Love One Another

If only each of us could do that one thing.

We got booted out of paradise

for doing the one and only thing forbidden,

and now we get back in

by doing the one thing He said we must do:

love one another as I have loved you. (John 13:34)

Jesus understood that only love like His

could ever save us from ourselves.

Our Father tried to get it through our heads

that vengeance and grudges would only hold us down,

that we have to love our neighbors as ourselves:

God is our Lord. (Leviticus 19:18)

But God knew from before time

that we’d have to have a demonstration

of love before we could actually

put love into practice.

Jesus rightly called His commandment new.

Without Him to follow,

we cannot love one another

or even ourselves.

Without Him to follow,

we’re just following the crowd.

This day, and all my todays,

I want to choose this one thing.

Amen and amen.