We Just Have One Job…

Matthew 7: 12 Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.

Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

Jesus Christ: His Life and Teaching, Vol.2 - The Sermon on the Mount, Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev

MHA: [This is] the fundamental principle according to which interpersonal relationships should be built.

Every question about interpersonal relationships can be answered with this golden rule.  But, as we will see shortly, this is conditional.  It is conditioned on a proper understanding of our self.

DMLJ: He comes back again to the original subject and says, ‘Therefore,’ in this matter of judgment, in this whole question of your relationship to other people, let this be the rule.

Jesus begins with “therefore.”  In other words, this is not a detached statement – it has some connection to what came before; that is, this matter of judging others.

DMLJ: Here, then, we stand face-to-face with our Lord’s final dictum with regard to this whole matter of judging others and our relationship to them.

The previous passage was the “ask, seek, knock” passage, a message of persistent prayer.  Lloyd-Jones ties this passage to the one before it: the speck and the log.  We are to ask, seek, and knock (pray persistently) that God gives us the Holy Spirit such that we keep in mind our log and not the other’s speck: judging others. 

DMLJ: The statement at which we are now looking, which is the summing up of this whole matter of judgment, comes with much greater force and cogency when we look at it in the light of that brief statement about prayer.

Now, here, Jesus sums it up: just keep this in mind, to do unto others as you would have done to you.  Lloyd-Jones offers: on this basis, judge.  That’s the point: it doesn’t really leave much room for us to judge others.  In the spirit of this entire Sermon, what gives us standing to judge when we place ourselves against this standard?

It is easy to read this golden rule and say to ourselves: “Yes, of course.  How wonderful.  I like the sentiment.”  But nothing is changed within us to make this so.

MHA: It is really about taking a proactive stance in life, which presupposes that a person would desire for others that which he desires for himself.

To practice the golden rule is a proactive act; it is positive law, not negative law: the requirement to do something, as opposed to requirement to not do something.  This golden rule is just another way of saying that which Jesus and several apostles said many times in the New Testament: love your neighbor as yourself:

MHA: The multiple references to this “law” on the pages of the New Testament writings compel us to consider it one of the most important aspects of Christian ethics. … [it is] one of the fundamental moral reference points in Christian ethics.

I agree that it certainly is this.  But I think it is more: it is the ethic that gives meaning to all of the other ethics: the negative ethics of do not murder, do not steal, do not covet; the positive ethics of aiding the poor and sick.  As Metropolitan Hilarion wrote, in the quote above, the golden rule is “the fundamental principle according to which interpersonal relationships should be built.”

Forgive the diversion to Dream Theater, but these lyrics best explain what I am getting at:

You're smart enough for me to trust

Go live your life now

Just keep these steps in your life

And you'll know how

If you're not sure, ask yourself

"Have I done to them

As I would have them do to me?"

When we aren’t sure about what the law (God’s natural law ethics) requires of us, just ask yourself the question posed by the golden rule.  In this way, the golden rule gives meaning to all other ethics.

Metropolitan Hilarion describes this ethic as standing firmly in the bounds of natural law.  On this point, and as long-time readers know, I agree completely.  Some version of this ethic is known in many cultures and traditions, evidence that God placed it in man’s heart from creation.

The apostle Paul writes of this as well:

Romans 2: 14 For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them…

Returning to the golden rule:

DMLJ: You do not like unkind things said about you?  Well, do not say them about others.  You do not like people who are difficult, and who make your life difficult, and bring problems in your life, and constantly put you on edge?  Well, in exactly the same way, do not let your behaviour be such that you become like that to them.

Here again, we are dealing with this idea of “self,” an idea that was dealt with even in the opening of this Sermon, in the Beatitudes.  We are unable in our natural condition to love our neighbor as our “self,” because we love “self” in much the wrong way.  We are self-centered, and this is not proper love of our “self.”

DMLJ: So the failure of man to live by, and to keep, the golden rule is due to the fact that he is self-centred. 

And this is the conditional part of this golden rule.  If we love our “self” wrongly, then it is not appropriate to do unto others as we would have done to us.

Here we also find the summary of the law and the prophets.  It is the best example of how completely the law has been misunderstood.  The law was not intended as a list of rules and regulations; it was meant to inform the spirit, to shape it.  The end of the law is not a mechanical following of it; it is to change our nature.

DMLJ: We so constantly forget the spirit of the law and of life as God meant us to live it.

So, how do we live this golden rule?  How can we implement it in our lives?  Jesus also answered this, when answering the question of the greatest commandment: first, you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.  Only then are you able to love your neighbor as yourself.

DMLJ: You notice the order.  You do not start with your neighbour, you start with God.  And relationships in this world will never be right…until we all start with God.

God is worthy to be praised.  When we truly see this and understand why this is so, we can properly see ourselves as sinners.  When we come to know God, this humbles us completely.  This moves us to the proper spirit when it comes to this idea of judging others.

DMLJ: …we see them, as we see ourselves, as the victims of sin and of Satan…

Look at others as Christ looks at us: humble, sacrificial, loving.  We do this by dying to self.

Conclusion

DMLJ: It is only when we come to this, after having started with God and sin and self and others, that we shall indeed be able to implement this amazing summary of the law and the prophets….

We are to live this, we are to implement this, we are to practice this: do unto others….  Jesus summarized the law and prophets down to one job, and it is this.