Love Your Neighbour
A Sermon on Romans 13:8-10
Originally preached March 3, 1967
Scripture
8Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. 9For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be …
Sermon Description
If there is one word in the Bible that is easily misunderstood, it is the word “love.” Contemporary society replaces the biblical view of love with mere sentiment or lust. Not only this, but love of neighbor is pitted against love of God. In this sermon on Romans 13:8–10 titled “Love Your Neighbour,” Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones contends that love of neighbor has been twisted. One must look to Scripture in order to see that theology and love are not contrasted nor is it right to pit love and law against each other. Instead, when one truly loves their neighbor, they are, by necessity, fulfilling the law. Should Christians then only talk about love and never theology? Should they expect non-Christians, who have never experienced the new birth, to carry out this command? In this careful message on love and neighbor, Dr. Lloyd-Jones diagnoses the problem modern people have with biblical understanding of love of neighbor by pointing out how love of neighbor must be wedded to sound doctrine. Listen as he helps understand the difference between agape and other kinds of love. Furthermore, he clues the listener in on how a self-centered and sinful person can actually love thy neighbor as thyself.
Sermon Breakdown
- The apostle Paul is summing up his teaching from Romans 12:3 onwards.
- He emphasizes that love is the governing principle.
- Paul says we must understand the true nature of the law. The Pharisees and moralists misunderstand it.
- The law's letter and spirit must not be separated. Faith without works is dead, like love without manifestation.
- Love is extremely practical and active. If love is not active, it is not really love.
- Paul says we owe nothing to anyone except to love one another. This is a permanent debt.
- Loving your neighbor fulfills the law. The examples of commandments show how love fulfills the law.
- Any other commandment is summarized by "love your neighbor as yourself."
- This is often misunderstood today. Many say love of neighbor is all that matters, not theology or God. But this reverses the order of the Ten Commandments and Jesus' teaching.
- Loving neighbor as self is impossible for the natural man due to sin and selfishness. The fall made us self-centered.
- The modern view of this verse fails to understand biblical love. The Bible uses three words for love: eros, phileo, agape. Agape is the highest, used in the NT, and refers to self-sacrificing love.
- Natural man cannot love this way. We must be born again by God's grace through faith, becoming new creatures with the Holy Spirit's help.
- Only then can we begin to love neighbor as self, as the Spirit produces love in us.
Sermon Q&A
How Does Lloyd-Jones Explain the Biblical View of Loving Your Neighbor?
What does Dr. Lloyd-Jones identify as the modern misunderstanding of "love your neighbor as yourself"?
According to Dr. Lloyd-Jones, the modern misunderstanding is that people believe loving your neighbor is all that matters, without reference to loving God first. He states: "This is the greatest of all the misunderstandings in the Christian church at the present time." The modern view reverses the biblical order by suggesting "the search now is the search for the gracious neighbor" rather than the search for the gracious God. Lloyd-Jones criticizes those who say, "What I want to know is this. How can I love my neighbor? You see the contrast? Not interested in theology."
How does Lloyd-Jones explain the correct order of the commandments?
Lloyd-Jones emphasizes that the modern view "is a complete reversing of the order of things in the Ten Commandments." He explains that the Ten Commandments are divided into two tables - the first concerning our relationship with God, and the second concerning our relationship with neighbors. Jesus clearly taught that loving God is "the first and the chiefest commandment," and loving your neighbor is second. Lloyd-Jones states, "To put anything before God is an insult to the glorious God. Nothing and no one must be put before God."
What Greek words for "love" does Lloyd-Jones discuss, and why are they significant?
Lloyd-Jones discusses three Greek words for love: 1. Eros - referring to fleshly desire and lust 2. Phileō - natural human affection, like family feelings 3. Agapē - the distinctive New Testament word for love
He emphasizes that agapē was "never used in classical Greek" by philosophers and poets, noting it's "a word that was used very rarely in the Septuagint. But in the New Testament and in the early Christian writers, it is the habitual and the general word." This shows that the biblical concept of love was something new and different than what natural man understood by the term.
According to Lloyd-Jones, why is it impossible for natural man to love his neighbor as himself?
Lloyd-Jones explains that sin has made man "self-centered" and "selfish," stating: "The terrible thing that sin has done to man is to turn him in upon himself and thereby to spoil his view of everything." Therefore, asking the natural man to love his neighbor as himself is "to expect and to ask the natural man to do something which is quite impossible to him." He calls this "rank heresy" because "you must never ask a man to do something that he cannot possibly do."
What does Lloyd-Jones teach is the only way someone can truly love their neighbor?
Lloyd-Jones teaches that the only way to truly love your neighbor is through spiritual regeneration. He says: "There is only one way whereby anybody can ever love his neighbor as himself" and that requires:
- Getting "the right view of himself" by standing "in the presence of God"
- Being "born again" with "a new nature"
- Becoming "new creatures, new creations" with "a new mind and a new outlook"
- Having "the Holy Spirit of God dwelling within us" producing the fruit of the Spirit, which is "love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, meekness, faith, temperance"
He concludes: "Man by nature is totally incapable of loving his neighbor as himself. There is only one way whereby man can do this, and that is that he be born of the Spirit."
The Book of Romans
Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones
Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (1899-1981) was a Welsh evangelical minister who preached and taught in the Reformed tradition. His principal ministry was at Westminster Chapel, in central London, from 1939-1968, where he delivered multi-year expositions on books of the bible such as Romans, Ephesians and the Gospel of John. In addition to the MLJ Trust’s collection of 1,600 of these sermons in audio format, most of these great sermon series are available in book form (including a 14 volume collection of the Romans sermons), as are other series such as "Spiritual Depression", "Studies in the Sermon on the Mount" and "Great Biblical Doctrines". He is considered by many evangelical leaders today to be an authority on biblical truth and the sufficiency of Scripture.