Love the stranger

He administers justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the stranger, giving him food and clothing. Therefore love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. – Deuteronomy 10v18-19

I really love our Sunday night Bible studies. They are always a blessing to me and to everyone else who comes. On an occasional Sunday we have an open Q&A night where any topic, within reason, is open for discussion. We have even had a couple of agnostics attend, one who was polite and respectful and another who was, well, not so much J.

Recently we discussed a topic which came from our Facebook fan page. The topic dealt with neighbours. We discussed who they are and how we are to deal with them. As we discussed we came up with three groups of people we are told to love; brothers, neighbours, and our enemies. Here is Deuteronomy we find another group.

In the descriptions of God we find that, among other things, He ‘loves the stranger’ and gives him food and clothing. Then he says, ‘Love the stranger, for you were strangers in Egypt.

What a great lesson for us. It looks like God just wants us to love everyone doesn’t it? It is hard to find any group that could be excluded.

Why is it so hard for us to just love everyone? We can always come up with some kind of excuse for not loving. But at the end of the day there is one reason. Love is hard. It takes sacrifice. It always costs something. It takes work. It even takes work to love the ones we love sometimes.

We don’t love the way we should because we love ourselves more. It sound tough, but that’s the way it is. Love your brother. Love your neighbour. Love the stranger. Love your enemy. Is there anyone else to love?