How is the Second Greatest Commandment Related to the Golden Rule?

Ideas for new articles for me to write on the theology of work and post on my blog come from a variety of sources: my own experiences on the job, discussions with family and coworkers about their job challenges, news articles about current trends, and passages in the Bible that I am seeing in a new light.

These ideas come to me far too often; I can’t keep up. I currently have over two dozen topics and articles in various stages of completion on a spreadsheet on my laptop that helps me prioritize. This topic landed on my heart on Thursday morning, so I had to bump it to the top of the list.

In the discussion that follows, I will share how I identified a connection between two key passages in the Gospels, explore their similarities, and then offer some ideas how we can apply this in the workplace.

The connection discovered

In answering a somewhat difficult question during a podcast interview earlier this week, I was reflecting on why honesty is important with regards to treating others with dignity and respect. My mind went quickly to the second of two greatest commandments according to Jesus – love your neighbor as yourself (Matt. 22:34-40). The next thing I said was this was tied to the Golden Rule, where Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount: “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.” (Matt. 7:12). I said that we don’t like it when people lie to us or deceive us, so why would we do it to others?

Why were these two verses connected in my mind? I am not sure. I think it is something I have known for a really long time. Perhaps there was something here worth exploring for a bit.

Those who have sat in one of my Sunday School classes or have read my blog articles know that I often see implied connections in the Bible that are not necessarily specified. A good example is the connection that I see between the Exodus and the cross. Sanctified eyes familiar with God’s Word can see that these two key events are clearly connected by divine design.

I am able to see a connection between loving our neighbor and following the Golden Rule as a divinely intended connection, and not just a cross reference in my own imagination. Has anyone else seen, heard, or read anything about this connection? Note that both passages came from Jesus’s teaching and both deal specifically on how to treat other people with Kingdom values.

The connection explored

So, my question is, how is the second of two greatest commandments related to the Golden Rule? Is the latter a subset of the former? In other words, is following the Golden Rule just one way (among many ways) to love our neighbor? I believe so. When I follow this rule, I am in fact loving my neighbor.

As we look closer at these passages, we see some similarities. Let us begin with Matt. 7:12. In the first part of the verse, we read, “ . . . do to others what you would have them do to you.” Is this not similar to how Jesus described what loving our neighbor should look like? He said to “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 22:39), which is a direct quote of Lev. 19:18. Additionally, in both passages, Jesus ends with a statement that doing these things aligned with “the Law and the Prophets.”

I found a connection between these two verses that was identified by my former seminary professor, Dr. David L. Turner in his Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament on the book of Matthew.

Regarding Matt. 7:12, he explains, “This verse (cf. Luke 6:31) should be understood as a conclusion to everything said since 5:17.” This begins a major portion the sermon where Jesus teaches that He came to fulfill the OT Law. Dr. Turner continues, “The encapsulation of this ethic in 7:12 summarizes how Jesus wishes his disciples to fulfill the law and the prophets. Later the Great Commandment (Matt 22:36-40) will similarly encapsulate the law by linking Deut. 6:5 and Lev. 19:18.” I was pleased he acknowledged the similarity.

Later, Dr. Turner connects these verses again. He writes, “The summation of the law as loving one’s neighbor or doing for others whatever one would like them to do to oneself is therefore not a higher law that replaces the Torah but the true goal of the law.” He notes that Paul taught “loving one’s neighbor is the fulfillment of the law.” (See Rom. 13:8-9 and Gal. 5:14.)

What I gathered from this brief study is that the Golden Rule and the second of two Greatest Commandments that Jesus taught in Matthew 7 and 22 have more in common than two different expressions on how to treat people with Kingdom values. It is much deeper than that. They are both decisively linked to the fulfillment of the OT Law. When we live this new way, we display God’s character, as God is love. As new creatures in Christ, transformed by His love, we show the world that God loves them.

The connection applied

Now, here comes the fun part.

Do you realize, Christian worker, wherever it is that you work, whether paid or volunteer, inside or outside the home, even if you do that work all by yourself, you can love God (with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength) by what you do because you are doing it for His glory?

Do you also know that as you work, you are loving your neighbor, as you allow God to work with, in, and through you (and often in spite of you), to love those around you? As you expend time and energy to do the things you are called, equipped, and in many cases paid to do, you are meeting the wide spectrum of human needs (physical, mental, emotional, social, and spiritual). Your efforts to meet those needs are a direct answer to someone’s prayers to God, asking Him for divine assistance.

Try to think about that as you wake up Monday morning to go to work. You won’t just thank God it‘s Friday; you will thank God when it’s Monday, too, and every day that you get the privilege to experience God’s presence at work, which I lovingly call “Immanuel labor.”

I trust that the time you took to join me in this discussion will help you to love God and love your neighbor in the place where you spend most of your waking hours. God is present with you!

