“Do not hate a fellow Israelite in your heart. Rebuke your neighbour frankly so you will not share in their guilt.”
Leviticus 19:17 (NIV)
Our Lord quoted verse 18 as the second greatest commandment - second only to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind and soul.
We could see this statement in verse 18 as a summary to the all of the instructions contained in verse 9 through 18, for they are all about how we are to live a life of love in the midst of our neighbours.
If we followed this great list of don’ts and do’s, we would become the neighbours God wants us to be, however, I want to draw special attention to one specific command- our duty to rebuke our neighbour. Most would in today’s age of not wanting to cause offence, find rebuking a neighbour to be a demonstration of hatred for our neighbour, but the Bible teaches the opposite. It is an act of love to rebuke our neighbour, and not in a subtle way but in a direct “frank” way of speaking. There is a warning also that if we don’t rebuke our neighbour we share in our neighbour’s guilt.
We should hesitate to take this verse as meaning that we should go into the world and rebuke every sinner we meet.
My wife had a stranger rebuke her for daring to wear pants in Walmart the other day instead of a dress- Wanda is more gracious than me but at the same time thought really,...?
It seems to me taht if we use Paul’s instruction in 1 Corinthians 5:12 to judge those inside the church as a qualifier to this instruction in Leviticus 19:17, we will end up taking our responsibility to rebuke our brothers and sisters in our church as seriously, as the Lord taught us to in Matthew 7 and 18.
We are our brother’s keeper.
We are our sister’s keeper.
Oh Heavenly Father - forgive me for looking away, from what You have shown me. Please give me the courage and the love and the wisdom to rebuke my brother and sister.
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