What If the Golden Rule Isn’t Enough?

We all know the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Jesus expressed the principle this way: “Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you” (Matthew 7:12 NLT).

But on the night before His crucifixion, He raised the standard for how we treat others: “Just as I have loved you, you should love each other” (John 13:34 NLT).

No longer were His followers to ask only, “How would I want to be treated?” Now they were to ask, “How has Jesus treated me?”

Just before Jesus gave the new command, He had washed His disciples’ feet, including the feet of Judas, who would betray Him within hours, and Peter, who would deny Him three times before morning (John 13:1–17). Foot washing was among the lowest tasks in a first-century household—grungy, humbling work normally left to the lowliest servants.

The New Standard

This kind of love that Jesus had shown them—and now expected of them—was self-giving, sacrificial love. It is love that honors others above self, putting aside self-interest to seek the good of another.

Paul wrote about this kind of love:

If you’ve gotten anything at all out of following Christ, if his love has made any difference in your life, if being in a community of the Spirit means anything to you, if you have a heart, if you care—then do me a favor: Agree with each other, love each other, be deep-spirited friends. Don’t push your way to the front; don’t sweet-talk your way to the top. Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don’t be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand. (Philippians 2:1–4 MSG)

We can’t practice this kind of love alone. We can’t consider others more important than ourselves if we don’t live in relationship with them. We learn patience because someone tests it. We learn forgiveness because someone wounds us. We learn humility because someone else is chosen, noticed, or celebrated. We learn service because another becomes tired, burdened, or lost.

The Love That Identifies Us

It is this love, Jesus said, that will identify us as His followers: “Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples” (John 13:35 NLT). He did not say the world would recognize us primarily by our biblical knowledge, our religious language, our worship style, or the number of miles we had traveled for Him. The clearest evidence that we belong to Him is the way we love the people around us.

We are becoming a people whose life together shows the world who God is and what His perfect love looks like in the lives of those who follow Jesus.

Here’s what you’ll receive in this toolkit:

What the Wait Reveals

Jesus’ Warnings About Waiting

Have you ever thought about how much we hate to wait?

So much so that we’ve built an entire culture around escaping it. Grocery pickup so you never stand in a checkout line. Restaurant apps that text you when your table is ready. Phone systems that offer a callback so you don’t sit on hold. Even your own phone will notify you when a human finally answers so you don’t have to endure a single minute of hold music.

We have gotten good at avoiding the wait.

But there is a wait that is not meant to be avoided, minimized, or escaped.

Jesus talks about it in Matthew 25. In three back-to-back parables, He explains how we are to wait for His return, and He lays out the consequences of waiting poorly. Each story ends with someone being shocked at their exclusion.

The bridesmaids didn’t expect to miss the wedding (Matthew 25:1–13). The fearful servant didn’t know he’d lose what he didn’t invest (Matthew 25:14–30). The goats didn’t realize they would be separated from the sheep (Matthew 25:31–46). Three different stories, three different failures, but the same stunned surprise at the end of each one.

They didn’t wait well.

The Bridesmaids: Waiting without Readiness

The bridesmaids who ran out of oil for their lamps failed because they weren’t ready. And readiness, Jesus makes clear, is not something you can borrow at the last minute. When the five unprepared ones asked the five wise ones to share their oil, the answer was no—not out of selfishness, but because that kind of preparation cannot be transferred.

Instead, we are called to live in a state of readiness for the return of the King of Kings. That means building our relationship with Jesus now so that we know Him when He returns. Only as we spend time with Him can we truly know who He is and how He loves us.

The Fearful Servant: Waiting without Investment

The second parable reminds us that we are stewards of the talents and resources God has given us, and we are to confidently put to good use what God has placed in our hands. Like the fearful servant, we may feel unprepared, but we are not to live in a “wait for more” posture in which we delay doing for God until we have more: more time, more confidence, more resources, more clarity, more permission….

God calls us to move forward with what has been entrusted to us.

The Goats: Waiting without Compassion

In the third parable, the sheep saw the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the sick, the imprisoned, and they helped them. The goats saw the same people and did nothing.

Jesus said that when we pass by the needy, the vulnerable, the overlooked, we are to see them and take action. We are to welcome and love those that society finds least comfortable. Jesus reminds us that these acts of mercy toward those who can’t return our generosity are acts performed for Him.

Waiting Well

Three parables. Three groups who didn’t see or expect their failures. And underneath all three failures was the same reality: They had not allowed the coming kingdom to shape how they lived in the present.

Had the bridesmaids truly known the bridegroom as King, they would have made sure their oil was sufficient to light their lamps. Had the servant known his master as good instead of harsh, he would have wisely invested what he had been given. Had the goats ever really known Jesus, they would have seen Him in the vulnerable and had compassion for them.

Had they known that their every act of faith, obedience, and love was part of getting ready for the coming King, perhaps they would have waited differently. Had they looked forward to the coming kingdom of astonishing abundance, breathtaking beauty, and unending awe, with Jesus on the throne, perhaps they would have changed how they waited.

Jesus’ parables are a warning so that we might know how to live, that we might grasp the significance of what we’re waiting for.

May we wait well.

Here’s what you’ll receive in this toolkit:

The Bread That Gives Life

Pick up a loaf of bread at most grocery stores and read the label. You’ll find enriched flour, which sounds generous until you understand what it means. The grain was first stripped of its bran and germ, removing the fiber, healthy fats, vitamins, and minerals God built into it. Then, because a grain emptied of its nutrition can’t sustain life, manufacturers add a handful of synthetic nutrients back in and call it enriched. We took out what was real and replaced it with a shadow of what was lost.

We’ve been eating this bread for so long that most of us don’t even know what real bread tastes like or what it does for a body. Ancient grains like einkorn and spelt, milled fresh and baked whole, contain nearly everything the human body needs to thrive. The protein structure is different. The nutrients are intact. Nothing has been stripped. Nothing artificial has been added. It is grain the way God designed it, complete, nourishing, genuinely life-giving.

When Bread Was Everything

When Jesus stood before the crowd in John 6 and said “I am the bread of life,” His listeners understood bread the way we no longer do—as the primary sustenance that stood between a family and starvation. Bread wasn’t a side dish. It was life itself. And Jesus was saying, “I am your complete nourishment. Everything you need is in me.”

What We’ve Done to the Bread

But here is the uncomfortable truth: We have often done to Jesus what modern mills do to grain. We have processed Him into something more convenient, stripped out the parts that challenged us, and enriched the result with substitutes like self-help wisdom and comfortable theology. And we wonder why we’re still hungry!

Your Hunger Is the Invitation

The hunger you feel is an invitation. It is your soul recognizing that it was made for something more than enriched flour. It was made for the Bread of Life.

I’ve started grinding my own grain and making real bread, about eight pounds a week for our family: cinnamon-raisin bread, einkorn sourdough, spelt blueberry muffins, fry bread, and hard white artisan. I do admit to sometimes using a bread machine! But in 15 minutes I have ground my flour and put all the ingredients into it—and three hours later, I take out a warm loaf ready for the table!

If you’d like my recipe for sweet sandwich bread, it’s in the toolkit when you subscribe, in 2 versions (both fresh-milled and store-bought flour).