23 - A New Life Series

Romans 12:9-13

9 Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. 10 Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honour giving preference to one another; 11 Not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord 12 Rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer; 13 Distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality.

After speaking about spiritual gifts Paul now moves into a deeper area of our lives – it’s the way we relate with one another. He begins by talking about the way we love one another, and reminds us that it needs to be genuine, or without hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is pretending to be someone we’re not. If we are loving, we need to demonstrate that love, if we are not loving, we should not pretend we are. Love can be feigned, and so Paul says it needs to be without hypocrisy. It’s easy to pretend to love someone when we’re before them, and then talk behind them – that isn’t love – that’s hypocrisy. Also, merely saying we love someone but doing nothing to help them in their time of need is hypocrisy.

He then tells his readers to hate evil. We are not called to hate those who do evil, but to rather hate evil itself. It’s easy for us to reject people, whose behaviour we dislike or consider evil, but that’s not what we are called to do – we are called to love people and hate sin. As someone said, “We need to hate the sin, but not the ‘sinner.’”

Not only are we to hate evil, but we are to simultaneously cling to what is good, because if we hate evil and don’t love good, we will end up having nothing to live for, and might end up loving evil all over again. Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 12:43-45: “When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes, he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first...” What Jesus was saying is that when we get rid of evil in our lives, we need to replace that evil with good, else we will get back into a lot more evil than we were in earlier.

After telling the believers to love one another without hypocrisy he then tells them to demonstrate brotherly love as well, and to show it by being kind and affectionate to one another. Showing kindness and affection is one of the greatest demonstrations of love. Claiming to possess it without expressing is of hardly any use to anyone. Here, Paul refers to another kind of love – brotherly love. Just as siblings love one another in a family, we need to love one another, since we’re now family members, with God, our heavenly Father having adopted us into His family.

He then suggests something that is hardly seen these days - honour for one another. Rather than expecting others to honour us, we are to honour others. Also, instead of expecting to be preferred by others, we are to give preference to others. Expecting to be preferred by other people is selfishness, but giving preference to other people is love.

Paul then goes on to talk about the way we work. He encourages believers to be diligent in their work, which means, not being lazy, but rather being hardworking. It’s the ones who work hard who accomplish things, and make a difference in both their lives, and in the lives of those around them. The lazy ones only get to watch and envy them. Regarding the attitude to work, he says that they should be fervent in spirit, not work half-heartedly and carelessly, or just to please people. He encourages them to view all that they do as being done unto the Lord, not as unto men. It is the Lord who has saved us, and therefore, since we belong to the Lord, everything we do in life should be done as unto Him, and not as unto men. Once we see all that we do as being done as unto the Lord, it gives our work a totally new perspective, and we do it in a way that brings joy to us, and pleases the Lord as well. We also do things a lot better and joyfully, not grudgingly.

He further encourages us to rejoice at the hope (assurance) they have. This assurance is concerning the eternal life we will enjoy with God in heaven. That’s what should keep a believer going – not the expectation of rewards here on earth, but the assurance of our reward in heaven, namely eternal life. Though we live with this hope, we are bound to have troubles in life and he encourages us to be patient through all the tribulation. It’s easy to give up when we have troubles in life, but we need to learn to be patient, so that we overcome the troubles we face. It’s only through troubles that we learn valuable lessons in life.