October 12, 2019
From the time of God’s Creation until now, it has always been the His design to have eternal, unbroken fellowship with the centerpiece of His Creation: humanity. So while addressing us, the Lord Jesus Christ cites Old Testament Law (Deuteronomy 6:5) to revise the old, established model of faith.
Here, He establishes a new faith-fellowship paradigm not based on our works, (although works can serve as evidence of our faith), but upon our affection instead:
Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:37-40 NIV)
We delight in those whom we love. We like to be around them and want do all we can to please them. Thus, to love the Lord with all of our heart infers that we have a sincere, passionate, single-minded attraction towards Him, as the only true and living God, Redeemer…and Friend.
The heart represents the seat of our emotions. No other person or object can dominate our attention or command our affections when the Lord owns our hearts. However, His access is by our invitation only as Revelation 3:20 (NIV) teaches:
“Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.”
The Lord also wants our soul and mind, which means that our love for Him is evident in every facet of our lives. In essence, both who we are and what we do. In other words, we surrender not just our emotions, wishes, desires, feelings, affections, understanding, intellect, but also our character, personality, thoughts, words, deeds, lifestyle, goals, aspirations and so forth.
All these things and many more should resonate a deep love for our Lord with every fiber of our being. In short, we are commanded not love the Lord half-heartedly, but wholeheartedly.
The Lord Jesus Christ could rightly demand such love from us because He demonstrated His when He died on Calvary’s Cross to pay the menacing, unbearable debt of sin, which we could not pay for ourselves.
Then He rose from the dead and ascended into Heaven where He intercedes for us today. While we await His glorious, imminent return, His Holy Spirit lives within us, communing with us while preserving us as His precious children. What a wonderful Savior!
We may not arrive at this level of love towards Him in all its intricacies and implications 24/7 in this life. Nevertheless, we can give Him our hearts daily as we set our affections on things above, as Colossians 3:1 teaches.
Although many may dread our Lord’s return, we can look forward to it, as the day when we unite with those other redeemed saints at the Great White Throne Judgment to hear the King of Kings and Lord of Lords say to us, as His beloved and redeemed children: “Well done!”
Then we shall forever experience His holy, unbridled love in its fullest measure just as this theologian observes:
But in heaven there is an undisturbed reign of holy love. All the inhabitants of that bright world love God supremely and love one another subordinately…The satisfaction arising from this consciousness will never be disturbed by a single doubt or solitary suspicion.1
Won’t you give the Lord your heart today? He’s given you His already!