Contemplative Bible Reading

Matthew 7:12 (New Living Translation)

12 “Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.

This is “The Golden Rule.” The good old King James Version uses the phrase, “Do unto others…”

This is a Sunday School verse we teach to kids. Again, it is a shame that we learn this as children. Once we become adults, we tend to shrug off those things learned as children. Childish lessons taught to children or something like that.

Let’s try to read this anew as adults. This lesson is, “the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.” This is the essence. Per an online dictionary, the noun essence means, the intrinsic nature or indispensable quality of something, especially something abstract, that determines its character.

We cannot dispense or toss away this lesson from the law and the prophets. It is a lesson for adults, not just for children.

I would like others to know who I am and treat me respectfully. Other persons would express their likes using different words.

In America today, the news people show us how people hate other people and scream at them and spit on one another. Is that how people want others to treat them? I doubt it, yet they treat others that way. Oh, there is righteous indignation and talking about how Jesus overturned the tables of the money changers in the temple. Did God send me to do that? Did God send me to practice the essence of the law and the prophets?

In America today, we have politics and all those discussions become heated quickly. Or do they? Yes, they do, but do they have to be that way? Is that how I would like others to treat me? Is that how others would like me to treat them? Police arrest law breakers and take them to jail. Protestors protest against unjust laws. We can all do these things while still having the Golden Rule in our hearts. Please God, help me in my unbelief.