We all know the passage in the Bible in which Jesus tells the Pharisees the greatest commandment…
“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:37-40 NIV)
I have personally read this passage about 9.36 million times, and each time I have given most of my attention to the first part. You know, the loving God part. I usually just skim the second part, primarily because I figure that following this command will be easy if I just nail the first half of the passage. This has always been my interpretation, if I am 100% honest.
However, I have learned recently that obeying the second greatest commandment is perhaps the most difficult task in the world, and I have been petitioning God to reconsider it. My thinking is this: I am pretty sure Jesus would revoke this commandment if he was forced to live next door to my neighbor.*
His name is Chuck. And I think God planted him next door to me to prove, among other things, that my Bible interpretation skills are pathetic.
The day Chuck moved next door is one which will live in infamy for the Schwab family. On that evening several years ago we were eating dinner, minding our own business. Then, out of nowhere, we heard a wretched, painfully annoying sound coming from the street in front of our house. It sounded as if a chainsaw, a thousand angry bees, and a weed wacker were all thrown into a blender and mixed on the “frappe’” setting. The sound startled me, and I almost choked on my dinner. Annoyed and confused, I ran into the street to find the source of the commotion and put a stop to it.
And there he was, my new neighbor. In all his splendor and glory. He wore Costco board shorts, a wife-beater, and had a gigantic Coors Light (in a koozie) at his feet. In his hands was a large remote control, with which he was driving an RC Car. He controlled his little vehicle with exaggerated twists of his arms, bending his knees for emphasis, like a DJ for a nu-metal band.
“Howdy neighbor!” He shouted to me without taking his eyes off the zipping, mini 4 x 4. I waved, trying to be polite, but unable to hide my grimace. Here, before me, was a forty-year-old man driving an RC car. This could not be a good omen.
And sure enough, a series of events over the next several weeks confirmed my suspicion that Chuck was, without a doubt, the neighbor from the deepest layer of the fiery pit.
First, there was the 4th of July, his first holiday in the community. To celebrate/assert his dominion, he proceeded to cone-off the whole cul-de-sac (as in, keep the residents from parking in the spots reserved for them near their own homes) so he could clear space to light illegal fireworks.** He also decided the optimal spot to light said fireworks was six feet outside my back door. And each time one of his mortar blasts went off, my dog shot explosive diarrhea on the carpet, then went into convulsions. He did this while driving his RC car, of course.*** When my wife and I asked him (politely) to move his operation, he moved it all of ten feet. At this point we just assumed he wasn’t very good at math, avoided any further drama, and decided to take our dog to a relative’s house for the evening.
A few days later, I found a threatening letter on my car (which was legally parked in a spot near our house), stating I would be towed if I did not move it into my garage immediately. After some detective work, we (my wife and I) discovered that our HOA did not, in fact, write this letter, but rather Chuck did, simply because he wanted my parking spot. I do not lie. We confronted him, but he flatly denied the whole thing, citing a conspiracy by the housing board to frame him. After doing further research, I learned that I was not the first victim of Chuck’s “HOA letter” in the neighborhood. In fact, he had targeted several other cars in the community. At this point, alarm bells were ringing.
A few weeks later we noticed new landscaping in Chuck’s front lawn, highlighted by a couple hundred large stones (which looked expensive). These stones had no business being in his lawn, and frankly, they looked ridiculous. While pulling out of our garage one afternoon he was standing in the street (Doing what? You guessed it! Driving his RC car!). Before we could escape his attention, he began bragging–with a straight face–that he stole them from the lawn of a millionaire who lives in one of the affluent communities nearby. We smiled awkwardly, rolled up the car window, and pulled away. Silence ensued between my wife and I as we drove. And as we did, we both though the same thing: No way this guy is for real.
Seriously, I had never met–let alone lived next door to–anyone like him. I thought people like him only existed on Jerry Springer. I thought he was a fictional being, like Dungeons and Dragons card traders or Miley Cyrus fans.
About a month later he brought a new dog home from the pound. It was a vicious, untamed mongrel, like something out of Ghostbusters. Chuck had to muzzle it to keep it from attacking other dogs. Of course, one day while walking our own dog, Chuck’s dog jumped out of the bushes and ATTACKED ours. As in, it bit our dog in the FACE. A canine death battle would have ensued had my wife not yanked with all her might and hoisted our own animal into her arms. Then, after the fact, Chuck came around the corner to corral his monster. He was barely able to restrain it. The thing snarled and chomped and sprayed beast drool into the atmosphere as he dragged it away. He did not apologize. He said, “Whoops, Chopper. You be nice.” I was too shocked to even respond to the guy. After the fact , while cleaning our dog’s wounds, I fantasized about smashing his RC car with a sledge hammer.
