Be indebted to no one, except to one another in love. For he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.Owe no man anything, save to love one another: for he that loveth his neighbor hath fulfilled the law.
4 sermons cite this verse
… you need to be paying it down. And then the Bible says in Romans 13, verse 8, let no debt remain outstanding. Do you know what an outstanding debt is? It's when you're paying interest payments only. If you have an amount on your credit card and you're not paying that credit card off every month, but you're just paying the minimum, you have an outstanding debt. And God says, no good. Because you're paying interest on interest on interest, which is dumb. And the thing you bought, you're paying for two, three, and four, five times over because you're paying interest on interest on interest. So an outstanding debt is when you're not paying down the principal or you're behind in your payments and things like that. You've got to set up a repayment plan. Okay, number eight. The eighth habit, and this is the bookend, is commit it all to God. I must commit it all to God. Now remember the first habit is I must realize it all comes from God, and the eighth habit is I must commit it all back to God. …
… oh, it's a sin to ever borrow money for any reason at any time. The Bible doesn't teach that. And yet to support that thinking, sometimes people quote Romans 13, verse 8, in which Paul says, owe no man anything except a debt of love. And yet if you look at that verse in context, you discover what Paul is talking about literally is paying your taxes. He's saying, don't be delinquent in paying your taxes. Don't be delinquent in giving honor to people to whom honor is due. Don't be delinquent in paying anything you owe. The only thing you want to owe people is the debt of love. It's not an absolute prohibition against debt. Nevertheless, the Bible does warn about the dangers of debt, especially excessive debt. In the book of Proverbs, Solomon refers to debt as a surety. And remember, we talked about this a few months ago. In Solomon's day, if you wanted to borrow money to purchase something, you would sign a pledge like a promissory note today, and you would have to have collateral to back it up. Now, Solomon said, before you go into debt and you make a pledge, you better make sure you've got the means to repay it. …
… I'm going to read again, beginning at verse 8 and reading through verse 14, which is the end of the chapter. I'll ask the congregation to stand for the reading of the Word of God. Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, you shall not covet, and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in the saying, namely, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfillment of the law. And do this, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep, For now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed. The night is far spent. The day is at hand. Therefore, let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. …
… customs to whom customs, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor. Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, you shall not covet. And if there's any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no harm to a neighbor, therefore love is the fulfillment of the law. This is the Word of God for God's people. Please be seated. Let us pray. Again, O Lord, we would be instructed not by human wisdom, but by that revelation that comes to us from Your omniscience. And this evening, as we direct our attention once again to this sacred text, we ask that You would help us understand it correctly and embrace it with our minds and with our hearts. For we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. We've seen in the beginning of chapter 13 Paul's critical teaching of the role of civil government, which is instituted by God, and here we are told that the rulers, the secular rulers of this world, are God's ministers. And in our last time together, I tried to draw applications of this text to questions of civil obedience as well as questions of capital punishment and theories of just warfare inasmuch as this is the classical locus of the text by which God gives to the civil magistrate the power …