LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF
Mark 12:29-31 Jesus said, "The first commandment is this: Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is the only Lord. Love the Lord your God with all you heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this: Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these."
Memories stir between senior moments for old retired guys like me. Occasionally I record them in an email. I would like to share today's flashback with my friends in Christ:
I was student pastor of a Presbyterian church in southern Illinois. Three days a week I traveled to a college sixty miles from our manse. One of my parishioners suffered the death of a brother. The brother had been living in the college town. Their mother, a member of another church, lived in the town of my church. The man left three small children and a working wife. The mother of the deceased often asked to ride with me to the college town to visit and care for her grandchildren.
Our first trip included a very interesting conversation. Mrs. Jones inquired of this twenty-two year old pastor, "Reverend Robling what do you think of the World Council of Churches?" I viewed the question with the same caution as, "Yes or no, have you stopped beating your wife?" I was proud of myself for having the quickness of wit to answer her question with a question, "Mrs. Jones what do you think of the World Council of Churches?"
She quickly replied, "I think it is a communist organization." I responded that her revelation was interesting and inquired as to how she had reached that conclusion. She said, "It is run by the Jews and you know that all of them Jews is Catholic." Astounded by her confidence in the logic of her conclusions, I inquired as to the source of her information. She replied, "Brother Lester told us so at church Sunday." Mrs. Jones was offering her newly discovered knowledge in the name of our Lord.
Thirty-seven years have past and unfortunately we are still faced with an overwhelming abundance of the same ignorance and anger based information and attitudes as were manifested in Mrs. Jones' comments. My heart aches with concern that there are too many of them for us to reach. We must devise ways to reach larger numbers of them. If not us, who? As long as we have breath, we will continue to bring the good news of Christ's love to as many as we can reach. But, our joy will always be tempered with sorrow for the ones we cannot reach. Our rest will not satisfy as long as passion burns within us for bringing the comfort of a saving knowledge of our Lord to angry hearts. Thank you for making this world a better place.
Peace, --dan
Dan Robling 2000