Do you treat others like you would want them to treat you? We think that if people were nicer to us, we could be nicer to them, don’t we? But that’s the Problem. Jesus didn’t say, “Treat people the same way they treat you.” He said, “Treat people like you would want them to treat you.”
We should know that one of the best compliments a person can give us is to listen to what we are saying. Think about your own experiences: Whenever a person really listened to you, it made you feel positive, didn’t it? But when someone did not want to listen to you, it made you feel very negative. A very good rule of thumb is this: “Listen to others as you would have them listen to you.”
Today, we are going to be talking about the Golden Rule. We all know it … Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. But there is an exception to that. Let me explain.
When my daughter was a teenager, I became a very protective father. I had three rules that her boyfriends has to read, every time they came over.
1- If you pull up and honk, you’d best be delivering pizza, because you are not taking my daughter out.
2- You do not touch my daughter in front of me. In fact, you do not even so much as glance at her in front of me. And after you go out, if your hands touch my daughter, I will have them removed.
3- Do not try to be my friend, as while you are dating my daughter, you are my enemy. The only thing I want to hear from you is what time you are bringing her home, and the only word I am looking for is “early.”
Now, sometimes I tried to be nice. Like the time a young man came to pick her up and I met him at the door. I shook his hand with a grip that could turn coal into diamonds. Noticing the pierced eyebrow, I asked him if he had that done because he was stupid, or just because he wanted to look stupid.
So we need to apply the Golden Rule to every situation except when your daughter is of dating age. Then it is optional if you are a father.
Getting past the humor, we do need to treat others as well as we would like for them to treat us. But to do it effectively, we must do something first. We must love our fellow man. Notice I said love, not like. You can love a person without wanting to become best friends or go out to dinner with them. You can love them enough to want them to go to heaven. You must love them enough to treat them with the same caliber of respect that you desire.
MATTHEW 5:43-44 tells us,
“You have heard it said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ I tell you, ‘Love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you.”
We are commanded to love everyone. That is how Jesus lived on this earth, and if we are Christians, we must strive to be like Christ. How will the world know that we are Christians?
They will not know that by reading a sign over our doors. They will only know that by the love we have in our hearts for other people.
Is your relationship with God a part of your relationship with men? Did you know that failure in one will cause failure in the other?”
Did you know that there are more important things in your life than you? It is true. We are a part of those things in our life, but we are not always the most important thing in our life.
For instance, I take part in spreading the word of God. But I am not more important than the word of God. Even though I might be doing something, I might not be the most important element in that something.
That being said, it is still nice to have somebody encourage you in what you are doing by giving you a sincere compliment. There is an old saying that goes: “A pat on the back is only a few vertebrae away from a kick in the pants, but the results are much better.”
1. WHAT HAS YOUR ATTITUDE BEEN LIKE LATELY?
Have you been able to show the Golden Rule in your attitude lately? Many people will say they can do that with ease, “if only” –
· · · they would do things the way I do
· · · they would see things like I do
· · · If only, if only, if only
Jesus did not say to do these things “if” they do something for you first. He commanded us to love people, even when they don’t do anything for us; or even when they ridicule us and persecute us.
Remember that the one area in our lives that is the most troublesome is how we deal with other people. Too many times, we find ourselves in negative and unhappy relationships with others and neither one wants to be flexible enough or be the first to give, even if it would save the relationship.
There is an old expression that says, “A smile is a crooked line that sets a lot of things straight.” If you start looking at everyone you meet as a person who is, or could be, a Christian – I promise that your relationships and your own happiness will change for the better.
There was a man once sitting by a tree near a creek, reading his Bible. Something caught his eye and he looked to see a scorpion caught between two roots of the tree.
The man reached over to help the scorpion loose, but each time he tried to grab it, the scorpion tried to sting him. A man who was standing nearby watching this said, “Don’t you know it is the scorpion’s nature to sting? Why don’t you just forget it and let it die there?”
The man smiled and looked up and replied, “Should it be necessary that I change my nature to accommodate someone else’s nature? The scorpion stings and I help, that is our natures.” When God’s love fills your heart, you cannot help but share it – with all things.