About the author:

Russell E. Gehrlein (Master Sergeant, U.S. Army, Retired) is a Christian, husband of 43 years, father of three, grandfather of five, and author of the book, Immanuel Labor – God’s Presence in our Profession: A Biblical, Theological, and Practical Approach to the Doctrine of Work, published by WestBow Press in February 2018. He received a Master of Arts in biblical studies from Grand Rapids Theological Seminary in 2015. He is passionate about helping his brothers and sisters in Christ with ordinary jobs understand that their work matters to God and that they can experience His presence at work every day. He has written more than 320 articles on a variety of faith and work and other topics; many of them have been published or posted on Christian organization’s websites, including the Institute for Faith, Work & Economics, Coram Deo, Nashville Institute for Faith + Work, Made to Flourish, The Gospel Coalition, and Christian Grandfather Magazine.

We Were Created to be God’s Coworkers

Here is an excerpt from chapter 3 of my book, Immanuel Labor – God’s Presence in our Profession that I have never put into an article. It is a critical topic in my theology of work. I want to emphasize God’s original purpose for creating human beings. That intent applied to Adam and Eve and applies to us as well. Lastly, I will describe what it looks like when God graciously chooses to use us.

The very first chapter of Genesis demonstrates that the triune God is a worker. On the sixth day, God initiates His greatest creation, human beings. The men and women He started with and every generation since that time were created to be His coworkers. Let me unpack this foundational concept a little deeper.

God’s purposes for making humans in His image

In Gen. 1:26–28, we see that God made Adam and Eve, the first man and woman in His image. He called them to work and to be His coworkers to sustain and expand God’s creation.

In his book, Systematic Theology, Grudem teaches, “When Scripture reports that God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness’ (Gen. 1:26), it simply would have meant to the original readers, ‘Let us make man to be like us and to represent us.’” Note that the man and the woman were made in God’s image. Both were equal and necessary. Adam and Eve were made for relationship. They were created to complement each other and represent God’s image together. They were made to work as a team!

Sherman and Hendricks, in Your Work Matters to God point out, “So man works because he is created in the image of God.” The Theology of Work Bible Commentary states, “God worked to create us and created us to work.” Later in the same source, we read, “God brought into being a flawless creation, an ideal platform, and then created humanity to continue the creation project.” 

In The Presence of God, J. Ryan Lister ties together the creation account in Gen. 1-2 and the description of the new creation in Revelation. He states,

The Lord called Adam to establish a dominion and dynasty that would cover the earth with his Creator’s relational presence. Adam was more than just a farmer; Adam’s call to subdue the earth had an eschatological, or future, goal. . . A large part of the divine mandate, then, consisted of Adam’s working to bring the presence of God to the rest of creation. Adam’s ‘subduing and ruling’ work in the garden was about the distribution of God’s presence. Adam was to expand the borders of Eden to cover the rest of the world. . . Adam was to subdue the whole earth – not just the garden.

In his book, Culture Making: Recovering our Creative Calling, Andy Crouch offers some original insights into humanity’s call to reflect the image of God through our creativity. “They will have a unique capacity to create—perhaps not to call something out of nothing in quite the way that God does in Genesis 1:1, but to reshape what exists into something genuinely new.” In The Fabric of This World, Lee Hardy explains, “When we shape and administer his creation in service to others and pursue his righteousness in the context of human society we express something of his nature in our lives.” 

God chooses us to work with Him

Genesis 2:5 takes our understanding beyond the fact that we were created to work. It introduces the idea of Adam being a coworker with God. We read that “no shrub of the field had yet appeared on the earth and no plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no man to work the ground.” This teaches us that plant life needed the rain God would send and that it also needed human workers in order to flourish. God waters, but man must work with God in the process, cultivating the ground as His coworkers.

Sherman and Hendricks ask, “Who took care of the garden of Eden? One view would say, Obviously Adam did. But the other view would say, No, God did; He merely used Adam as an instrument to meet the garden’s needs. But there is no reason why we couldn’t say they both participated in this work.” They continue, “As humans, we act as junior partners in what is ultimately God’s work. Yet participation in that work makes it our work, too. We are colaborers with God in managing His creation.”

Sherman and Hendricks advise, “Perhaps you feel that I am implying that God ‘needs’ us to accomplish His work. Not at all. An omnipotent, sovereign Creator has no need. Rather, God chooses to have us participate in His plans.” 

As I mentioned before, when God made the earth and spoke it into being, He did two things. He created something from nothing, and He created order from chaos. So whenever we work, we imitate God’s creativity.

For example, when a woman student writes a research paper, she may have sixteen books in front of her. She has her computer up. Her brain is going eight million directions. She is bringing order to the chaos as she puts all her research in a logical sequence. She is not creating something from nothing like God did. She is creating something new from something else. We were made in His image to be workers and to do things as God does.

