"Love your neighbor as yourself [and] love your enemies". Honestly, how difficult is this for you to do?

Question

(and please, no perverse answers)

"...‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’..." (Mark 12:31)

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’
But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you" (Matthew 5:33-34)

Answer 1

It is not as easy if you still regard yourself as seperate, distinct, and see your actions upon others as just something that effects the one you act upon. However if you start seeing how your actions effect others, sometimes those whom you hadn't intended, and on the effects on yourself then that tends to change how you treat others. The next step is then seeing yourself as connected to everyone and everything around you. That changes your perspective, too, and with a changed perspective the way you treat others changes well. The final aspect, atleast for myself as a Hindu, is to strive to remember and see God in everyone and everything and to treat them the way that I treat God. With that kind of changed perspective the way you treat others definately changes. Suddenly they are God and you are treating them with the same respect, reverence, dignity, and love that you give and show towards God. You start to understand and see other people's actions of hostility towards you or others as being misguided or just ignorance of the reality that we're all connected, we're all effected by each other, and that everyone of us has the divine spark of God within us. At that point it is easy to forgive someone for just not realizing, for just not knowing, for not just not being able to see God in everyone and to treat them as with the same respect and dignity and love that they do God. You accept that isn't their perspective and that they are acting from an ego-centric standpoint: that they are seperate from all things, that there actions do not effect themselves or anyone else they do not intend for them to effect, etc.

"This universe is the outpouring of the majesty of God, the auspicious One, radiant love. Every face you see belongs to Him. He is present in everyone without exception." Yajur Veda
"Everything in the outside world changes constantly. But the Lord of Love in the inner world never changes. He rules both the inner and the outer realities. Meditate on Him. Merge in Him. Wake up from the dream that you exist apart from Him." Shvetashvatara Upanishad 1:10

"There is one Supreme Controller, Who is the Inner Self of all beings. He projects Himself outward, creating infinity from the One." Katha Upanishad 2:2.12

"That one Being has become all this. All this is only one." Rig Veda 8:10.2

Answer 2

I love this question! This is an excerpt from "The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse" by David Johnson and Jeff VanVondern:

One basic purpose of this book is to help you examine your own practice of Christianity first. Are you practicing grace, allowing the Spirit of Christ to live through you in such a way that you help lift oppressive weights off of others and spiritually empower them to live? Or are you trying to force people to live under laws, rules or formulas for spirituality that cause them to feel weighed down, unable to measure up to your standards? p. 25

Never Resist: Matthew 5:39—“But I say to you, do not resist him who is evil; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn to him the other also.” …This verse is often used to encourage abuse victims to stay in bad situations and continue to being abused. This verse is often wrongly quoted to people who have been humiliated or given bad counsel by Christian leaders…Yet religious helpers counseled many people who have been propelled back into abusive relationships through the use of this verse, even though the context clearly indicates that the issue is that of righteousness and how a person enters the Kingdom…the wrong response is to try hard. The correct response is to look at your lack of righteousness and your own inability to generate it and say, ‘I can’t do that.’ ”

Answer 3

In a way I love every body. I have sympathy for my enemies because they lack the level of intelligence to understand civility. Ever heard of tough love?? If a neighbor lets his dog crap in my yard or steals tools out of my garage. I'm going to lovingly teach him a life lesson via a** whooping. If i catch him at it. His blessing would be to learn not to steal. The good I would have done was to correct his behavior. I do love and pray for those but I'm not about to allow them to walk all over me. Mostly I would pray for the ability to correct their behavior.

Answer 4

It is very hard esp in certain situations. When you know someone has done wrong to you. You just want to sit there and talk about what they did. I think this is hard for everyone. I think the best anyone can do is try to not think negative about the person and pray for them. Even though that in itself is hard.

Answer 5

I will be honest with you. At times it is very challengeing to love someone who's personality just makes you sick. But, I have to clothe myself with the mind of Christ each day and remind myself to be compassionate and loving to those individuals. When God sees that you are willing to love people who are offensive to you, it touches His heart. Because this kind of love is like His. Then God will beging to convict and move on the hearts of those who are difficult to love. And sometimes they get saved.

Answer 6

This is more of a parable than an instruction to me.
I try to love all and do some good each day. Those who do their best each day to destroy themselves and everyone around them, I pray for them but turn away from them. Just in case they turn to God in private, but not in public. I do not want my presence to stand between them and their journey to God.
It might be a journey they must do alone.

Answer 7

Most people can't do this because they don't really understand what Jesus is saying. A better way to say it would be "Love others while you are loving yourself." In other words, until you learn to love yourself as God loves you, you won't be able to love others. The reason we don't love others is because he haven't learned to love ourselves as God does. How does God love us. Read I Corinthians 13. Oh, and 1 John says God is Love.

Answer 8

It is very difficult for me. If everybody could live up to this, then the world would be perfect (or close to it, anyway), and everybody would be walking saints. It's difficult, and God knows it's difficult. But He did it, and so should we.

Answer 9

Sometimes the easiest teachings to hear are the most difficult to put into action.

Answer 10

It's a challenge, because people (including christians) are often stupid and unlovable, but it was the Lord expects and He set the example for us.