Over the last 9 years the growth rate in Merced has been at about 3.4%. What that means is that In 1990 there were about 56,000 Mercedians. By 2010 that number is suppose to be around 92,000. Last year the number of single family housing starts were about double the city average for the 1990’s. All we have to do is drive around - or try to drive around town - and the reality of this stares us all in the face every day. This city is growing. With growth comes change - ethnic - economic - a growing gap between those who live south of 99 and those who are moving into gated neighborhoods.

All that’s happening around us presents some interesting challenges and opportunities for us - especially as we ponder the people we share fences with. As one great philosopher has said, “Neighbors are like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re going to get.” We could go around the room and share stories about neighbors. Some good. Some bad.

What we’re going to look at today - what Paul writes here in verses 8 to 14 - hits us right where we live. How does God want us to get along with our neighbors?

Romans 13 - starting at verse 8: “Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.”

Let’s pause and be careful not to misunderstand what Paul is saying. We could read this and think that Paul is saying we should never go into financial debt.

You’ll remember that last week we looked at Getting Along With Government - Romans 13:1-7. We looked at our obligation before God to pay our taxes - to honor those in the government who are to be honored - to respect those to whom respect is due. These are obligations. Verse 8 continues that teaching.

We could say it this way, “Don’t owe taxes, honor, and respect or anything else to anyone - instead owe love to one another.” We owe - we're obligated - to love to our neighbors.

The Judge awarded child support to Lena. The judge said to Ole, “I’ve decided to give your wife $400 a month for support.”

“Vell, dat’s fine, Judge,” said Ole. “An vunce in a while I’ll try to chip in a few bucks myself.”

Do you remember the theologian who asked Jesus, “Who’s my neighbor?” Jesus answers with the parable of the Good Samaritan. (Luke 10:25-37) Who did Jesus say are our neighbors? Everyone. Including other ethnic groups - people we wouldn’t normally associate with - those who oppress us - those who oppose us - those who play their music too loud and fix cars 24/7 on their driveway. Everyone.

As Paul is writing to the Church of Rome he’s writing to a church that was oppressed - living under the heel of the Roman military - pressured by living at the seeming whim of a cruel, depraved Emperor. Paul is writing from Corinth - a city of renowned immorality and sexual depravity. Love was lacking in the Roman Empire.

Just as love is lacking today. People are searching - desperate for love. Contemporary music almost without exception focuses on love and yet is devoid of true love. How many marriages could be saved - wars avoided - murders would never have been committed - prostitutes and pimps and drug dealers and gangs would be put out of business - how many places in this city would be safe to be at night - if people knew God’s love?

The greatest need of the world today is know God’s love.

As Christians - as those who know and experience God’s love - the reality of Jesus dying on the cross for us - “Greater love has no one than this - than what? - that one lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13 NIV) - we have a tremendous example and God given and God empowered ability to love.

Love - Paul writes - is the debt that we owe our neighbors. We owe them the love of Jesus. We’re to remember that obligation as we’re rubbing shoulder’s - stopped in traffic - looking at a yard that isn’t taken care of. As we go through our day - seeing those around us - to ask ourselves, “Does that person need love? How am I to love that person?”

Going on in verse 9: “For - our obligation is - this, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.”

Looking at this list of commandments here in verse 9 it would be easy to feel that we’ve fulfilled our obligation to love - that we’re doing what God wants - because we haven’t broken any of these commandments - at least not too badly - or at least not all of them. It would be so easy to get by with doing the minimum and convince ourselves that we’re loving our neighbor.

Ray Stedman - preaching on this passage - shares a prayer that says out loud what’s often really going on in our hearts. Let me read you part of this prayer. As I’m reading think about our obligation to love.

We miserable owners of increasingly luxurious cars, and ever-expanding television screens,
do most humbly pray for that two-thirds of the world’s population which is undernourished;
You can do all things, O God.

We pray that our statesmen may do everything they can to promote peace,
so long as our own national history and honor and pride and prosperity
and superiority and sovereignty are maintained;
You can do all things, O God.

That the sick may be visited, the prisoner cared for, the refugee rehabilitated,
the naked clothed, the orphan housed, and that we may be allowed to enjoy
our own firesides evening by evening, in peace;
You can do all things, O God.

O Son of God, we beg, we beseech, we supplicate, we petition, we implore You to hear us.
Lord, be good to us.
Christ, make things easy for us.
Lord, deliver us from the necessity of doing anything. (1)

Our obligation before God - the love of God - goes way beyond that kind of thinking (Matthew 7:12).

The laws - the four of the 10 commandments - that Paul quotes here focus on our relationship with others. Notice the commands are in the negative “You shall not do this.” But the summary commandment is positive, “You shall love…”

When Jesus summarized all the commandments - the “Thou shalt nots” of the Old Testament - He summarized them with two commandments - both stated in the positive. The greatest commandment: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” And the second - what Paul quotes here dealing with our relationships - “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:36-40)

Jesus - and Paul - are not talking about what we haven’t done to people - fulfilling the minimum standard of expectation so we can get right with God. He’s talking about what we’re obligated - compelled to do as Christians - to do for people - to love them. This is a radial - from our hearts poured out for others in response to God’s love poured out in Jesus - proactive - get outside the church walls - put down the remote - get off of our “barko-lounger” - life changing - world changing - radical approach to love. When we proactively seek to love our neighbors we begin to fulfill what God has in His heart - to get along with our neighbors as God desires for us to get along with our neighbors.

