The greatest commandment . . .

Deuteronomy 6; Psalm 89; Isaiah 34; Revelation 4

It does not take much imagination to figure out how a person would respond if I ordered them to love me. Love does not work like that, at least on a human level. If someone gave me that order, my obedience would depend on how that person treated me and what I decided to do.

Love is a huge topic. We love pizza, chocolate, a beautiful sunset, our children, comfort food, and other people. How can one word have so many angles and applications? Even in Scripture, God loves the world, loves sinners, loves His people, loves righteousness, loves many things. How can one word mean the same for so much? Love has a mysterious side to it also. Why do people ‘fall in love’ and what happens to make some say, “I don’t love you anymore”? Is this about emotions? Or is it about a decision? Or both?

Jesus said that the most important command from God is to love Him. This came early in history and was often repeated:

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. (Deuteronomy 6:4–7)

In these verses, love is expressed by obedience, but God does not order us with, “If you love me, you will do what I say.” Loving God is not about coercion. As the apostle John repeatedly said, we love Him because He first loved us. I get that. Because He loves me and treats me with great affection and consideration, my heart cannot help but respond. I want to please Him. Another way to express love is with praise and making Him known:

I will sing of the steadfast love of the Lord, forever; with my mouth I will make known your faithfulness to all generations. (Psalm 89:1)

Loving God is linked to trust and faith. Because I believe Him and has revealed to me His great glory and power, I want to respond with respect, praise, and a heart full of love.

This morning, He reminds me of one way that much of the world has missed what it means to love Him. He reveals how some living creatures never cease to say, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!” Then He adds that “Twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever” and say, “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.” (Revelation 4:8–11)

They worship Him because they see His worth, power and glory in what He has created, yet, much of the world thinks that is nonsense, that we evolved from a primordial soup to one-celled life, to sea creatures who became land creatures, who eventually walked on two legs and from those early apes we evolved. In other words, God did not speak life into existence; it just happened. This is what our children are taught and God is no longer honored or considered worthy to receive glory, never mind our loving devotion.

Idolatry is common also. It is our sin nature to choose to do our own thing, to decide what is best for ourselves. We ignore the obvious; our Creator knows what makes us tick and gives us a good life. In deciding to pick and choose for ourselves, we should not wonder why the world is in such a mess.

The bottom line equates loving God with trusting Him instead of going my own way . . .

Do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments, for length of days and years of life and peace they will add to you. Let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you; bind them around your neck; write them on the tablet of your heart. So you will find favor and good success in the sight of God and man. Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. Be not wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and turn away from evil. It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones. Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the firstfruits of all your produce; then your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will be bursting with wine. (Proverbs 3:1–10)

APPLY: Confess my failures and making an idol out of my own wisdom. Instead, love God with all my heart and soul, trusting Him because He created me and knows what is best for me!

 

 

Dealing with sin . . .

Hiding and covering them up are useless ways to deal with my sin. These tactics give me headaches, knots in my stomach and the reputation of being a hypocrite. It is very opposite to the heart of God. He has a better plan.

“O you who love the Lord, hate evil! He preserves the lives of his saints; he delivers them from the hand of the wicked. Light is sown for the righteous, and joy for the upright in heart. Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous, and give thanks to his holy name!” (Psalm 97:10–12)

Dealing with sin is about loving God. On a human level, if my hubby asked me to have supper ready for 6:00 so he could get to a 7 o’clock meeting, and I totally ignored him, what does that say about my love for him? If my children are sick or in trouble and I went shopping rather than going to their aid, what does that demonstrate?

Loving God begins a new way of life. One of the changes is a total shift in my opinion of evil. While it drags at my pant legs like an annoying stray dog, hating evil means not stooping to pet it, not feeding it, not thinking it is attractive. While a swift kick cannot rid me of sin like it might discourage that stray, God gives the solution, from both the Old Testament and the New.

“Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.” (Proverbs 28:13)

“If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” (1 John 1:6–10)

Clearly any hiding or concealment does not fool God. This tactic usually does not fool others either. The solution is confessing or ‘saying the same thing’ as God says about sin. Nor can I deny it lest I fall into self-deception and lies.