Jesus knew there are two ways of giving. One way is to give in hopes that you will get something out of it. That is like the man who bought his wife a ping-pong table for her birthday.
He knew she wanted it, but he expected to use it as much as she did. In effect, he didn’t just give to her; he gave to her with the expectation that he would have it, too. When we give with expectations of getting something back, we aren’t really giving in the first place.
The other way is to give with absolutely no expectation of getting anything back. That is what Jesus is talking about. That is the best way to show your love is to freely give, just because you want someone else to be fulfilled in some way. You sacrifice your own feelings for someone else’s feelings.
What you feel on the inside of your heart determines what you show on the outside of your attitude. It is necessary to remember that having a positive does not depend on your circumstances but on your attitude. Or as one person said, “A cloudy day is no match for a sunny disposition.”
PHILIPPIANS 2:5, says,
“Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.”
Unfortunately, in too many cases, our attitudes are all about demanding our rights while shunning our responsibilities. And our biggest responsibility is to be Christ-like in our hearts. And the best way we can show that is by being Christ-like to other people – ALL other people, even those who have done you wrong. Jesus was beaten, whipped, hung on a cross and killed, but He continued to love those who did it. A person who looks up to God does not look down on other people – no matter who they are.
Has your attitude towards others been positive lately?
2. HAVING A GODLY ATTITUDE
The ancient Israelites were slaves in Egypt. They were not free and could not live up to their potential as humans. They wanted to be free, and finally, when they turned to God as one, God listened and God led them out of captivity. What they did not realize was that God was with them all the time, but He rarely intervenes without somebody asking Him to.
Many in the church are slaves today, too! They are slaves to materialism; to their jobs; or even to relaxing in general! We allow things to control us! You might disagree with that, but watch how fast you jump when circumstances tell you to!
We need to do what the Israelites did. We need to cry out to the Lord in unison, as one voice, and ask for deliverance – both individually and nationally. There is just something about talking to God that lifts a person’s attitude up.
Another thing: Our attitudes would be much more positive if we could forget our troubles as quickly as we forget our blessings.
Jesus made a statement that explains His entire ministry was about. It is so basic that even a child can understand it, yet it is so profound that none of us can live up to it without the power of Jesus.
What is the statement that Jesus made? It is the one that most of us learned as children. It is in MATTHEW 7:12.
“So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sum’s up the law and the Prophets.”
Jesus’ whole ministry was one of seeking the blessings of God. But right in the middle of it, He seems to have thrown us a curve ball. Now, not only do we have to live in right standing with Him, but we also have to live in right standing with other people. He is basically telling us that if we treat others as good as we want to be treated, we will receive God’s blessings for doing that.
We are evaluated by God, and rewarded in direct proportion to the way we treat and feel about other people. That is scary, isn’t it? But to be successful as Christians, we must do this.
There is a story of a young boy who had been invited to attend a friend’s birthday party and was eagerly awaiting the day he could go. On that day, however, there was a near blizzard outside, and his father thought it was too dangerous for him to walk the short 3 blocks to his friends house, and it was much too dangerous to drive the boy.
The little boy reacted tearfully and begged his father to let him go. Finally, the father recanted and gave his permission. The boy bundled himself up started walking down the street. The wind and snow blew so hard against him that what should have only taken 10 minutes took nearly an hour.
Finally, the boy got to the house. As he rang the doorbell, he looked back to see the shadowy figure of his father disappearing into the snow. His father had followed every footstep to make sure the boy was safe.
It is all about sacrifice, isn’t it? When we are able to sacrifice what we want; what we need; what we think; so that we can freely give to someone else what they want or need, we have proven ourselves successful as a Christian.
If your attitude has been Christ-like, it has been positive. But there is another question we must ask ourselves.
3. HOW DO YOU TREAT OTHERS?
A brother and sister were in the attic looking through the letters their parents had written to each other many years ago. The boy asked, “Are you sure these belong to mom and dad?” The sister assured him that they did. He then told her, “That’s not the names they call each other now!”
Did you know that each time you talk negative to your spouse, you are actually robbing him or her of some of their self-worth? Yet, how many times do we come home very tired or get busy concentrating on something just to snap at the other?