Starting in verse 11 Paul tells us two things we must understand if we’re to live loving our neighbors. First: Loving our neighbors is urgent.

Verse 11: Do this - love your neighbor - knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep - in other words wake up - for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. The night is almost gone, and the day is near.

Before his July 1995 disappearance, Jimmy Hoffa announced, “I don’t need bodyguards.” (2)

What do we know about the future? We know that one day we’ll die. We know that the day of our death is nearer today than it was yesterday - a fact that becomes increasingly evident. Two great lessons of life are: First - learning that our lives here on earth don’t go on forever. And, Second - learning how to use the time we have wisely.

George Bernard Shaw said, “Youth is such a wonderful thing, it’s a shame to waste it on the young.”

We need to recognize that there’s a crucial urgency to our lives - to use our time wisely.

Paul writes, “now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed.”

“We believed” - meaning when we’re born spiritually - salvation in the immediate - being made right before God - sense. One day - a day nearer than it was yesterday - Jesus is coming back. On that day those who have believed will experience salvation in the ultimate sense - eternity with God.

Then Paul writes - “The night is almost gone, and the day is near.” From the day Eve and Adam sinned we’ve been living in that night - the darkness of that sin. But, when Jesus comes back something different is going to take place. On the day Jesus returns there will be judgment. Those who are trusting in Jesus as their Savior will spend eternity with Him. Those who do not know Him as their personal Savior will be sent to hell for eternal punishment. (Revelation 20:11-15)

Paul’s point is that we don’t know how much time we have left to share the Gospel with our neighbors. But we do that it’s even more urgent today that it was yesterday. If we love our neighbors we will make wise use of our time by sharing the Gospel with them.

First - loving our neighbors is urgent. Second thing we must understand if we’re to live loving our neighbors is that loving our neighbors is a matter of our own behavior.

Going on in verse 12: Therefore - because there’s urgency to how we use our time - therefore let us lay aside the deeds of the darkness - let us let go of the sin of this age - and put on the armor of light

Verse 13: Let us behave properly as in the day - as those who know Jesus - here’s what that means - not in carousing and drunkenness - not wasting our time in the endless pursuit of self-indulgence - not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality - fornication - adultery - homosexuality - pornography - not in strife and jealousy - not causing conflict - not living for what we can get for ourselves. All of which is a part of the society around us.

Instead - verse 14: “put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts.” In verse 12 Paul writes - instead of living for sin - put on the armor of light.

Who’s the light? Jesus. Jesus said - John 8:12: “I am the Light of the world’ he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life.”

Paul is telling us that we have a choice. Rather than living in sin - we can “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.” We can choose to live life in dependence on Jesus. To give control of our life to Him. To let His words and character shape our character. To let Him change our hearts and teach us to love as He loves.

Do you think the people around us notice how we live our lives? What we fill our lives with? How we talk? What we joke about? If our love and concern for others is genuine?

We’re not advocating hypocrisy. Trying to put up a good Christian image for the neighbors. What we are advocating - as we allow Jesus to change our hearts and shape our character - is allowing the genuine heart changing light of Jesus to shine through us so that as those around notice a difference in us - in this church - they will see Him in us and come to know Him as their own personal Savior.

Our lives are too valuable. The time is too short. The needs of our neighbors are too great - to waste on anything less than our lives being lived in 100% sold out dependence on Jesus.

As I’m being challenged by all this for myself let me share a challenge with you. Everything we looked at today - if we take it to heart - should rearrange our priorities and attitude towards our neighbors.

In the year 2000 - and this is probably just as true today - in the year 2000 about 50% of local churches in North America did not add a single person to their membership through conversion. (3) Can we say a collective “ouch” to that. It hurts to hear this. But, if we slip into doing the minimum - living as status quo Christians with indifference to our obligation and the urgency of loving our neighbors - what do we expect?

Less than 1% of those who come to Jesus do so as a result of an evangelistic crusade. No more than 4% say they’re influenced by local church programs or worship services. Fully 80% come to faith “because a friend or family member cared for me until I accepted Christ.” (4)

We need to make the days we have left count for something - something that goes way beyond the temporal stuff we usually waste time with. Want to love your neighbor proactively? Want to help someone avoid the fires of hell?

Three suggestions:

First: PRAY PROACTIVELY for your neighbors - across the street - behind us - next to us. Drive through town in prayer for the people we see. While you’re shopping pray for the people around you. While you’re working pray for your co-workers. Pray for God to work in their hearts. Pray that they’ll respond to His love and trust in Jesus as their Savior. Pray for God to open our eyes to see the physical and spiritual needs around us. For God to open our hearts and move us with compassion and love for those around us.

Second: CULTIVATE RELATIONSHIPS with those who need to know Jesus. Not because we’re more holy than them. Not because were suppose to be so much more righteous and we need to straighten out their lives. Not to preach at them. But to share our lives with them - to come along side them as they go through the stuff of life like we do - for the sake of sharing the love of Jesus with them.

Third: LOOK FOR OPPORTUNTIES to share Jesus. This concert on the 29th is a no brainer opportunity to bring someone to hear the Gospel. When you see things happening here at church or in the Christian community - these things aren’t just for us. These are opportunities for us to invite those we’ve been praying for and cultivated a relationship with.

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1. Ray Steadman, from the sermon “The Demand of The Hour” - quoting from
    “He Sent Leanness - Book of Prayers for the Natural Man” - Discovery Publishing
2. Charles R. Swindol, The Finishing Touch
3. Lost in America, Group, 2001
4. www.thejesusplan.com