Following Jesus’s command to love our neighbor can be challenging for all of us, but Gen Z may struggle in different ways than other generations. One simple reason is that we don’t know our neighbors. We can order anything we need from Amazon instead of asking the family next door.
But there’s a deeper issue than our tendency to rely on technology over people—the meaning of love has changed. While philosophers and poets have pondered the nature of love for centuries, my generation states their definition as fact: love is to accept someone, and acceptance is to never criticize who she is and what she does.
Fellow Gen Zers, we can’t rely on our generation to tell us what love is. We must look to the gospel. Here are three ways the gospel teaches us to love others.
1. Let your light shine.
No generation has liked being told they’re sinners, but now even disagreeing with others is often equated with hating them. If some Christian beliefs are considered toxic, if praying for someone could be a hate crime, how do we go about loving our neighbors?
There’s a temptation to stay quiet, to not offend anyone, to stick to our beliefs but not tell anyone about them or defend them when we’re slandered. We may be tempted to conform to the world and abandon clear commandments from Scripture in favor of changing times. This can feel like the right and “loving” response.
If some Christian beliefs are considered toxic, if praying for someone could be a hate crime, how do we go about loving our neighbors?
Instead, we must take encouragement from Scripture, look to Christ, and follow the example of those who came before us. We let our light shine before others (Matt. 5:14–16), knowing we’ll stand out. We seek to glorify our Father, not to please the world.
While some may hate us for it, others will, Lord willing, seek out Christ because of our witness. The pressures around us are daunting, but there are people quietly searching for God and his truth in a world that tells them to be their own god and find their own truth. Standing firm and standing out doesn’t mean we have to create a platform online or stand and shout in the street to reach these people. We can point them to Christ by bearing witness in our daily lives—and this is the most loving thing we can do.
2. Choose sacrifice over selfishness.
Selfishness isn’t unique to Gen Z, but we can easily overlook it in our lives. You can no longer get into university just by having good grades, and you need a well-rounded CV to get a job making coffee at Starbucks. The world is competitive, and we’re bombarded with carefully curated lives that seem attainable if we only try hard enough. So we join clubs, volunteer on weekends, and start YouTube channels, all in the hope something we do will help us get ahead.
While it’s possible to grow to love our neighbors in these pursuits, our focus is often not on serving others but on serving ourselves. We can be tempted to use our neighbors as stepping stones to where we want to go. But the gospel radically flips this around, calling us to sacrifice for others (John 15:13). We may not have to die for someone, but loving others means sacrificing our time, money, comforts, and even needs to help those around us.
3. Get off the pedestal.
“Main character energy” has become part of social media vocabulary, describing a person who puts himself or herself at the center of attention. The idea is that you can now write your own story and cast yourself as the protagonist. Everyone else is a secondary character whose happiness isn’t as important as yours.
We can be tempted to use our neighbors as stepping stones to where we want to go. But the gospel radically flips this around.
One result is that our generation is unable to deal with criticism and guilt. If we don’t listen to anyone else but ourselves, we can never be wrong. So it’s no wonder we crumble under the heavy weight of shame when we fail.
We might try to eradicate our shame by convincing ourselves our actions weren’t wrong but rather a result of society (perhaps even Christian influence) forcing its opinions on us. But the true answer to our shame is the gospel.
The gospel topples the pedestal we place ourselves on and instead puts Jesus at the center of our lives. In him, we find true freedom, fullness of joy, and the gracious commandment to love others. If we want to be part of the story that’s really changing the world, we won’t focus on promoting ourselves and amassing followers. We’ll humble ourselves, follow Jesus, and be ready to wash the feet of others (John 13:4–5).
Be Aware
Gen Z Christians, consider the ways we tend to interact unlovingly with others. These problems aren’t unique to us, but we need to be aware of the influence of technology and ideas like cancel culture that influence how we understand love and how we interact with our neighbors.
We must be careful not to live for the praise of others. But we also can’t use others for our selfish gain or disregard them altogether. Let’s follow the call of Jesus—not the way of culture—and love our neighbors as ourselves.
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June 20, 2023 at 11:02AM
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Gen Z, Let's Love Our Neighbors - The Gospel Coalition
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