Thoughts from Romans 13 (part 10)

Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed. Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

Romans 13:7-10

Love. Let’s say it like this – our final objective is love. If you could take the whole law, scrunch it up and put it into one word, that word would be – LOVE.

Now, watch carefully. Our definition of love does not replace God’s law. Let me say it again – our definition of love does not replace God’s law.

For example, sometimes you’ll hear people say something like this: I left my spouse because I simply didn’t love them anymore. But now I’ve found someone new, and we’re so happy.

“Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery…'”

Well, what’s “adultery”? It’s breaking that marriage covenant that you have with your husband or wife, so that you can be with someone else. “…and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'” In other words, that last part is a summary of the law, it’s not a substitution for the law.

God’s Word explains what love is. Adultery is not love.

How should I love? Here’s how: read the Bible and do what it says. Because love is a summary of the law.

And so if someone says, “In the Old Testament we had laws. In the New Testament, we are simply told to love.” – they’re missing the point completely. Or if someone says, “The Old Testament is Law, the New Testament is Love”, they’re wrong.

Why? Paul explains it here. All of the commandments “are summed up in this word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself”.

Romans 13 makes it abundantly clear: Love is a summary of the Law (Romans 13:9), Love fulfills the Law (Romans 13:8), but Love does not replace the Law. In fact, Love is Law (Matthew 22:36-40).

To love is to obey God’s Word. We will never fully pay the debt of love. In fact, we are condemned by God’s Word, because we don’t love as God loves. We don’t perfectly love God, and perfectly love our neighbour. Yes, we owe love. But thank God, love is not the gospel! It’s law.

Jesus loved perfectly. He obeyed His Father without hesitation or exception. And then He gave His perfect life on the cross, taking upon Himself the punishment that we deserved. That’s the gospel.

Place your faith in Christ, as your Lord and Saviour. Your sins, including your failure to love, will be forgiven. His perfect life, His perfect record, will be credited to your account.

And now we are free to love God, and to love others. Not because we are afraid of condemnation, but in gratitude to God as our loving Father.

So in summary, as believers we are free from the punishment that we deserve for our lack of love. Now we can love freely in Christ. And the whole Bible teaches us how to love.

The Bible defines love. Yes, our world wants to come in with its own definitions. But we have God’s Word as our perfect guide.

How does all this relate to Paul’s discussion of governing authorities? We’ll talk about that next time.