Is it not about time ladies and gentlemen, for us to give a more thorough examination into why the greatest of all commandments has to be love? If military forces have to give way, are you still having a second thought? If kingdoms and empires are now history, what do you think your end will be if you don’t consider love? According to the Master, the world is made to function by love. Love is the gas that our vehicles run on. Love is the oiling in our engines. It is the motor of our vehicles. When we live by love, things work out well and fine. When we live and act against the principles of love, we hurt and suffer. Life becomes painful. Life becomes unbearable. Life turns into a torturous experience. Because friends, we were made to love.

Ladies and gentlemen, let me now take you to the crux of our message today. Is love a possibility for an ordinary mortal like you and me? Can Christ’s commandment be truly obeyed? Can we individually love our neighbors as ourselves? Is it still practical in our cyber world today to love our neighbour? Or is it old fashioned?

The question most people often ask is, we all see the importance of love but how do I practically do that. How do I practically love people? What if I don’t know them? How do I love people I don’t know? How do I practically love them if I am not sure how I will be recompensed? What are the practical things I could do to make someone feel that I love them? To these questions and more, I wish to give an exposition in this article.

HOW DO I LOVE PEOPLE?

JUST LIKE ME, THIS PERSON IS IN NEED OF HAPPINESS

The principle of love expects us to first of all put ourselves in the place of another. We must first of all assume that people everywhere have some fundamental basic needs and desires that are universal. One of these universal needs is to acknowledge for ourselves that everyone, no matter their race, nation, age or sex, is just like us. Every man or woman everywhere has feelings and if they have feelings, they feel what I feel. Everybody everywhere has emotions. They experience what I experience. Meaning I can understand my fellow man, because I can feel what he feels.

“...love people when they least expect it and least deserve it. That is the kind of love Jesus shows to us.” ― Mark Batterson

One of the fundamental needs and desires in the heart of all my fellow men is the desire and the need to be happy. It is natural that men desire and crave happiness even when they don’t realize it. People are always looking for happiness.

Dear friends, when you next see somebody, put yourself in their place and assume in your mind, that the person you are seeing, needs happiness and wants happiness, just like you. We all appreciate it when somebody comes to us and makes us really happy. On the one hand, we are all excited about the fact that we are giving joy and happiness, but on the other hand, someone else around you is waiting that you or others would also give them happiness.

“Love is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own. - Robert A. Heinlein

Selfishness however makes men only want to think about themselves. They refuse to remember that just like they desire happiness, so does every one of their neighbours. Just like me, this person I am standing with right now, wants to be happy. Onсe that understanding is reached, you must add to your understanding action. If it is true that this person in front of me wants to be happy just like me, then I must ask myself the question, how can I make his dream and aspiration for happiness come true?

So each time you meet people, don’t just recognise that they want to be happy like you, but more importantly ask what you can do to facilitate the joy and happiness of these people. If you don’t have the money to facilitate what these people need, you still have something to add to their joy.

“The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved; loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves.” — Victor Hugo

But the key factor here is to recognise the fact that you are focusing not on yourself but on meeting the needs of the other. Your focus is the happiness that the other man is craving for. Do something about it. Contribute, maybe through your smile, touch or embrace. Contribute something, just to make sure the man gets some happiness, just like you desire to have.

The paradox of life is that what you do to others, God promises to do to you, so your act of kindness is never lost. It becomes a seed that comes back to you in the form of a harvest.

“And remember, as it was written, to love another person is to see the face of God.” — Les Miserables

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