Welcome to Grace’s exploration of the Jesus Creed! For this Lent, we are taking on something new: our Middle and High School youth classes and our adult education classes will be exploring Scott McKnight's The Jesus Creed.
What is the Jesus Creed? It's simply what Jesus described as the greatest commandments:
Jesus said, “’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” Matthew 22:37-40
Each week youth and adults will explore how these two simple, yet challenging, commands are woven into the fabric of the Bible, the church, and our lives.
And, each week, we’ll be able to carry this exploration into the week. We have prepared suggested discussion questions to talk with your family. And, if you’re feeling adventuresome, there are some suggested follow-up activities to try.
Here are this week’s Questions for Discussion:
(Things to talk about with your family)
- What does it mean to love God with everything? How do we do that?
- What is the difference between being happy and being blessed?
- Do you think love is more of a feeling or more of an action?
And hear are this week’s suggested Follow-up Activities:
(Additional actions you can try if you feel led… or adventuresome)
- Commit to saying the Jesus Creed each day throughout Lent. Repeat it when you get up, go to work/school, go to bed, other times.
- Share your day with your family at dinner or at night.
- Write and post it somewhere in your home or office where you will see it regularly.
- Did the Jesus Creed change the way you approached or handled things during the day?
Feel free to share your experiences in the comments below.
1. Fun with words: in the Amplified Bible, the version of the ”Jesus Creed” in Matthew further defines “mind” as “intellect”. In Mark 12:28-34, it further defines “soul” as “your life” and “mind” as “your faculty of thought and your moral understanding”. Additionally, In Mark it also adds the words “out of and” to “with” in “love God with all your heart and soul and mind”. I’m given to wonder how they could translate the same English words differently in two different chapters. There is probably some technical explanation dealing with the original Greek words, but even if I heard it, I’m not sure I’d understand it.
ReplyDelete2. The “Jesus Creed” has a different context in Luke (the historian). Instead of a standalone piece, it’s part of the parable of the Good Samaritan (although those headings indicating parables and so on were apparently added later on). Jesus uses it to explain to a lawyer what he had to do to inherit eternal life. Then the lawyer asks who his neighbor is and Jesus responds by telling him about the Good Samaritan. Further, in the Amplified Bible, Luke 17:15-18 praises a Samaritan and refers to him as an alien. In Jer 7:6 and also in two or three other places I think, the Bible says “do not oppress the transient and the alien”. If aliens are foreigners in our land, as these Bible passages seem to present them, then what does that mean for the current debate in our country over immigration? What does the Jesus Creed tell us, no command us, to do and where to stand in this debate?
While attending the Hispanic Bible Study last fall, I was particularly struck by a lesson titled "No Mas Lineas Divisorias" ("No More Dividing Lines"). It was from Acts 8 about Philip (Yes, the "Philip" of our partner St. Philip's Anglican Church in Nablus) and the Ethiopian Eunuch. Scot McKnight touches on this in Day 3's "Loving Others".
DeleteHe writes:
"... the priest and the Levite... respond to the label {i.e. "unclean"} instead of the need. The Samaritan, who in stereotyped categories shouldn't have been the one to respond, responded to the need and ignored the label.
We are like the priest and the Levite far more often than we care to admit. We may choose not to stop our journey to respond to persons because of their ethnicity, their economic status, their clothing, their age, or their body piercings or tattoos. Sometimes we respond negatively to an immigrant's accent or country of origin, or we may fall prey to stereotypes about such persons because of their disease or their rumored sins. Neighbor love, as Jesus teaches it and practices it, crosses those boundaries because it responds to needs, not labels."
When I talked with my sons about what it means to love our neighbor, we talked about how difficult it can be to love someone who might be considered our enemy and how we might even begin to do something like that. They agreed it is a lot tougher to follow that commandment in practice than in principle.
DeleteI came across a quote that ties into your point about responding to labels rather than needs: By and large, people are more interesting than the stereotypes make them out to be. Most of the time, we have to move beyond the labels that get in the way of seeing the real human behind it.
Amen, brother!
DeleteI was reading today's reflection (Loving Others) and realized how challenging (was going to say 'subversive' but we'll go with challenging) Jesus made it when he added "Love your neighbor as yourself" to the familiar "Love God with all your mind/heart/soul/strength."
ReplyDeleteWhile we (or maybe me) tend to look at the priest and Levite in the Good Samaritan parable as being heartless (or, at least, self-absorbed) in not helping the person who was injured on the side of the road, they were also following the laws concerning ritual purity. In effect, they could very well have thought that they were loving God by following the commandments about being pure/clean in the presence of God. Jesus's parable indicated that they need to consider the command to love their neighbor (in this case, tending to the injured person on the side of the road) as well.
In fact, it seems to me that a lot of the conflicts Jesus had with the Pharisees (particularly in healing on the Sabbath and associated with "sinners") stemmed from the fact that Jesus was showing them how "love your neighbor as yourself" fit in with the commandments about loving God. In fact, loving our neighbor could be seen as a logical offshoot of loving God.
One difficulty is with the word "love." In English, the meaning is ambiguous.
ReplyDeleteThe Wiki article "Greek Words for Love" identifies four words: "Agape", "Philia", "Storge", and "Eros."
The Greek Interlinear Bible uses the word "agapEisis" for both "love God" and "love your neighbor" portions of Mark's rendering of the Great Commandments. Clearly it is agape love we should emphasize.
In web browsing on this subject, I came across the Wiki page on C.S. Lewis' book "The Four Loves -- Affection, Friendship, Eros, Charity." The Wiki summary on Agape/Charity reads:
"Charity (agapē, ἀγάπη) is the love that brings forth caring regardless of the circumstance. Lewis recognizes this as the greatest of loves, and sees it as a specifically Christian virtue. The chapter on the subject focuses on the need of subordinating the natural loves to the love of God, who is full of charitable love."
I'm partial to the definition Paul provided in 1 Corinthians 13
DeleteI believe that covers "charity" well
Has anyone found that reciting the Jesus Creed has made a difference in the way you approached others?
ReplyDeleteI have one real-life example this week: I'm leading a project that requires people with a variety of skills/backgrounds. One of the people assigned to the team has been a vocal critic of the project (canned management approach: If someone is complaining, assign them to the team that is addressing the issue). So far he's been more passive aggressive than productive (and, with limited resources, we can't afford that). So, this week, instead of talking about why he hasn't delivered on his part, I sat down and talked with him about his concerns in hopes that we could find ways for him to feel more like a contributing team player than an outsider (who also knows the reason our management assigned him to the team was because he was continually complaining about the project).
It's a small start, and I'm probably going to be mentally reciting "Love God, love others" many, many more times before it's over, at least it's a start.