Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.
Matthew 7:12
The Golden Rule is virtually never quoted with any regard to its context. It is not a standalone verse. Jesus was a better preacher than to say something in the middle of an address that has nothing to do with the context of His sermon. That said, it is easy to make the mistake of missing the contextual connection, so let’s make some sense of the Golden Rule within its context.
Immediately prior to Jesus stating the Golden Rule, He was speaking about our good Heavenly Father only giving His children what is good. So, on the heels of the God’s goodness toward us, the Golden Rule bids God’s children to do good to one another. It is that simple.
Why must we only do good to each other? Besides the somewhat selfish reason about how we would want to be treated by others, there is a more important reason: Because we are the children of God, we are to act like our Father. As He does good to His children, because we are His children, we must treat each other according to the way our Father treats us. The way we treat our brothers and sisters in Christ (as well as our neighbors who do not know Christ), is evidence that we are truly His children.
Additionally, we display our gratitude to God for His benevolence toward us, by being benevolent to others.
So, here is a truly “Golden Rule” for living: However we want people to treat us, let us also treat people.