Let me share a few quotes from Gustav Wingren’s fascinating book Luther on Vocation. Martin Luther referred to the jobs, roles, and responsibilities that people held as offices or stations.

Regarding God’s work of sustaining the world, Luther preached, “He gives the wool, but not without our labor. If it is on the sheep, it makes no garment.” Luther explains, “God gives the wool, but it must be sheared, carded, spun, etc. In these vocations God’s creative work moves on, coming to its destination only with the neighbor who needs the clothing … God is active in this. There is a direct connection between God’s work in creation and his work in these offices.” This concept is so simple yet so profound.

Later Wingren reports that Luther wisely came to the following conclusion:

Through this work in man’s offices, God’s creative work goes forward, and that creative work is love, a profusion of good gifts. With persons as his “hands” or “coworkers,” God gives his gifts through the earthly vocations, toward man’s life on earth (food through farmers, fishermen and hunters; external peace through princes, judges, and orderly powers; knowledge and education through teachers and parents, etc.)

Closing thoughts

I trust that this snapshot from my book sheds a little light on some ideas that you may never have heard or considered before. I invite you to check out my book or articles on my blog to discover more of these biblical, practical, and personal concepts on the theology of work. I pray that these life-changing truths will inspire you to look at the way that God works through you in your own profession as His coworker.

About the author:

Russell E. Gehrlein (Master Sergeant, U.S. Army, Retired) is a Christian, husband of 43 years, father of three, grandfather of five, and author of the book, Immanuel Labor – God’s Presence in our Profession: A Biblical, Theological, and Practical Approach to the Doctrine of Work, published by WestBow Press in February 2018. He received a Master of Arts in biblical studies from Grand Rapids Theological Seminary in 2015. He is passionate about helping his brothers and sisters in Christ with ordinary jobs understand that their work matters to God and that they can experience His presence at work every day. He has written more than 320 articles on a variety of faith and work and other topics; many of them have been published or posted on Christian organization’s websites, including the Institute for Faith, Work & Economics, Coram Deo, Nashville Institute for Faith + Work, Made to Flourish, The Gospel Coalition, and Christian Grandfather Magazine.

Imagery in Scripture – God’s Ears

(Note: This is the final article in a four-part series. I invite you to read my introduction, where I shared what I discovered in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. Click here for the previous article I wrote on God’s eyes.)

The psalmist writes, “Does he who fashioned the ear not hear? Does he who formed the eye not see?” (Ps. 94:9).

This rhetorical question has one obvious answer. Yes, the God who created human ears does hear, although He does not have physical ears. He sees, as well, without having literal eyes. These are literary devices to reveal that God gets directly involved with His people. He is with us. His hands act on our behalf, His mouth speaks truth to us, His eyes see our needs, and His ears hear our prayers.

As we take one last look at a body part that God possesses in a figurative sense, may I remind you that our ears have limitations. We don’t hear high or low frequencies. Some of us have ringing in our ears or hearing loss which causes us to ask people to repeat themselves. We can’t sort through competing sounds and noises and we can’t hear the unspoken words from a person’s downcast heart.

On the other hand, it should be fairly obvious to all who know God personally through faith in Jesus Christ that God’s ears have no limitations. They are far superior to ours. He hears all that He needs to hear all of the time. He can hear words long before we speak them and words that we would never speak.

In this article, I will share my observations about God’s ears from Ezra and Nehemiah. I will discuss a few other Scriptures concerning God’s ears so that we can know Him better. Lastly, I will ask my readers to consider what they can do with their own ears in response to what they know about God’s ears.

God’s ears in Ezra

At first glance, I did not find any direct references to God’s ears. However, after a second look, I discovered that God’s people actively worshiped and prayed to their God who they believed was clearly able to hear.

As the Israelites rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem, there was an effort to follow the instructions for worship given by King David. (See 1 Chron. 6:31-32.) After the foundation was laid, there were priests with trumpets and Levites with cymbals who “took their places to praise the Lord” in song (Ezra 3:10-11). They sang, “He is good; his love to Israel endures forever.” Among the exiles who returned from captivity were 128 singers (Ezra 2:41). God’s people must have believed that God had the ability to hear the music that was played and sung for Him.

The Zondervan NIV Bible Commentary indicates that “trumpets were always blown by priests. . . They were most often used on joyous occasions such as here and at the dedication of the rebuilt walls of Jerusalem (Neh. 12:25).”

We see several references to prayer in this book as well. King Darius issued a degree where he pledged his financial support for the project. He knew that it was in his best interest, “so that they may offer sacrifices pleasing to the God of heaven and pray for the well-being of the king and his sons” (Ezra 6:10). Later, Ezra offers a long prayer of genuine confession of the sins of God’s people (Ezra 9:5-15).

