Friday, October 31, 2014

LOVE OTHERS AS YOU LOVE YOURSELF


Galations 6:1-5          Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. But let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor. For each will have to bear his own load.

It is problematic for someone to see another Christian sin. There exists a temptation for us when this happens. We want to judge them because we had set them higher on the spiritual scale than they deserved. No man can fully live life without sinning.

Someone who is in our mind a wonderful witness for Christ is held in high regard. We expect much from them. Sometimes we expect too much. When they fall we are shocked. They fall far down from the pedestal we had set them on. The temptation is not to commit their sin but to pass judgment on them.

Someone else not set up on such a high pedestal will not fall very far. This Christian is dismissed as a poor witness or we might even say they were never a Christian to begin with. The temptation to judge is still present.

Carry their burden when they sin. The pedestal we have placed them on is irrelevant. The burden of their sorrow and grief for having sinned become evident in them. We are to carry this in our own heart, next to the burden of sorrow and grief for the sins we have committed ourselves. We are no different to other Christians in this regard. For all of us sin and fall short of God’s standards.

We are deceivers at times because we are sinners all the time. We deceive others and ourselves by our sinfulness. We think we are above the sin of others or all sin. Test your heart and see if you can accept the sinfulness of others as you accept your own sinfulness. Love others as you love yourself. In this way you carry your own load and the load of others.

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