Love Yourself In Order to Love Others?

"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40)

Jesus loves to surprise people. It is of course his nature to do so, especially to those people who want to trap him in his own words and indict him based on his response to questions. This was certainly the case with the lawyer who was a Pharisee, for he would see much pleasure in making the One who says he is the Christ trip over his own argumentation. For Jesus, who in many cases criticised the Jewish leaders for stacking more laws than ever on top of the revealed law, it was his turn to be asked, "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?"

His response is staggering and logical and true. The greatest commandment is to love God with every fiber of your being: your heart, your soul, and your mind. This is a horizontal relationship that revives the Spirit, strengthens good works, and glorifies him. Naturally then, it is the most important, and to fail in this one area is to fail in all virtuous areas, for there is no true virtue that has its branch severed from this root.

But then Jesus continues by saying that the second is like it: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." What did he mean? What was his point in saying this? Many have concluded that Jesus believes that it is only when one loves himself properly and esteems who God made him or her to be that one can love others in a correct manner. As if he is saying, "Loving yourself is important because loving others is important. When you learn to love yourself properly you can love others properly as well."

This is far from his point. Jesus aims to teach us that just as there is a natural inclination in every heart to sustain oneself--to feed oneself, put clothes on oneself, and indeed love oneself, there should be the same inclination to love others. In other words, rather than saying, "Love yourself; and love others too," the emphasis is rather, "Everyone naturally loves there own self--use that same energy and devotion that you naturally have for yourself, for others' good."

Do you see the difference? One turns the command almost on its head to a plea for more self-love and affirmation, almost as though it were a means to accomplishing more love for others, whereas the other keeps the love for God as supreme. One commands both love of self and love for others, the other assumes love of self and commands love for others. Only one interpretation sustains a God-centered approach and nourishes acts of love.

So, love Christ supremely...and demonstrate to the world that your care for them is just as intense as your natural desire to love yourself.