Then, finally, there was the incident which forever solidified Chuck’s label in our mind’s as not only someone who is difficult to live next door to, but as someone who should be avoided at all costs: The long and short of the story is as follows: 1. Chuck gets drunk. 2. Chuck removes his cable box from the TV in his garage and hides it in his bedroom closet. 3. While still drunk, Chuck forgets he moved his cable box, calls the police, and reports his cable box stolen. 4. Still, still drunk, he knocks on each door on our street, asking if anyone had spotted the mysterious cable box thief. He tells us to be on the lookout and to shut our garage door. 5. Chuck then retires to his house for the evening. Threats and curses can be heard emanating from his bedroom, directed towards the phantom burglar, for the thirty minutes prior to his passing out. 6. The next day, he finds his cable box right where he left it and shows no signs of embarrassment as he knocks on our door and tells us we can sleep easier, because the thief has been identified.
To say Chuck is an awful neighbor would be the understatement of the year, if not decade. And his mere presence in my proximity has highlighted something about the second commandment to me that I had previously not considered:
It is freaking tough to love your neighbor when he has no consideration for your feelings, needs, or human rights. In fact, keeping the second greatest commandment is next to impossible. Even if the command read, “Do not perform a rear naked choke on your neighbor” I would have a tough time obeying, at least when it comes to Chuck.
Which leads me to the question, Why did Jesus give us a command that is so difficult to keep?
I have thought and prayed long and hard about this one. I have come at it from every angle and these are my conclusions:
Jesus knew that each one of us would be wronged by other people, and plenty of times throughout our lifetimes. He also knew that our natural, gut reaction as fallen humans would be to seek retribution, justice, or retaliation when we are wronged by another. We want to react, we want to do something when people infringe upon us.
He created us to be individuals of action. It’s in our programming, our DNA, to do something about it.
For example, it would be really, really satisfying to shoot a cannon ball through Chuck’s living room window at 3 AM on a Tuesday. It takes a lot of energy to restrain myself from doing this, mostly because it is the most awesome idea ever.
But notice the commandment doesn’t say “Restrain yourself when your neighbor wrongs you.” That is not what God asks us to do. He tells us to love our neighbor, period, as we would love ourselves, in all circumstances.
I believe he commands this because, above all else, love is an action. Again, since we are created to act and react, to be creatures of motion and response, he tells us what to do about it. We were not created to sit passively. And this is the reason why doing nothing when we are infringed upon is actually the hardest thing in the world.
That’s not all. By telling us act in love, he is actually telling us to do the very thing that is the opposite of what is natural, expected, and deserved. He is asking us to be a source of confusion to those around us. And in so doing, he is drawing attention to Himself.
I think that is pretty cool.
By actively seeking to love, even when the person does not deserve it, we are engaging in a momentum-shifting, nature-altering event. We are killing our own sinful wills, and allowing God’s spirit to take control of our arms, legs, feet, face, and tongues. We are, in essence, transacting an event that makes no logical sense, which can only be attributed and explained as supernatural.
Love given when it is not deserved is baffling. Dumbfounding, confusing. And I like the idea of baffling someone in the name of something supernatural.
For many months, I contemplated confronting Chuck, knowing that if I did it would only evoke defensiveness, and most likely more shenanigans towards my family on his part. So then I took to avoidance. Whenever I saw him, I just looked at the ground. But it was only recently that I began treating him like a normal neighbor…saying hello, being kind, using the attitude of love as my guide, even when I didn’t “feel” like it.
Every time I say “hello” to him I can see the confusion in his eyes. Though he baffled me with his antics, I think I baffle him even more when I respond with kindness.
And I think that’s they way Jesus wants it.
*Yes, I know God doesn’t reconsider commands. And I also know that He already is fully aware of my neighbor. While not theologically accurate, these statements are meant for comedic effect. You know, like LOL, haha, ROTFL?
**Sadly, in California the only fireworks that are legal are sparklers, snakes, firecrackers, and cones. This is reason #147 why California is overrated.
***Of course. Obviously. Duh.
April 18, 2011 · Other · 16 Comments
