Gospel Commandments (Matt. 22:37-40)
“And one of them, a lawyer, tempting Him, asked, saying: Teacher! What is the greatest commandment in the law? 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 greatest commandment.
The second is similar to it: “Love your neighbor as yourself. ”
On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matt. 22
:37-40)
The name of the Gospel moral law refers to those truths and rules that the Lord Jesus Christ Himself announced to people and His holy apostles preached to the whole world.
Essence
The Lord expressed this law in two main commandments:
In the commandment of Self-denial
: “If anyone wants to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me” (Matthew
16:24
) and in the commandment about
Love
for
God
and
Neighbor
: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all your mind... and your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew
22
:37-40.)
The first commandment has as its goal the eradication in us of the very beginning of all sin - pride or self-love. The second aims, with the help of the life-giving power of love, to root in us, instead of the previous sinful life, the seed of a new renewed life, a holy and godly life, and to reunite us with God, Who is Love (1 John. 4
:3).
Since the Gospel law follows the Old Testament law in terms of the time of its origin, the question arises: in what relation is the New Testament moral law to the Old Testament?
The Gospel law and the Old Testament law have a close connection with each other.
Both of them originated from the One God, both of them are a supernatural revelation of God. The Lord Jesus Christ Himself determined the Old Testament and New Testament laws, saying that He came “not to destroy,” i.e. not to abolish the law of Moses, which served as a necessary preparation for the law of the Gospel, but only to “fulfill” it, i.e. to fill in what is missing, to perfect what is incomplete (Matthew 5
:17-18).
He accomplished this precisely by freeing the Old Testament law from those temporary forms that can no longer take place in the spiritually grace-filled kingdom of Christ, revealing its eternal content, its hidden, inner spiritual essence, which consists in love for God and neighbors. Christ gave such a law to people in accordance with the new regenerated state of man. The Lord Jesus Christ saved man, freed him from the power of sin and its consequences, recreated him, renewed human nature, poured into him new grace-filled forces “even to life and piety.” And the law given to people by the Savior was no longer external and alien to sinful man, as the Old Testament law was, but coincided in its content with the internal desire of the regenerated grace of the human will, and was in the full sense a spiritual law of freedom, akin to the renewed nature of man
.
And therefore, the “ancient” commandment about love in letter, in spirit, undoubtedly became a “new commandment.” “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another” (John 33:34
; cf. 1 John
2
:7).
Only now, in Christ Jesus, is a new desire, a new spirit, inspired in man, by the power of which he can strive and achieve the ideal of love. The Lord called the commandment about love “new” primarily because of its content, because of new motives, because of a new image and measure of love. Here the norm of love is defined as the love of Christ, and an example of love is given in “dying for one’s friends” (John 15:13
).
The Gospel law revealed the spiritual essence of the Old Testament law, its inner perfection. Jesus Christ built the New Testament law on the same foundation
that was laid in ancient times by the prophets.
Therefore, He confirmed the basic commandments of the Old Testament law as an unchanging guide in moral life and an indispensable condition for salvation. “If you want to take it into your belly, keep the commandments. Which? “You will not kill, you will not commit adultery, you will not steal,” etc. (Matthew 19
:17-29). And at the same time, His building is perfect, i.e. the law He proclaimed is higher, more excellent.
The interpretations of the Gospel Commandments are taken from the notes on Moral Theology, compiled by the teacher of Moral Theology of the Kyiv Theological Seminary Hermogenes Ivanovich Shimansky (1915-1970).
Love the Lord your God with all your heart - part one.
Love the Lord your God with all your heart - part one. [ 25:44 | 23.57 MB ] Play Now Listen (53)
Peace to you, dear listeners and readers of our sermons! Let us consider with you today the theme that we find in the Gospel of Matthew 22:37: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart.”
(“Du sollst den Herrn, deinen Gott, lieben mit deinem ganzen Herzen”). For comparison, I have cited this excerpt from Matthew 22:37, also in German. This topic is very important and relevant, so I took this segment as the title of our sermon today.
But for clarity, I will quote the entire text from the Gospel of Matthew 22:37-39: “Jesus said to him: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind: 38 This is the first and greatest commandment; 39 And the second is like it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”
At the very beginning of this sermon, I inform you that this sermon was not written by me, but by a certain brother in Christ Jesus named Daniel Mul. And in view of the extreme importance of this topic, I decided to translate this sermon into Russian and bring its content to your hearts.
