Loving Your Neighbor; A Practical Guide to Keeping the Second Great Commandment

Loving Your Neighbor: A Practical Guide to Keeping the Second Great Commandment explores what God actually means by the word "love." Often, in our culture, we use the word "love" to mean "like very, very much," as in, "I love pizza!" But then there are Bible verses that command us to love our enemies; clearly, the Lord cannot be asking us to like them very much. This book looks first at the heart of love, as evidenced by God and others. From these scriptural records, we can see that spiritual love really means a selfless caring for the other. When we love, we must start with a motivation that focuses solely on the well-being of the other and not on any benefits to self. Next, as this is a practical guide, this book examines "pictures" of love, words that give the reader a picture of how this love might actually practically work in our lives. Often, these biblical words have both a physical and a figurative usage. The physical usage gives us the picture, and the figurative usage shows us how to practically apply this in loving our neighbor. Finally, the author shows that God has given us tools in the Bible to help us get better at loving our neighbor. God gave us the commandment, but then He was loving enough to help us love and to help us grow in loving our neighbors.