start to define our neighbors as the people that are in our closest proximity, whether it's in our own household, within our own neighborhood, or our own county, city, community. But I think that we have to truly understand that if we are neighbors in Christ, there really are no boundaries that will define or give a boundary of who is your neighbor and who is not. I think as humans we do that. We say, well, that's happening in Chicago, right? So that doesn't really affect me. I say that because I'm in downstate Springfield, y'all. Or we see something that is happening across the world and different nations, and we feel, well, that doesn't really affect me because that's not in close proximity. That's not truly my neighbor. We do that even in in our town here. I don't know how many times someone has maybe said to me, well, you know, the unhoused problem doesn't really affect me because they don't see it. They, you know, work on a side of town where they're not really faced with it day to day. Or things on the quote-unquote east side don't affect them. They're most worried about the people that are closer to them. If we are truly going to be neighbors in Christ, we have to rid ourselves of those physical boundaries. We have to rid ourselves of those even ethnic or emotional boundaries that we have that make it easier for us. Let's face it, it's easier for us to be neighborly to the people that are within our church walls. It's easier for us to be neighborly with people who uh speak in the same way, that have the same belief system, because it's very comfortable for us. But if we are going to be neighbors through Christ and within Christ, we have to start accepting the fact that our neighbors include everyone, our neighbors include the folks who don't look like us, who don't speak like us, who don't have the same belief system as we do. And it may be that as uncomfortable as it is, we may have to be in the position of being neighborly and showing love and gentleness and kindness to those who it may be uncomfortable for us to do so. As it may be the way that you present yourself and show yourself with those fruits of the spirit, you may be that one neighbor who brings that other person closer to Christ, or you might be the one who shows mercy when no one else did, and that person may ask, how on earth did you do this, or why did you do this? Why did you show me forgiveness when I did not deserve it? Why did you show me mercy when I did not lend mercy to you? Why were you gentle and kind when I was not in that way to you or others? And you may be that one who can say to them, because you are my neighbor through Christ, and through him I know that I am offered the same mercy and grace and forgiveness and blessing. So how am I to not offer that to you? Because part of that greatest command that we know is to love our neighbor as thyself. And we would want that same offered to us, right? And Lord knows we've been given that, and then some by our Lord and Savior. So we first have to rid ourselves of the traditional sense of being a neighbor. We have to rid ourselves of the physical boundaries, the ethnic and cultural boundaries, language, all of the things that I believe we as human mankind have put in place to distract us from us being the spiritual neighbors in Christ, and start seeing and understanding that if we have been presented or placed or faced with another whom we can show mercy, who we can bear the fruit of the spirit, whether it be someone on the street, at work, in a phone call, whether we see it even on social media or across the world where we are moved and we feel that we are in a position to bear the fruit of the spirit to that neighbor, then we should do so. Because we know through him a neighbor is the stranger, a neighbor is the enemy, a neighbor is the person who goes against maybe everything that we have been taught or everything we have known. A neighbor is someone who may have cursed you, a neighbor is not just the person who we are comfortable with. But through him, we are all neighbors, we are all loved by him, we are all his sheep, we are all his children. So who are we to not show mercy, love, give grace to another when we have been shown so much that we have not earned nor deserved? Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.