The promise of God is forgiveness. It requires confession, but it also requires the blood of Jesus Christ. Jesus died to pay my penalty for sin. God does not forgive in an arbitrary way but only on the basis that Jesus has satisfied His wrath and taken upon Himself God’s righteous judgment of sin. This is important. Hatred of sin begins with God. He knows what it does to us; it separates us from Him and that is not what He wants. It also destroys our lives.

Today, Tozer writes about persecution. Sometimes we are opposed because of a godly life, yet the opposition may come because of an obnoxious personality or other traits that irritate people. Tozer points at Christians who hide their unpleasant traits behind verses of Scripture. He also mentions that a believer might live without doing what we might call the “biggies” like murder or adultery, but can be guilty of greed, self-righteousness, or other ‘socially acceptable’ behaviors. That believer might even be unaware of this, nevertheless, those sins will turn others off to God even more than more visible sins.

For me, this is important. I’ve said that God begins pruning with a large axe, then uses pruning shears, and finally goes at me with a small scalpel. His hatred of sin is there only because of His love for me, His desire that I am blessed and become all that He created me to be.

^^^^^^^^

Jesus, You know the sins I need to confess before I know them. You are so gracious to expose them to me at the right time so that I will hate and confess them. I realize this is a life-long process, but with each confession comes forgiveness and cleansing. I also am lighter, can see more clearly, have greater energy for the things that matter and am able to drink more deeply from the water of life. You are such a great blessing. Thank You from the depths of my heart.

Saving faith changes everything

Faith often begins when disaster strikes. Because of a threatening situation, the human heart is desperate for deliverance and calls out to the God they know exists, a God that they see is the author of creation and the only One who can do anything about the troubles they are experiencing.

A friend was in a building struck by a huge tornado. She said everyone was praying, even praying aloud. However, when the storm was over and life returned to a semblence of normal, nothing had changed in their spiritual lives. Most of them returned to a life without faith.

Sometimes the Bible describes faith like an outcry in trouble. Consider this portion of a psalm:

“I love the Lord, because he has heard my voice and my pleas for mercy. Because he inclined his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as long as I live. The snares of death encompassed me; the pangs of Sheol laid hold on me; I suffered distress and anguish. Then I called on the name of the Lord: ‘O Lord, I pray, deliver my soul!’” (Psalm 116:1–4)

The psalmist was in trouble and great distress. He cried out to God to rescue him, yet this was not the actions of one with ‘temporary’ faith — because he asked for more than physical deliverance. His prayer asked also that God would save his soul.

Some would call the first kind of faith ‘temporary faith’ because it came during a felt need for God but left when that need was satisfied. It was partial faith, not faith concerning the salvation from sin that is the main focus of biblical faith. It was temporary in that it didn’t last.

Biblical faith has an eternal component because it is about eternal life. It also comes with a declaration. That is, those with faith share with others a testimony of what God has done for them:

“And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.” (1 John 5:11–12)

Biblical faith is not about faith that God will rescue me when I am in trouble, even though that is part of it. Rather, it is faith that God, through Christ, has forgiven my sin and given me the life of His Son. Because of Jesus, I am changed!

Actually, who could not change when the Son of God comes into their hearts, their very being! And since He is eternal, that new life is also eternal, an amazing gift from God that changes everything.

As proclaimed in the Old Testament and by Jesus, the two most important commands are that we love God with all our hearts, minds, souls and strength, and we love one another. Without Jesus, this does not happen. Temporary faith is insufficient because that focus of self-preservation is always there. So is that immature, ‘I want what I want when I want it.’ We can dress it up, but it remains the driving force of life.

Saving faith has a new objective. It takes my eyes off me and turns my heart upward and outward. I can love God love others because of new life in me. Even though the ‘old me’ sometimes fights that, because God is God, He gives victory over that sinfulness and changes my focus from here and now into eternal hope.

“We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven . . . .” (Colossians 1:3–5)

^^^^^^^

Jesus, I love You because You first loved me and gave Yourself for me. I love others, because You have taken care of my love needs and set me free from selfish concerns that rob me of the joy of serving You. When I slip back into that old life, You pick me up and turn my heart again toward eternal matters. You are the most amazing God and I thank You for saving me!