The greatest of all commandments, given to mankind throughout the Holy Word of God, as Jesus said, is: “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. (Mark 12:29-31)
The sum of all the reasons is this: the conclusion of the whole matter is that the Lord is Worthy of all our love; with every part of us He created and allowed us to love Him. Our heart, the core of who you are the individual; with which when we love with all our heart, we honestly love him first and choose him above all else. Our soul, with which we love and fellowship with God in this eternal and spiritual part of us. Our spirit, the intelligent part of you, that delights in seeking, studying, and growing in the knowledge of the Lord and His Word for us. And our strength, body and energy within it, which can be governed by spirit, under the Spirit of God to act in obedience to accomplish His divine purpose, for His honor, glory and pleasure .
Psalm 139:14-18, “I will praise you; for I am terribly and wonderfully made… How precious are your thoughts to me, O God. What is their sum. If I have to count them, they outnumber the sand. You are not an accident. The fingerprints of God’s wise design are all over you. You are a living, breathing scientific miracle of beautiful complexity, and God has countless thoughts of love for you.
In gratitude for life, and even more in gratitude for eternal life through Christ, we should love him by living for him. Psalm 34:8, Taste and see that the Lord is good: blessed is he who trusts in him. God has been so kind to us, to equip us with taste buds, through which we can enjoy so many delicious flavors of food, to nourish, replenish and fuel our bodies. He also graciously gave us eyes, which can perceive about a million colors (according to scientists), and we appreciate light and greatly appreciate beauty.
I would like to glorify God by also adding to this Psalm, that He created us with ears to hear music, the laughter of a child, the song of a bird. Then our nose, which can smell the rain, the scent of a flower or bacon. God gave us the sense of touch, our skin tingles when we feel softness or texture, cold or heat. All this information received through our incredible and multiple receptors to send to our brain, to understand that “the Lord is good”.
And because God is good, we love him with our bodies and our strength, using them to bless him in return. We use our bodies, His temple for good works of love and justice. I Cor. 10:31, “Whether you eat, or drink, or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” We keep our bodies, His temple, from sinning against Him and others. I Cor.9:27, “But I keep my body under (control) and subdue it.”
Remember we learned that love is a verb, an action word. Love compels us to do something loving. What love for God is not like is living in a way that is opposed or rebellious to his will. What He forbids, condemns and calls an abomination is sin, and He hates sin. Anything against His holiness is evil, and we should also hate all wickedness. (Ps.97:10, Prov.8:13).
Don’t get me wrong, God commands us to love people, even sinners; but, we must still despise sin. Remember, we were sinners before we received healing too; Jesus the Savior. I John 2:3-6, “And by this we know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. Whoever says that I know him, and does not keep his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him…Whoever says that he abides in him must also walk, as he (Jesus) walked .
Once again, Jesus is our greatest example of what God’s love looks like. And God gave us His Holy Spirit to help us love and obey Him. If we love God with all our might, what it will look like is that we are on a mission to make him happy. It will seem that we intend to do his will with all our might, and we do so as a moving body, following Jesus. Sometimes it will be in the direction of worship, because our joy is full and our “cup overflows”. We can “lift up holy hands” (I Tim.2:8 & Psalm 24:3-4), and our voices can be lifted up to “sing the mercies of the Lord forever” (Psalm 34:1, 63:3 , 89:1).
Sometimes our love for God will go hand in hand with loving others. Perhaps a raised hand (Prov.22:9, James 1:27, 2:15-17) and Matt.25:34-40, “And the king shall answer and say unto them, Verily (verily) I tell you, Inasmuch as you have done it to one of these least of my brothers, you have done it to me. One of the best ways to love others is to share the greatest news of all, the Gospel message with those who do not yet know the Lord (I Tim. 2:24-26, Jude 1:22-23, Daniel 12:3, Ps.126:6 ) It is with our bodies; our eyes, our ears, our mouth, our hands and our feet that we are “doers of the Word, and not only hearers. And we do this, not by duty, but by pleasure that this love gives us. We joyfully live our lives as a gift to the Lord; we are his temple, lifting up our loving and joyful adoration to Him who created us and saved us.
When all of these parts of you work together as a whole, to love the Lord, God is fully blessed through you. When with your heart you desire him first, when you adore him and commune with him in your eternal soul, when with your mind you meditate on his goodness and his word, and when you worship and serve him with all your strength of your body, God must be so happy that he created you. Fall in love with him daily. Abide in Him continually. “Cling (stick, cling) to Him because He is your life. (John 15:1-17, Deut.30:20)
May God bless you abundantly throughout your life as you bless him.
Comments are closed.