But I reserve the right to explain certain aspects of this sermon. Let's start with the most important thing. My beloved daughter Miriam once expressed a desire for me to write a sermon on the topic: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart.”
I immediately thought: Yes! This topic is the most important and central topic of faith, and besides, we don’t hear many sermons on this topic anymore! Regarding this topic, the time has come for me to study and write about it.
The Lord Jesus names two commandments that stand above all other commandments. These are the two commandments that have the absolute highest priority. I repeat this text from Matthew 22:37-39:
“Jesus said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind: 38 This is the first and greatest commandment; 39 And the second is like it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”
Nothing is more satisfying and peaceful, nothing is more fulfilling and leading to the goal, like these two commandments! Whoever has these two commandments as the meaning and content of his life, and puts them above everything else, has chosen the best path.
This orientation and principled position is reflected and has an optimal and healing effect not only on our contemporaries, but also makes it possible to come to peace in our own heart and soul.
This peace, calm and absence of fear that comes from this principled position cannot even be approximately compared with any other pleasure. The spirit, heart and soul instantly discover a pole of strength and hardness, which does not disappear even in suffering, despair and death:
“ For love is strong as death ; fierce, like hell, jealousy; her arrows are arrows of fire; she is a very strong flame” (Proverbs 8:6).
He who strives diligently for Divine love makes investments for eternity, he lays up treasures in heaven (Matt. 6:20) and always has the final goal before his eyes!
But love would not be love if it did not know compassion, if it did not feel the pain and suffering of others. Love would also not be love if it were not able to make sacrifices for others, and in its completed form even sacrifice itself.
Perfect love can let go of everything if on the basis of this it can become a blessing to another.
Love the Lord your God
The call: “thou shalt love the Lord thy God,” each person feels in his own way or looks at this call in his own way. For some this is a difficult, tedious task, but for others it is an advantage! And others don’t even know what they should do with this call in order to love the invisible God, about whom they don’t even know if He exists at all. For some people, God is a punishing and vengeful God. Therefore, it seems impossible for them to love Him.
Some people have personally known God to be merciful, merciful and gentle! Loving This God is an advantage for them! They cannot even do anything other than love this God with all their hearts. Bible translators translate v. 37 of our main text differently. In the Elberfelder Bible we read
Matthew 22:37 “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”
And in the Bible (DBR) this verse reads as follows:
Matthew 22:37 “He (Jesus) explained to him: You will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your thinking.”
In most translations of the Bible, the content of this verse reads as a call, as a command, as we read in our main text: “Thou shalt...”. In the DBR Bible and in the Bible (KK), the authors translated this passage as follows: “you will love the Lord.”
However, I must at this point interrupt the author of this sermon, Daniil Kuhl, and explain to you what kind of Bibles he is talking about here and comparing them with the Elberfelder Bible. This Daniil Kul does not explain what kind of Bible these are, but only briefly talks about them.
Bible (BK) is the English Bible. And one of the best translations. Believers who speak English readily use this Bible. Wikipedia says about it: “English Bible-Christian store K orisna K book.”
And regarding the DBR Bible, I searched for information on Wikipedia for a long time and found that it is simply “Wikipedia Bible”. And then the author Daniil Kul says: therefore, we have a legitimate question: which of these translations is correct?
The Greek word we have in this expression is the future tense indicative of the expression: “you love.” Therefore, this scripture (Matt. 22:37) is more of a prophecy and a promise.
In the Old Testament these passages are translated in the (DBR) Bible as follows:
Deuteronomy 6:5 “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God...”
Deuteronomy 10:12 “Therefore, O Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you? Only that you fear the Lord your God, walk in all His ways, and love Him, and serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.”
And the servant of Jehovah, one might say, bequeaths Israel in the book of Joshua 22:5: “only try to carefully fulfill the commandments and the law that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you: to love the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, to keep His commandments, cleave to Him and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul.”
This sequence is very revealing and instructive! Firstly, it simply says: “and love the Lord...”, which also looks more like a prophecy than a call.
In the second place (Deut. 10:12) from the literal translation it follows: God asks and asks that Israel love Him! Here we are talking more about a request. In the third place, it is not God who commands, but Moses commands to love God.
Above I pointed out the fact that some people, based on their lives and experiences, have a lot of trouble loving this invisible and unknown God.
