Being a neighbour for God 

The call to love our neighbour is not an abstract principle, nor a pleasant sentiment to be admired from a distance. It is the essence of the life of faith, rooted in the very heart of God. When Jesus was asked what the greatest commandment was, He did not stop at loving God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. He pressed further, uniting love for God with love for neighbour, as if the two were indivisible. And indeed, they are. One cannot claim to love God while turning a blind eye to the person next door, the stranger at the supermarket, the suffering soul on the margins. To be a neighbour for God is to embody the love we profess, making tangible the unseen glory of Christ in the most ordinary of human interactions.

The Good Samaritan was not good because he had a fine theology. He was good because he did what love demands. He saw a man, broken and bleeding, and he crossed the road towards him rather than away from him. He inconvenienced himself. He took on cost and risk. He extended mercy where others extended nothing but indifference. This is the measure of being a neighbour: not simply knowing the right thing, but doing it. Not merely agreeing that love is good, but making love real.

To be a neighbour for God is to be willing to see people as He sees them. It is to be moved with the compassion that moved Christ when He looked upon the crowds, harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. It is to hear the unspoken cries of those weighed down by sorrow and sin, to notice the burdens that others walk past. In Britain, where personal space is prized and community often feels fractured, this calling may require even greater intentionality. It means slowing down in a hurried world to listen, to notice, to enter into the lives of those God has placed near us.

Jesus did not simply speak about love; He walked in it. His entire earthly ministry was an outpouring of divine neighbourliness. He dined with sinners, touched the untouchable, and had time for those whom society discarded. And the ultimate act of love was not merely kindness, but sacrifice. To be a neighbour for God is not simply to do good deeds, but to reflect the cruciform love of Christ—a love that bears the cost for the sake of another, that lays down privilege, comfort, even reputation, to serve. This is the scandal of grace: that it does not ask what is deserved, but rather, what love compels us to give.

But here is where we must be careful. We can do good things without having the love of God burning within us. The world is full of humanitarian efforts that alleviate suffering but do not point to Christ. If we help the poor but do not speak of Jesus, if we offer kindness but do not bear witness to the One who is love incarnate, then we have merely dressed wounds without healing the soul. True neighbourliness is not just being nice; it is being a signpost to the Kingdom, embodying the presence of God in the places we live, work, and move.

This is no small task. It is a high calling, a costly calling, but it is also a joyful one. The paradox of love is that in giving, we receive. In pouring ourselves out, we are filled. In stepping into another’s pain, we find the grace of God strengthening us. When we see our neighbour through God’s eyes, love ceases to be an effort and becomes an overflow, a natural response to the overwhelming love we ourselves have received.

The cross stands as the ultimate demonstration of this love, and it compels us to action. If Christ has loved us at our worst, how can we withhold love from those around us? If He has given everything to bring us home, how can we not extend a hand to those still far from Him? To be a neighbour for God is to live a life that points unmistakably to Him, to be a tangible expression of His heart in a world that is desperate for grace but does not know where to find it.

And so, let us love—not in word only, but in deed. Let us be neighbours who reflect the nearness of Christ, who move towards the broken, the lost, the lonely. Let us embody the love that we ourselves have received, knowing that in so doing, we do not merely represent God—we reveal Him. In every act of mercy, every cup of cold water, every listening ear and open door, the presence of Christ is made known. And when the world sees such love, it will know that we are His disciples.