Do I really need to love my neighbor?
September 17, 2007
By John W. Kennedy
Jesus commanded us to love our neighbors as ourselves (Luke 10:27). Did He really mean it?
I think so.
In America today it’s easy to exist without ever really knowing our neighbors if we so choose. The only contact we might have with them is to complain about the dog that barks all night, grass that doesn’t get mowed as quickly as we’d like, or the old junker that’s been sitting in the driveway a bit too long.
We’ve lived in a rural subdivision for eight years. No one ever welcomed us to the neighborhood. We figured we had picked an area where people deliberately buy one-acre lots because they don’t want to be bothered.
Oh, we’ve borrowed tools from one neighbor and solicited computer advice from another. But, for the most part, we don’t know those who live around us. We wouldn’t know some of our neighbors if we saw them on the street.
But if we are to take Jesus’ admonition seriously, how can we love people we never speak to, or acknowledge? My wife, Patty, and I determined to become better acquainted with those who live nearby.
So we decided to have a neighborhood barbecue on our deck. A new catty-cornered neighbor provided the perfect incentive for the gathering.
A couple of weeks before the event we hand-delivered invitations to the 11 houses surrounding us. The invitation distribution took up several evenings. These neighbors — most of whom have lived on this street much longer than we have — really did want to know us. At some homes we chatted for half an hour.
The grapevine already had branded us. Most knew we worked at the Assemblies of God headquarters. Some identified us as having the sons who hit a tennis ball back and forth in the street. Others viewed us as the wife who rides the mower and the husband who does the trimming.
We discovered our neighbors lead interesting lives. For instance, one fellow has a collection of 19th-century high-wheel bicycles, one of which he rode across the nation in 32 days.
The evening of the barbecue, two dozen people from seven houses showed up. We learned most of those close to us are churchgoers. We have Sunday School teachers on both sides of us. A choir director lives across the street. In three households, couples are sacrificially raising children of relatives.
We saw a different side of our next-door neighbor. Our infrequent contact with him before had been mostly unpleasant, especially after his pit bull ran onto our deck and slashed open our dog’s neck. On the same deck during the barbecue, this neighbor — a Pentecostal — talked mostly about the Lord.
Some of the neighbors sat and talked for more than six hours.
Subsequently, we better know how to pray for our neighbors and interact in their lives. And the waves as we drive our car down the street are now a little more genuine.
John W. Kennedy is news editor of Today’s Pentecostal Evangel.
“Every believer has a lot to give. Don’t sell yourself short. God uses us despite our weaknesses. God wants to use you.”
“Vantage Point: God Uses Weak People,” Ken Horn
Today’s Pentecostal Evangel, September 16, 2007
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