Matthew
22:36-38 “Teacher, which is the
great commandment in the law?” Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love
the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with
all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment.”
Can
you imagine someone commanding us to love? Well, those commands do happen, but
we consider the source and act accordingly. We can understand how God can
command certain actions or to refrain from some actions for our good. We can
understand God telling us how we should speak or even think, because He knows
and desires the best for us. But, when it comes to the “great commandment” to
love the Lord our God, which goes into the inner-most depths of our heart,
there seems to be a contradiction. Isn’t love a free choice. Why is this command
the case?
Deuteronomy
6:4-5 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our
God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your God with all your
heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.”
I
read an interesting article that poses several reasons. First, we are wired to
love. God knows that we are going to love something above all and supremely. What
do we really love? If we are not going to love our Almighty Maker, we are going
to love something immeasurably less honorable, something inestimably less
exalted than God. When we do that, we are inevitably going to become like the
thing that we love and worship. That is why God says that He is a jealous God,
that we should have no other gods before Him (meaning between His face and
ours). We need only love and worship the one true God. If we do not, will no
doubt suffer loss in empty love of idols.
What
is love? In Webster’s 1828 definition of true “Love”, it states that if our hearts are right, we love God above
all things, as the sum of all excellence and all the attributes which can
communicate happiness to intelligent beings. In other words, the Christian
loves God with the love of complacency in his attributes, the love of
benevolence towards the interest of his kingdom, and the love of gratitude for
favors received. The love of God is the first duty of man, and this springs
from just views of his attributes or excellencies of character, which afford
the highest delight to the sanctified heart. Esteem and reverence constitute
ingredients in this affection, and a fear of offending him is its inseparable
effect. True “Worship” is defined as, chiefly and eminently, the act of paying
divine honors to the Supreme Being; or the reverence and homage paid to him in
religious exercises, consisting in adoration, confession, prayer, thanksgiving
and the like.
In
fact, God does not “need” anything from us. But we most definitely need Him.
The love of God fills the God-shaped hole in our heart. We need to worship Him
and love Him so that our lives might be purified by that love. The Lord God has
ordered us to love Him because He knows that our biggest problem is selfishness.
In fact, the essence of sin is selfishness, which is the very antithesis of
love.
1 John
4:8 “Whoever does not love does not know
God, because God is love.”
The
article concluded that if we are going to be lifted out of the mire of our sin,
it is going to be by the power of love. Let us fix our gaze on Jesus Christ and
His love for us. Let His love kindle in your heart and spirit a greater love of
God. Let our love for Him lead us to the assurance that He is indeed utterly
trustworthy and worthy of our love.
In
Christ, Brian
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