Never Be Separated From Love
by Dan Jones, M.D.
Matthew 5:43-48
You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
We close this series of devotionals on walking the walk by addressing the question of why Jesus chose to deal with the leper, the soldier, and the woman as recorded in Matthew 8. We close with the same core verses from his great sermon that we used in the opening devotional. The “why” that motivated Jesus was the love he talked about in his sermon. In Matthew 8, the gospel writer simply shows us Jesus walking the walk of love he talked of in chapters 5-7.
As Christian health professionals, it is critically important that we not forget why we do what we do. For our own spiritual health and for the sake of our patients, we must never allow ourselves to be separated from love as a motivation for what we do. A career as a health professional driven by greed, family expectations, obligation, or a sense of responsibility is a hollow existence. But a career as a health professional motivated day after day by love is a rich and rewarding life.
In I Corinthians 13, we are reminded by Paul that a life not motivated by love is a wasted life. He notes that even if we give all we possess to the poor, if we don’t have love, we have gained nothing.
More than in any other career, those of us in the health professions are capable of giving ourselves to a life of service and missing the opportunity for great rewards in this life and the life beyond, because we slip away from love as the motivating factor for what we do. In my early days of practice, I watched my more mature professional colleagues closely for clues to a successful practice. What I observed was that those who seemed to have God’s love in their heart central to what they did in their professional lives appeared to be the most fulfilled in their profession. It had nothing to do with how much money they made, how prestigious their specialty, how busy they were, how much vacation time was taken, or any other “human” measure. Their fulfillment and satisfaction seemed to come from a spirit of love for all people.
Lord, fill me with your love. Allow me to walk the walk of love every day in my professional life.
Dan Jones, M.D., MACP, FAHA, a board-certified Internist, a former medical missionary to Korea, professor of medicine at the University of Mississippi School of Medicine, Dean of the School of Medicine, and Chancellor of the University of Mississippi until 2015. Dr. Dan Jones is a member of CMDA.
Dr. Jones welcomes any comments or questions about what he has written and can be reached at - djones@umc.edu
Rounds with the Master, Spiritual Pearls from the Great Physician Devotionals are released every Monday and Thursday.
Photo by Clem Onojeghuo on Unsplash
