-February 26, 2022-
Good morning, happy Saturday,
“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. The second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”
(Matthew 22:37-39).
One of the Pharisees, a lawyer, asked Jesus, testing Him, ‘Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?’ This man thought He would confound Jesus. After all, there are so many commandments in the Scripture even beyond the Ten Commandments. Jesus gave the perfect answer. In another account of this incident in Mark, this man agrees with Jesus and says that these two commandments are more than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices. Jesus told him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God” (Mark 12:34). After this no one dared ask Him any more questions.
Jesus quoted what is known in the Hebrew as the Shema as the greatest of all and the second is like it, of loving one’s neighbor as oneself. These two commandments summarize the whole law. This is not to say that all commandments are important, for they are, but these two are the greatest.
To love God with all our heart, soul, and mind is extremely challenging to all of us. We are to love Him as He loves us. How do we show our love for Him? Jesus gave the answer in John 15:9-10, “As My Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.” There are a definite link between love and obedience. Jesus also said in John 14:15, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” As followers of Christ we must love Him with all the fabric of our being.
The second commandment is like the first: to love our neighbor as ourselves. When we love God whom we have not seen, we must also love others whom we have seen. In another passage in Luke, a man asked him, “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus told the parable of the Good Samaritan. The lesson of the parable is that a neighbor is anyone in need. In the story, a priest and a Levite both see a man who was robbed and beaten on the side of the road half dead, they both passed by without stopping to help him. Only a Samaritan stopped, helped him, and took him to an inn for further care, rest, and recovery.
To love someone is not just to say it, although that is important, but even more importantly, we must show it. Love must be in action. 1 John 3:18 says, “My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.” Loving others is one of the best ways to introduce people to Jesus. People want to see that we really care for them.
Have a blessed day. May the Lord help us to love God and our neighbor. Stay safe and healthy.
In His eternal love,
Dean
Dean Allen's Daily Devotional 