God’s ears in Nehemiah

I mentioned in my last article in this series on God’s eyes that Nehemiah began his prayer with a petition that the Lord’s ears would be “attentive” and that His eyes would be “open to hear” his prayer on behalf of  God’s people (Neh. 1:6). Nehemiah believed God could see the disgraceful condition of the walls around Jerusalem and would hear his words as he poured out his heart. He echoes this plea at the end of the prayer: “O Lord, let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant and to the prayer of your servants who delight in revering your name” (Neh. 1:11).

After the wall is completed, we see the Israelites gathering to fast and pray. They listened to the reading of the Law for several hours, and then spent an equal amount of time confessing their sins. In a wonderful summary of how God created the heavens, made a covenant with Abram, and delivered His people from Egypt, they acknowledged that God saw their bondage and “heard their cry” (Neh. 9:9).

At the end of this long prayer, they recalled how the Israelites rebelled in the wilderness. They remembered that God handed them over to their enemies. In their oppression, they cried out to God. He “heard them” and rescued them. However, they took God for granted and disobeyed again. But God, in His mercy heard them when they cried out to God. They did this again and again (Neh. 9:26-28).

God’s ears throughout the Bible

Psalm 5:1-3 immediately comes to mind, in the form of a praise hymn. The psalmist wrote: “Give ear to my words, O Lord. Consider my meditation. Harken unto the voice of my cry, my King and my God. For unto thee will I pray. My voice shalt thou hear in the morning” (KJV). (Click here to watch and listen to a video of this song from one of the Maranatha Praise albums from way back when.)

My wife reminded me of a verse found in Isa. 65:24 that has a personal meaning to her. Yahweh declares, “Before they call I will answer; while they are still speaking I will hear.” This promise teaches us that even before we utter a word, God has already prepared an answer. What we learn from this passage is that God is always one step ahead of us. He knows what we need way before we have taken the time, found the courage, and put the right words together to lift up our need.

In the Gospels, I found an interesting verse. A blind man that Jesus had just healed said in John 9:31, “We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly person who does his will.” It was a common teaching at the time in the Jewish faith that God only hears and responds to the prayers of His faithful ones. The only prayer God would answer from an unbeliever would be one of repentance.

How should we respond to God’s ears?

Because God listened to the prayers of His people, they listened to His word. We see this in Neh. 8:3, when Ezra reads the Law on the first day of the month. “He read it aloud from daybreak till noon . . . And all the people listened attentively to the Book of the Law.” We see it again the very next day (Neh. 8:13) and also on the twenty-fourth day of the same month (Neh. 9:1-3). This attitude of humility was in contrast to what their forefathers had done, which was to refuse to listen (Neh. 9:17).

This same response is appropriate for us. Jesus said, “Whoever belongs to God hears what God says.” (John 8:47). God’s people listen to Him. In John 10:27. Jesus said, “My sheep hear my voice.” Jesus’s sheep are ones who trust the Shepherd and actively listen to His voice so that they do not go astray.

Moreover, the natural response by a believer to knowing that God actively listens to the prayers of His people is for us to pray. If we believe God is listening, how can we not lift up our voices? Just like our response to the words coming from God’s mouth through the Bible is to listen to Him speak, our right response to God’s ability and desire to hear us is for us to speak with Him.

As I referenced musical instruments and singing earlier, I could not help but recall that believers are called to praise and worship through song. Psalm 96:1 declares, “Sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord, all the earth.” Singing our praises to the Lord, which involves our heart, soul, mind, and strength, is a great way for us to express our love to God, which Jesus taught was the greatest commandment.

Final thoughts

For those who have joined me in this deeper study of some of the attributes of God, I applaud you for sticking with it as I have posted these articles since late January. I trust that these insights that I observed were helpful in your pursuit of drawing near to God the Father. This lifelong endeavor is what Jesus envisioned, as He paid the penalty for our sins on the cross so that we could be reconciled to God.

I encourage you to continue to pop in and out of both the Old and New Testaments to discover the treasures that you will find as the Holy Spirit teaches you about God the Father and God the Son on every page.

About the author:

Russell E. Gehrlein (Master Sergeant, U.S. Army, Retired) is a Christian, husband of 43 years, father of three, grandfather of five, and author of the book, Immanuel Labor – God’s Presence in our Profession: A Biblical, Theological, and Practical Approach to the Doctrine of Work, published by WestBow Press in February 2018. He received a Master of Arts in biblical studies from Grand Rapids Theological Seminary in 2015. He is passionate about helping his brothers and sisters in Christ with ordinary jobs understand that their work matters to God and that they can experience His presence at work every day. He has written more than 320 articles on a variety of faith and work and other topics; many of them have been published or posted on Christian organization’s websites, including the Institute for Faith, Work & Economics, Coram Deo, Nashville Institute for Faith + Work, Made to Flourish, The Gospel Coalition, and Christian Grandfather Magazine.