Because for them this God either does not exist, or because for them he is terrible and creepy. Others are so ardent in their love for God that they are even ready to die for Him!
And the latter, this third case, personally experienced God and His love in their lives! They have seen the amazing and unconditional love of God, so they cannot love anything other than this God!
Let me remind you on this occasion of the story of the sinner, as we read in Ev. Luke 7:37-48: “And behold, a woman of that city, who was a sinner, when she heard that He (Jesus) was reclining in the house of a Pharisee, brought an alabaster flask of ointment 38 and, standing behind Him at His feet and weeping, began wet His feet with tears and wipe them with the hair of their heads, and kissed His feet and anointed them with myrrh.
39 Seeing this, the Pharisee who invited Him said within himself: If He were a prophet, He would know who and what kind of woman is touching Him, for she is a sinner. 40 Turning to him, Jesus said: Simon! I have something to tell you.
He says: tell me, Teacher. 41 Jesus said, “A certain creditor had two debtors: one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty, 42 but because they had nothing with which to pay, he forgave them both.
Tell me, which of them will love him more? 43 Simon answered: I think the one to whom he forgave more. He said to him: you judged correctly. 44 And turning to the woman, he said to Simon, “Do you see this woman?”
I came to your house, and you did not give me water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head; 45 You did not give Me a kiss, but she, since I came, has not stopped kissing My feet;
46 You did not anoint My head with oil, but she anointed My feet with ointment. 47 Therefore I tell you, her many sins are forgiven because she loved much, but he who is forgiven little loves little. 48 He said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.”
Please also remember how Zacchaeus, that deceiver, had Jesus as his guest, and was so overwhelmed by the love of Jesus and shocked that he radically changed and could no longer do anything other than love Jesus, as we read in:
Luke 19:8 “And Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord: Lord! I will give half of my property to the poor, and if I have offended anyone in any way, I will repay him fourfold.”
Without knowing this God, without personally experiencing Him in your life, it is hardly possible to love this God! In any case, every person does well if he wants to know God well.
He also does well if he strives to draw closer to God, as we read in James 4:8: “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you; Cleanse your hands, you sinners; straighten your hearts, you double-minded.”
Whoever yearns for this God of love and desires to know Him in His Word will sooner or later come to know God personally! Only the influence of God gives a person the opportunity to truly desire to love Him.
To love not out of a sense of duty. I read from Philippians 2:13: “For it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.”
And the next scripture shows us that our love for God is based on the influence of God. I read from the book of Deuteronomy 30:6: “And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants,
that you may love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.”
It follows that if God circumcises people's hearts, then they can love Him with all their heart and with all their soul! But why is this circumcision of hearts necessary , and what happens? Physical circumcision is a very painful procedure in itself.
This procedure involves cutting off the baby's "foreskin" so that the head of the penis is freed. The head of the penis is the most intimate and sensitive area of a man, which becomes visible due to circumcision of the foreskin.
Based on the circumcision of the heart, in exactly the same way, the most intimate, that is, the spiritual-soul area of a person, becomes open! The circumcised heart is no longer in darkness in that it practices the passions of the flesh and hides them!
A circumcised heart acknowledges its sins, brings them to light, and subsequently avoids them. The circumcised heart came into the light, so it became open, and on this basis it became genuine, authentic.
Not only does it continue to hide its mistakes and keep them in darkness, but it also reveals the deepest and hidden longing, the longing for deep and unconditional love. That is, the kind of love that does not set any conditions.
The circumcised heart is free from compulsions and open to the exciting and tremendous love of God. The love of God is poured out by the Holy Spirit into the hearts of people according to Romans 5:5: “But hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”
Real, tested love conditions and always requires an open, vulnerable heart. Many people don't open up fully for fear of getting hurt. But an open state towards friends and brothers (not towards enemies) refers to true love!
The fact that we then become vulnerable is a side effect of love, which also applies to love. God's love allowed itself to be cruelly insulted and wounded on the Golof cross. But she endured all this because she can endure it and bear it.
As we read in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7: “Love (of God) is patient and kind; love does not envy; love does not boast, nor is it proud; , but rejoices in the truth;
7 (God’s love) covers all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things .”
The circumcised heart has personally experienced God's love. Such a heart cannot and does not desire anything other than to love. In this case, the above example comes into fulfillment: “you will love the Lord your God...”! (DBR).
Personally tested and experienced God's love, ultimately, should always be the basis for loving God with all your heart!
