by Kimberly Smith

Created on: August 22, 2009   Last Updated: September 01, 2009

"Love your neighbor as yourself" is a verse that has such relevance in everyday live. We come in contact with our "neighbor" everyday all day long. It is not intended that your neighbor is only limited to the people that live beside you, upstairs or across the street. Your neighbor is any other person that shares this world with you.

No matter how far away, race, religion, political beliefs, your neighbor deserves to be treated as well as you would treat yourself. This verse can go along with "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you".

If you are hungry you feed yourself. If you are cold you put on a coat. If it is raining you get shelter from the rain. If you are sick you seek a doctor. Yet we see people around us daily that are all these things and more and turn a blind eye, because we don't know them, we don't owe them anything, so we think.

But these people are out neighbors and it is God's command that we love our neighbors as we do our selves. Believers living a life close to God cannot look in the eyes of a homeless, hungry person and simply walk away. You would be going against what God has asked you to do and that is disobedience.

No one person alone can feed every hungry person or provide clothing and shelter for every homeless victim, but you can do your part, which is all that is asked of us by God.

It may not be a matter of feeding hungry people or providing for the needs of less fortune ones. It could be something as simple as speaking a kind work to a co-worker that you generally ignore, or complimenting someone that you may have had difficulties with in the past.

Treating every human being with respect and dignity is a simple thing to do on a daily bases that don't cost you a dime and shows that you think as much of your world neighbors as you do yourself. You should ask yourself before you speak or act would I say or do this if I were doing it to myself and see if the answer is yes.

God wants peace among all his children and until we all learn to love one either with our differences and treat one another as we would ourselves that peace cannot truly be achieved.

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