Leviticus 19.1–2, 19.15–18

1 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 2 Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. 15 You shall not render an unjust judgement; you shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great: with justice you shall judge your neighbour. 16 You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not profit by the blood of your neighbour: I am the Lord . 17 You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall reprove your neighbour, or you will incur guilt yourself. 18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbour as yourself: I am the Lord .

 

REFLECTION

This is an apt reading to explain the commandments Love the LORD our God and love our neighbour, as it is all in one reading. These commandments didn't come from Jesus though. Deuteronomy 6:5 is where Jesus got the commandment for loving the LORD, and Leviticus 19:18 is where Jesus got the commandment to love your neighbor. In fact, these commandments are all through the Old Testament. It is expressed many times. The only time we get a new commandment is when Jesus tells them to love one another as he had loved them. This too is just the same commandment from a different perspective. These are the bases of our living into God's grace, and weirdly, it is God's grace that makes it possible. We love because we have been loved. 

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Psalm 1         

1 Blessed are they

who have not walked in the counsel of the ungodly:

nor followed the way of sinners,

nor taken their seat amongst the scornful.

2 But their delight is in the law of the Lord:

and on that law will they ponder day and night.

3 They are like trees planted beside streams of water:

that yield their fruit in due season.

4 Their leaves also shall not wither:

and look, whatever they do, it shall prosper.

5 As for the ungodly, it is not so with them:

they are like the chaff which the wind scatters.

6 Therefore the ungodly shall not stand up

at the judgement:

nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

7 For the Lord cares for the way of the righteous:

but the way of the ungodly shall perish.

 

 

1 Thessalonians 2.1–13

1 You yourselves know, brothers and sisters, that our coming to you was not in vain, 2 but though we had already suffered and been shamefully maltreated at Philippi, as you know, we had courage in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in spite of great opposition. 3 For our appeal does not spring from deceit or impure motives or trickery, 4 but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the message of the gospel, even so we speak, not to please mortals, but to please God who tests our hearts. 5 As you know and as God is our witness, we never came with words of flattery or with a pretext for greed; 6 nor did we seek praise from mortals, whether from you or from others, 7 though we might have made demands as apostles of Christ. But we were gentle among you, like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children. 8 So deeply do we care for you that we are determined to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you have become very dear to us. 9 You remember our labour and toil, brothers and sisters; we worked night and day, so that we might not burden any of you while we proclaimed to you the gospel of God. 10 You are witnesses, and God also, how pure, upright, and blameless our conduct was towards you believers. 11 As you know, we dealt with each one of you like a father with his children, 12 urging and encouraging you and pleading that you should lead a life worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory. 13 We also constantly give thanks to God for this, that when you received the word of God that you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word but as what it really is, God’s word, which is also at work in you believers.

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REFLECTION

This letter of Paul's reflects the love your neighbour as yourself in a form which suggests better than yourself. In all this though we see the overarching motivation for their actions is that they love God. Paul and all the disciples proclaimed the gospel in word and action because they were moved by the great love they had known from the Father, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. This made the love of those in the world possible. We can get caught trying to fulfill the commandments out of obedience, but it is fraught with failure. Thew fulfillment of the Commandments is in love through the Holy Spirit.

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Matthew 22.34–46

34 When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together,
35 and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him.
36 ‘Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?’
37 He said to him, ‘ “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.”
38 This is the greatest and first commandment.
39 And a second is like it: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.”
40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.’
41 Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them this question:
42 ‘What do you think of the Messiah? Whose son is he?’ They said to him, ‘The son of David.’
43 He said to them, ‘How is it then that David by the Spirit calls him Lord, saying,
44 “The Lord said to my Lord,
‘Sit at my right hand,
    until I put your enemies under your feet’ ”?
45 If David thus calls him Lord, how can he be his son?’
46 No one was able to give him an answer, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.

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REFLECTION

In Matthews gospel we only have Jesus telling the two commandments. It is in Luke's gospel that it is linked to the parable of the Good Samaritan. The two commandments come from different parts of the bible as I have mentioned above, but Jesus brings them together. I think the relevance is missed. I tell everyone you cannot do the second without the first. To love your neighbour as God calls us to, is only possible as we love God. We can only love God because we have accepted the love God has shown us. This seems enough and yet the interaction does not stop there.

In this reading it goes on to Jesus asking a question about the Messiah. I believe it has to do with Jesus preparing the people to understand and see him as Messiah. For the Jewish people, the Messiah is a human being born out of the line of David. The Jewish faith places David as the most important person. Their flag has the Star of David on it. The Jewish people see the Messiah as a leader in the likeness of David. They see the Messiah as the leader of armies who will lead the nation into war to reclaim their land and their authority among the nations. In this interaction Jesus is planting a change of understanding. If the Messiah is just a biological descendant, why does David say that the LORD God say to David's Lord, the Messiah, that he will sit at the right hand of the LORD God? David suggests that the one to come after him, is greater than him, and that the Messiah already existed. It also suggests that the Messiah's position is in God's Kingdom not on earth. These ideas challenged their understanding. They would be important in the light of the crucifixion and ascension.  

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