Quadruple love
Love in relation to God contains not only one area or sphere, but contains four areas. Love in relation to God is not only a rational, rational matter, but, above all, a matter of the heart, where the soul and all our strength also have their part!
Every believer loves God in his own way. A person who has been approached by God in his intellect often loves Him also on the level of his mind.
And if such a person sees brothers and sisters who love God very much on a soul level, then most often he only shows a sympathetic smile towards them.
Presumably, every believer has his own special, so to speak, center of gravity in his love for God. No one should consider his neighbor low, or have a low opinion of him, because he loves God in a different way.
But every believer should strive to love God on all four levels! If I love God in my thoughts, but barely love Him with my heart, then I still lack something decisive!
Although it is good if I love God with my mind, in my thinking, my heart must also take full part in this. Let's finish this today, we'll continue next time.
Elena Reinhardt
Posted by Elena Reinhardt Apr 21, 2022 in Sermons, Sermon Texts | Comments for the post Love the Lord your God with all your heart - part one. disabled
Love!
Yesholla
And one of them, a lawyer, tempting Him, asked, saying: Teacher!
What is the greatest commandment in the law? Jesus said to him: You shall 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; (Matthew 22:35-38) The Lord told us that this is the FIRST and GREAT commandment! How should we respond to His command? Execute? But how? How to love someone you can't see? What does it mean with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind? The problem is that our human understanding of love is completely different from God's. I once preached in a village in the south of Ukraine, during evangelization, and one local resident, in order to show himself as a believer, told me publicly: “But I know the Ten Commandments!” I fell silent and said: “Well, name it then!” And he clearly listed all the ten commandments given by God to Moses for the Jewish people. I said: “Well done! Everything is true, but tell me, how do you understand the commandment “Thou shalt not steal?” In the silence that followed, all eyes were directed at this expert of the Word. Without any doubt, the man blurted out: “The commandment do not steal means that you cannot steal from me!” Everyone laughed, the service was successful, but this man’s answer did not leave me alone. When I began to reflect on him, I realized that this man from the village was more honest than us who call ourselves believers. Almost always, all articles of the law are considered by us as due execution in relation to us, but whatever from us is not reviewed. For example: when a believer inadvertently misappropriated something or did not pay (for example, a tax), then this bothers him little. But when they stole from him, the whole nature of the “righteous” man demands that the sentence be carried out according to the law. Or when you give false information (gossip) about someone, you may not even notice that you violated a commandment, but when they say too much about us, we immediately remember about the law and feel victimized. Same thing about love... Agree, when we come to church, we expect the believers to show love towards us! Inherent in our old nature is the need to be loved and disappointment if this love is not given to us. I have seen many people who believe in God leave the church with the words: “There is no love in this church!” Of course not, because almost everyone legitimately demands self-love and does not even think about loving unconditionally themselves.
love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind
It is not human nature to love anyone other than yourself. We even love our wives and children simply because they are “mine”! And if they don’t do what I want, hate replaces love. This property of human love is to love temporarily and conditionally. A person cannot love any other way and, worst of all, does not want to! There is no need for a person to learn the love of Christ. It is enough to memorize the verse from John 3:16, attach a badge like “I love Jesus”, learn to say correctly: “I love you with the love of Christ”, learn songs about the love of Christ, an unctuous smile, in short, put on the whole range of decorations. It’s funny, but the majority, having gotten used to these settings, sincerely believe that they are in the love of God, and if their conscience starts to drill, there are enough spiritual mechanisms based on the books of famous Christian writers. According to the scheme, we must forgive, confess, repent, bless, thank! All! I am at peace with the Lord again, the main thing is to always rejoice and give thanks for EVERYTHING! I declare with full responsibility that if even a little bit of the love of Christ were manifested in our churches, then sinners themselves would come to surrender to God and there would be no need to spend huge amounts of money on fruitless evangelistic programs, seminars, festivals, parades, etc. In the absence of a manifestation of the true love of Christ, as crazy as it may sound, there is solid unity between all faiths. We are all united in this!
