Romans 13:9-10

The commandments, "Do not commit adultery," "Do not murder," "Do not steal," "Do not covet" [Exodus 20:13-15,17; Deuteronomy 5:17-19,21], and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: "Love your neighbor as yourself" [Leviticus 19:18]. Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

The sum of the commandments is to love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no harm to its neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfillment of the law. The 613 commandments of the law can be summed up by the 10 Commandments found in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5. These 10 commandments can be summed up by the two commandments found in Matthew 22:36-40. These two commandments can be summed up by one word: LOVE. A basic definition of love here might be: “seeking the best interest of another.” And notice that, for Paul, love and law are not contradictory. Love fulfills the law; obeying the law is done out of love. “If you love Me,” Jesus said, “you will obey My commands.” Love compels you to do exactly what the law requires.

Paul lists the “second tablet” laws, those which involve our relationship to mankind (the “first tablet” laws involve our relationship to God), and he sums them up with Jesus’ penultimate commandment (Matthew 22:37-39). The first and greatest (ultimate) commandment is to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” So if we LOVE both God and our neighbor, then we will not break any of the laws, and thereby fulfill the law.

Lastly here, notice that we can only love according to God’s command by the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit. Because the practical action demanded in the command to love is impossible for us to measure up to its standards, we need grace. Both the law and the gospel call us to love rightly, wholly, genuinely; and none of us “love” that way consistently, thus we need grace. That’s why Paul spends 11 chapters on grace and mercy before he begins to lay out this beautiful representation of what it means to live the Christian life. The foundation for this kind of living in love is found only in the gracious mercy of God, given to us and present in us by the indwelling Holy Spirit. And it’s not that our goal in loving is to fulfill the law. Rather, we love because Christ fulfilled the law by love and we want to glorify Christ by imitating Him.