In those situations, we would never think about saying that we didn’t love them, so why are we talking to them in such a way that says it to them?
The marriage counselor told the husband to start being more attentive to the wife and start treating her with more love. So, one day he comes home a little early with a dozen roses in one hand and a box of chocolates in the other.
His wife opens the door, sees him and burst into tears. In between sobs, she says, “Little Johnny threw up, your parents called and said they were coming over for dinner, and to top it all off, you come home drunk!”
This describes too many people today. Now, if we cannot treat our families better than that, how are we going to be able to treat other people better than that?
There are many people who have completely severed their relationships with family just because of something that happened years ago. In some cases, they remember something happened, but have no idea what happened. And there they sit, in pride, thinking about how much they have been hurt and refusing to reach out to the person in the family who hurt them.
Billy Graham used to have a daily column in a newspaper. One day, he got a letter from a man who said his dad was dying and wanted to see the grown son one more time. But the son wrote that his dad had left him when he was a kid, and wanted to know why he should go see the father now.
Billy Graham wrote back and told the son to put himself in the shoes of his father. He said, “If you messed up your relationship with your family, wouldn’t you pray for one more chance to make things right before you died? Wouldn’t you want one last chance to tell them you were sorry? Wouldn’t you want one more chance to be some kind of a blessing to them? That is what your father is trying to do now.”
He went on to say, “It isn’t about your dad’s need of forgiveness, but your willingness to extend your forgiveness. It isn’t about how somebody else has treated you, but how you are now treating them.
In PHILIPPIANS 2:4-5, we are told how our attitudes are supposed to be.
‘Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interest of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.’
But we cannot have the same interests that Jesus has unless we first have Jesus. He is not just somebody who lived a long time ago. We can have a personal relationship with Jesus. We can laugh with Jesus and we can cry with Jesus. We can go to Him in our time of need and He will help us.
You reap what you sow. What have you been sowing for the Lord lately?
Little Chad was in 2nd grade. He was a little slower than the other children and that made them shun Chad.
A couple of weeks before Valentines’ Day, Chad came home and told his mother that he wanted to make cards for everyone in his class. She knew how they treated her son, but she helped him make 35 cards.
On Valentine’s Day, she waited by the curb for the school bus to bring him home. When it got there, she saw all the kids laughing and getting off the bus, and then she saw Chad walking by himself near the back of the bus.
When he got off the bus, he was very happy, and told his mother that he didn’t forget a single classmate, that he remembered them all. They still shunned Chad, but he remembered each one of them with a card.
We have shunned Jesus Christ from the very beginning, too, but He has remembered each one of us in His love. And He wants us to show that love to other people, too, just like Chad did – for the sake of loving, not for the purpose of receiving anything back.
Obedience is not always easy. Chad’s classmates were not treating him very well, but he continued to treat them the way he wanted to be treated, not the way he was being treated. That little boy was living the Golden Rule. How many of us can say the same thing?
If this lost and hurting world is going to come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, it will not be from some epiphany of sorts. It will be from people like you and me showing the love of Christ to others from our hearts.
Do you remember the man I told you about who tried to free that scorpion so it could live? Jesus came to earth in hopes of freeing us so that we might also live.
Here is an old Bible and a new Bible. What is the difference in them? One is newer, one has all the pages, one hasn’t been marked in very much.
Do you think God loves this old Bible? Do you think He loves this new Bible? Why? Because they say the same thing – His words, and He wants us to use them to help other people come to Him, doesn’t He?
Those Bibles are us. Some are younger and some are older. Some are taller and some are shorter. What I am getting at is that our differences make no difference in the eyes of God. And when He looks down upon mankind, He expects us to look at those around us and see us looking past our differences. God wants us to look at each person we meet as a person who might work in His kingdom.
We have no problem loving our friends, but Jesus tells us to love our enemies, too. We can only do that if our attitude is Godly-positive and not worldly-negative.
We need to realize that He is the Giver and we need to receive what He has given. He can give all day long, but unless we make a choice to accept it, His gift does us no good whatsoever.
INVITATION