A normal person loves a lot of people and things. In his heart, soul and mind, as in rooms - cells, various worldly passions successfully live. He loves his wife, his mother, his brothers and sisters, his friends, his work, he loves beer and talking, he loves preference, rock music, books, he loves his homeland, he loves Kiev cake too... What's wrong with that? By human standards - nothing. In the life of every person there is a huge number of love attachments to various objects of adoration. A person loves everything that his “ego” wants, which means he pays for his lusts, that is, he spends his life to achieve what he loves. When a person hears the Word and God opens his heart to believe, then often the person deceives himself that he is able to fulfill all the commandments. He tries with all his might not to sin, but he sins even more, since he now knows the law, which reveals to him that he is a sinner. The law is a teacher to Christ and after fruitless attempts to be righteous through the works of the law, he has a need for a Savior. It is very sad that many, coming to Jesus as the redeemer from sin, are least concerned about the need for redemption from the curse for failure to fulfill the first and greatest commandment. They confess the sins of drunkenness, drug addiction, fornication, theft, lying, but very rarely about the lack of love. Moreover, false teachers teach them to simply “confess” that He loves Jesus. The works of the flesh bring their own disappointments, because without love there is no fruit!
The commandment to love God first of all judges the insides of the believer, telling him that now he must love only Him. Our God is Zealot! That is, now in our life, in our soul, in our mind and in our spirit, NOTHING should have a place except Him. That's why Jesus said in Luke 14:26 that if we don't hate our father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters and OUR ENTIRE LIFE, then we cannot be his disciples. Nothing and no one, even our life, can be more loved and dearer than Him, otherwise something or someone will close us off from God and become our idol. Our whole mind must be filled with Him, and if we do not take care of this, our mind will become corrupt, that is, perverted (Rom. 1:28). Our soul must leave all former desires (Matthew 16:25) “for whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it” and thirst only for Him. Our will must be completely subject to Him. All this is possible through love. It is useless to strive to fulfill the commandments, to be zealous for gifts, to seek strength, to be in service, to move mountains... everything will be in vain. Only to the ONE who LOVES all things work together for good (Rom. 8:28)!
“Love is so perfected in us that we have confidence in the day of judgment, because we walk in this world as He does” (1 John 4:17). Only love will make us perfect and capable of doing the works of Christ. Only a lover is able to fulfill His Word and Commandments (1 John 2:5, 1 John 5:3). Abiding in love, we abide in God, and He in us (1 John 4:16). That is why the commandments of love are the first and most important, because they contain the Law and the Prophets, that is, only through love for God and neighbor is life not subject to sin. In Christ Jesus the law has no meaning, but faith working through LOVE! This means only one thing: if you believe, then the manifestation of faith in you can be seen primarily through love, and everything else is a consequence of love. A specific fact is written: Everyone who LOVES is born of God and knows God (1 John 4:7)! The Apostle Paul calls to put on the love of Christ (Col. 3:14), to understand the love of Christ (Eph. 3:19), so that we may achieve love (1 Cor. 14:1).
Why do many do not have the love of Christ, despite the fact that they confess Him as Lord? First: (Matthew 24:12) “Because iniquity abounds, the love of many will grow cold.” You, gentlemen, know without me that if you love sin, then your love for the Lord will grow cold, which is a violation of the First and Greatest Commandment, that is, lawlessness. Everyone must make a decision: are you the Bride or the Whore of Babylon. The principle of Babylon is confusion, that is, I believe in God and love sin. The Bride will not tolerate anything unclean in her life, because she loves the Groom. Second: (2 Tim. 4:3-4) “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires they will heap up for themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they will turn away their ears from the truth and turn to fables.” What sermons are we listening to today? What books do we read? What teaching are we in? What songs do we sing? Listen! All messages are directed at us, at our Self, at our needs, at our problems. What is prevalent in your ministry today, what is the theme? “Restoration”, “Prosperity”, “Healing”, “Family and Children”, and songs like “I want to say so...”, “I want to glorify you”, “I need you”.... And where is the most important topic: ABOUT THE LOVE OF CHRIST? Have you ever wondered why preachers so rarely preach on this topic? Yes, because how can you talk about what you don’t know. How can you share what you don't have? Moreover, everyone knows you and when you talk about love, no one believes you, but they pretend that they agree. I have always been surprised that all Christians, having learned the Word about Christ, make an effort to accept Him as Lord and Savior by faith, but a much smaller number of people, having learned the Word that the Holy Spirit is poured out on all flesh, make an effort of faith that to receive the Holy Spirit and be filled with it. And, almost a few, some, having learned the Word that Love has been poured out into our hearts by the Holy Spirit (Rom. 5:5), I make efforts of faith to accept this love and abide in it. A church without love is a consequence of the fact that the teaching of Christ is neglected. Third: (2 Cor. 3:6) “He has given us the ability to be ministers of the New Testament, not of the letter, but of the Spirit, because the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” The letter kills. Our worship should never be saturated with intellectual knowledge of God alone. For the vast majority of people, God is not reality or reality, but the result of inference, a deductive conclusion: “I read a book called the Bible, which talked about a man named Jesus Christ, and I also watched a video program by Kenneth Copeland and I realized that God there must be, therefore I believe that He exists!” In the atmosphere of today's ministry in most churches there has long been boredom and indifference, because the ministry is ruled by She - Her Majesty the PROGRAM. Even before the meeting of most churches in the world, people know how the meeting will go, what songs will be sung, how many sermons there will be, and that nothing interesting will happen. It has long been forgotten that God is a person! And He wants to have fellowship with His people and breathe in the fragrance of His worship in Spirit and Truth. But the people have already forgotten that the meaning of human life is to find God in the designated period of time for everyone, to feel Him (Acts 17:26-27), but they really love their rituals, traditions and remember the history of their denomination.
