People are more important than things. Life is more than how I feel at the moment. Faith in love is required to live the truth in both of those statements. The statements are a small mouthful that can rattle around in the mind for hours. The first statement encompasses the worshipping of things, the law of giving, the laws prohibiting murder, stealing and coveting your neighbor’s positions. The second statement adds the worshipping ones self, sexual misconduct and lying. The third statement changes the law of giving to the love of giving and the laws prohibiting into love preventing.
People are more important than things, sounds like a statement of denying oneself possessions. In reality it is the truth that places possessions in proper order. I will not covet what is my neighbor’s because my neighbor is more important than the things I would covet. In like manner I would not steal because the owner is more important than the thing I would take. The acquiring of possessions, if the acquisitions are done honestly, is not wrong. Allowing possessions to take the place of the true treasure of love is a sad mistake. Possessions should have a use that serves and not one of being served.
Life is more than how I feel at the moment, takes me one step back when dealing with the moment. When do we worship, steal, kill, lust and lie? They are done in the moment. The things we do in the moment are the things we must deal with in the moments that follow. We may not always know the right thing to do in a moment but we may know that something we are doing is wrong and stop. Just because we feel like doing wrong is not a reason to follow through and perform the act. Using the truth “People are more important than things” help us recognize the things that are wrong. With faith in love, love will guide us to what is right and way we react in the moment.
Murder is covered by both of the first two truths. First, I would not murder to possess things owned by another. Second, my emotions would not be more important than another’s life. Together they would keep the desire for possessions from overtaking ones emotions. But isn’t love an emotion that leads to crimes of passion? No. Selfishness, played on by lust and greed, is the emotion that leads to crimes of passion. Selfishness is an emotion based on the idea that the wants and needs of I is more important than another’s life and possessions.
How do those truths work with individualism? They are the only way individualism can work. Selfishness keeps one from recognizing the individualism of others and truly experiencing their own. You are more than your possessions and the way you feel at the moment. Another is more than their possessions and the way they feel at the moment. Selfishness pulls one into a quest for possessions and leads one to judge others by their possessions. Selfishness is often joined by envy or jealously and lusts for another possessions. Love is not selfish, envious and does not lust after a neighbors possessions. How can one truly be an individual if their passion is focussed on the possessions of others?
Love is how one forgives another; faith in love is how one believes another forgives us. Love is how one is dedicated to another and to relationships; faith in love is how one believes that another is dedicated to the relationship. Love is what makes us keep trying when things seem impossible; faith in love is what gives us hope. God’s love is what brought Jesus Christ to live among us and to die for us; faith in God’s love is how we believe. God’s love is what raised Jesus from death; faith in God’s love is how we know the Jesus is alive. We were created to be loved and to love. Love is at the core of our existence. The need for love is why we are the lost children. Love is how we come home to the Father, because He first loves us. Have faith in love and be faithful in love.