Do You Really Know How to Live By the Golden Rule?

The Golden Rule may be the last frontier for the use of scripture in the public school classroom. It’s easy to see why. Whenever human beings have to occupy the same space, conflict is inevitable because we’re innately selfish. The Golden Rule is golden because it challenges us to rise above our instinct to favor ourselves, to serve ourselves, and to expect others to see the world from our perspective.

I wonder how many people realize that it comes straight out of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount?

"So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 7:12)

Jesus’s Upside-Down Kingdom

The Golden Rule lands easily on our ears today because it’s so often repeated, but when Jesus slipped this teaching into his sermon, it must have landed with some dissonance to his Jewish audience. Their sacred writings, the Talmud, phrases the command with a different twist:

"What is hateful to you, do not do unto your neighbor.”

Furthermore, Confucius (who lived into the 5th century BC) was recorded to have said, “Do not to others what you would not wish done to you.”

Do you see the difference? Jesus took a commandment to do no harm and pushed his listeners to a higher and better righteousness: not only do no harm—do good!
Think about the good thing you’d like to have done to you and then go ahead!
Do it! Do it for someone else!

If this sounds familiar, flip the pages of your Bible back to Matthew 5. The Golden Rule as Jesus has phrased it is one more example of Jesus’ rejection of bare-minimum obedience. Jesus has called us to a deeper obedience whose focus is character and motive—not simply actions.

Golden Actions with Golden Motives

In the Kingdom of God where right actions for right reasons are the goal, where we consider others as better than ourselves, we expand our sight beyond what we wish others would do for us. We go first in doing good.

What would living by the Golden Rule look like at work? Do you wish someone else would clean up in the breakroom, bring muffins on Mondays, offer to pick up the slack, volunteer for the unpopular shift, say a kind word about your work, or recognize your over-the-top effort? Whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them.

What would Golden Rule living look like in your home? Do you wish your family would be more appreciative, take the initiative in work or play, demonstrate a more positive attitude, or be more transparent about feelings? Whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them.

What would it look like with your friends? Do you wish they would call to check on you, bring you coffee, initiate meet-ups, answer texts more promptly, or offer practical help to you when you’re overwhelmed? Whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them.

Praying Together

Lord, we ask for grace to kick ourselves out of the center of the universe. You have said that the way we give to and prefer others sums up the Law and the Prophets, and we want to faithfully fulfill your call to righteousness. By your example and by your indwelling Spirit, show us how to consider others first. Show us how to move beyond a do-no-harm mentality as we demonstrate your love to a world where everyone is chasing after the wrong kind of gold. Amen

Let’s continue this conversation:

• Picture the person toward whom it would be most difficult for you to practice the Golden Rule. Analyze your feelings. What makes that person particularly difficult, and how could God change your thinking?
• Based on our reading of the Sermon on the Mount to this point, how would your definition of righteousness be impacted by Jesus’s rejection of bare minimum obedience?
• What would be the biggest change in your closest relationships if your treatment of others was mindful of the Golden Rule?