So how to love? (Isaiah 44:3) “For I will pour water on the thirsty land and streams on the dry land.” Many have a deceptive understanding that the grace of God pours out on us of its own accord. No! Grace is not free water from the tap. Try to beg her again. They taught us that for nothing! So it’s on the ball, so you can treat it with disdain. Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are those who hunger and thirst. God opens His fountains to those who thirst (John 7:37), He opens them to those who knock, He will let those who seek find them. If you don’t care, if you think that you already have everything (the heresy of Calvinism is very developed in Christian circles: “You don’t need to do anything, God has already done everything, just believe, and in general, a person has no freedom of choice), you are rich, then the grace of God is in vain for you, even if you say “Yes” to Christ. That’s why this phrase is popular among our ministers: “Repeat after me.” Well, if you are thirsty, you will definitely get drunk, and if you are hungry, you will be satisfied. Don’t be a passive mind, make sure to always have God in your mind. Do not be passive in your will, make an effort of will to capture the Kingdom in your life. (1 Cor. 14:1) “Achieve love!” Love is an achievement and we need to achieve it in order to remain in it. That is, it requires effort, patience, search, sacrifice, co-crucifixion. Without death according to the flesh, it is impossible to grow the fruit of the spirit called love. Our path of love, like Jesus’s, passes through Calvary. Until our “I” dies, there will be no achievements. (Isaiah 66:2) “But this is the one I will look upon: the one who is humble and contrite in spirit and who trembles at My word.” I want to emphasize the phrase “to him who trembles at My word.” God is watching so that His Word will soon be fulfilled (Jer. 1:12). We must treat the Word of Life with due reverence so that It will soon be fulfilled in our lives. When we receive exhortation in the Word of God, we must remember that the GOAL of exhortation is LOVE from a pure heart (1 Timothy 1:5), not knowledge of the letter. By abiding in the Word, we abide in Him, and then His Word abides in us, bearing fruit in its season (John 15:7). (1 John 2:5) “But if anyone keeps His word, the love of God is truly perfected in him: by this we know that we are in Him.” By accepting His Word, feeding on it as Bread from Heaven, we feed on Christ Himself and His Love, which will certainly manifest itself in deeds of love and mercy, and from which it will be clear that we are in Him. (Rom.5:5) “The love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” By receiving the Holy Spirit, we have received the potential of God's love. And now, it is our responsibility to experience the love of God ourselves, through knowing Him and communicating with Him “And we knew the love that God has for us and believed in it. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:1). (1 John 3:1) “In this we know love, that He laid down His life for us.” Is it really possible not to accept the love of Christ, dwelling in the Word about how He showed His love to a perishing world by deed. May the Holy Spirit guide us to this truth. (1 John 3:1) “See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God. The world does not know us because it has not known Him.” Look! What a call! What love the Father has given us! What are you looking at today, brother? Where are the eyes of your heart directed, sister? Do you look at the Glory of God so that, as if in a mirror, you are reflected in the image of God? Or you look at this world and it attracts you. Do you look to Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God? Or you see your needs, your sins, your worries. What you look at will manifest itself in your life. Keep your eyes on Love and don't let the devil take your eyes off Jesus!
May the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God and into the patience of Christ (2 Thess. 3:5).
