Loving God

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“Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?” Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.” Matthew 22:36-40 (NLT)

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I have heard it said that the Ten Commandments can be summed up in one word - love. Jesus seems to echo that sentiment here when he tells us that the whole of the Old Testament is about loving God and the people who he has made. In a sense the Lord is giving us a measuring stick to evaluate everything that Moses, the law giver, and the prophets spoke in ancient times. He knew that even these great men were not perfect in all they said.

These words of Christ cause me to think about the religious things that often divert our attention away from these most important commandments - sometimes we really miss it when we our motive is not love. Even so, I think that love can be our guiding precept in all things religious and secular. If a word that we hear in church, on TV or at work lines up with love then it may be a sign that God is speaking to us - even when it is communicated by an imperfect vessel.

All that said, I think that we all have a tendency to discount love as just one of the ways that God works in us and our culture. Sometimes when read the scriptures we can imagine God as wrathful and not loving. I think that we err when we do. In my view, Jesus tells us in these verses that we are most like God when we love with everything we have. God is manifest when love overflows from us to those around us. When we are loving God everything is different.

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