Untitled Sermon

Deuteronomy 6

6 Now these are the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments, which the Lord your God commanded to teach you, that ye might do them in the land whither ye go to possess it:

2 That thou mightest fear the Lord thy God, to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command thee, thou, and thy son, and thy son's son, all the days of thy life; and that thy days may be prolonged.

3 Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it; that it may be well with thee, and that ye may increase mightily, as the Lord God of thy fathers hath promised thee, in the land that floweth with milk and honey.

4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord:

5 And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.

6 And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart:

7 And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.

Prayer: Don’t forget!!

Title: Teach me how to love

The book of Deuteronomy chapter 6 it is known as the Shama. The Shama is the Jewish confession of faith! In the Jewish community they quote this as a section of a three part prayer that covers all aspects of the 10 Commandments. This Shama was so important that Jesus even refers to it when he is asked the question of what is the greatest commandment of them all. Today we as Christians keep this scripture in our hearts so that we can remember our commitment to love the LORD our God and to walk in His ways because of that love. For some of us this is an easy task, some people were taught how to love God! But if you’re anything like me you were never taught how to love God. I must admit that I have never heard a preacher preach or teach how to love God. I've always heard a preacher say you aught to love God but I've never heard anybody tell me how to love God. I went to a Baptist University and got a degree in Bible in theology and still no one has ever taught me how to love God. And I'm not trowing shots at nobody but I guess people automatically assume that you know how to love God! People ask me do I love God and my natural response is yes and I meant yes but secretly I didn’t know how love God fully! I want it to be like John legend and give them all of me but instead I was like the group H-Town and I was Gods part time lover! I've been told how to love my mother and father but it's not quite the same as loving God. So I begin to ponder in my mind how long has it been that I have not known how to love God properly. And not knowing how to love God wasn't something that I intentionally did it came up as a question in my mind as I was wondering why did God created us and what is our purpose here on earth. So there I was doing my research and I came to find out that many theologians and scientist have asked the question what is the meaning of life and no one could give me an exact answer. Now I don’t know about y’all but I believe in the power of the holy ghost. So I went ahead and asked and that’s how I came Deuteronomy Chapter 6 and through the word of God, He told that my purpose was to love Him first before I love or do anything else! And that’s what led me to the realization that I wasn’t sure of how I am suppose to love God completely. To be honest I understood that in order to complete the first commandment you had to keep the rest! Thats what I have always understood from the preachers that I heard. Every preacher that I ever heard always quoted John 14:15 If you love me keep my commandments. Thats cool and all I get it, but the question still remains how do you love God in order to keep his commandments? Today we're going to try and figure out how do we love God in order to keep his commandments.

In verse number 5 Moses speaks to the people of Israel and begins to tell them how to love God. The first thing he tell the Israelites is that they are to love God with all of their heart. Now if your like me you probably took this as a general statement and didn’t know what it truly means to love God with al of your heart. You're probably thinking I really do love God and most of us feel this way. But if you're anything like me you haven’t loved God with all of your heart. Perhaps you were just like me and were partially infatuated with idea of loving God and not loving God at 100%. Its easy to be infatuated with loving God! If everyone around you says that they love God surely you don’t want to be the odd ball not doing the same thing or confessing the same thing so you just go with the flow. When I was young I thought I loved me some Nia long (for those that don’t know she’s the actress that played in the movie Love Jones). I thought I loved her short haircut and the way she took her two fingers and put her hair behind her ear. You couldn’t tell me that I didn’t love Nia long! But the truth was I was infatuated with her because of the people that I was around. When Nia long first hit the scene all my friends were talking about her and by curiosity I too was sucked in to the excitement of Nia long. See some times we get sucked into the idea of loving God through family and friends and we don’t know what love really is. See some of us are like me! I was never explicitly taught how to love God. I was just always told love God and I believed that I loved God and that was it. But Moses tells the people to love God with all their heart. The word heart plays a vital role in loving God and if you don’t define the word correctly then you're going to fail at loving God every time. The word heart is defined as the inner man, mind or will. What Moses is saying is that we are to love God with all of our will. We must submit our will to his will. The way that we love God with all of our hearts is to do what ever he tells us to do! Think about it as a child or when you were a child your mother told you to wash the dishes and what you do? Wash the dishes! Your daddy told to rake the the leaves and what you do you raked the leaves! If my mother was alive and told me she get PJ because he cursed her out you best believe I wouldn’t ask no questions! I would be all on him like white on rice! Whatever she wants done I’m going to do it for her because I love her with all of my heart! Thats the same type of mindset that we must have to love God with all of our heart! If God said tho shalt have no other Gods before him! Then our will to love him shouldn’t be to serve Newports and Marlboro, Hennessy or Patron, fornication and lust but it should be to put God first and server hime according to his will. We show God that we love him with all of our heart by our actions that we display in our everyday lives! If we love the lord it should be our mission to please him with our deeds of submission to his will! What ever God said do, I will do! If he says feed the hungry I will feed the hungry. If he says help the elderly I will help the elderly! If he says show kindness I will be kind to others! If he says comfort his people I will provide companionship. And if he says teach his people I will educate his people! No matter what! We must sever him with all of our heart. Don't we know that we must be about our fathers business? Not our will be done but his will be done! This is called acts of love.

Now in part B of verse 5 Moses tells the Israelites that they must love God with all of their soul. Now I got to thinking like why would God want us to love him with all of our soul? The word soul is defined the breath of life. It's what's on the inside of us! It is the evidence that we exist. See God wants us to love him with our life. Now the question is how do we love them with our life? Well I'm glad you asked! In order for us to love Him with our life we must build a relationship with God. We have to be able to connect with God on a personal level. Therefore we must have a personal relationship with God. When I first met my wife I had to build a personal relationship with her. We didn't have a connection with each other we had to build that connection. We spent long nights on the telephone, took long walks in the park, we read the Bible together, talked about our hopes and dreams. And overtime we built a bond and now we know each other very well! We know what the other one like and we dislike. We know what can cause an attitude and what can cause one to be happy. I know what she like to eat if it ain't crabs, steak or white rice she don't want it. It's gotten to the point where we don't even have to say anything to each other we know we can catch the vibe just by looking at each other. What am I saying? This is what I'm saying we have to love God with our whole life! We have to have a soul to soul connection or a Spirit to spirit connection with God! We must be connected to God in every which way that we possibly can. One way that we can connect with God is by having faith in his word! When we take the time to study and let his words saturate a heart so that we don’t forget it shows that we rely on God. And when we rely on God we rely on God for his teachings and guidance for her lives. Our reliance reflects our respect for God's wisdom and a desire to align our actions with his divine plan and indicates our love for him. Another way that we can love him with all of our soul is the commune with him. See through prayer it gives us the ability to express our thoughts, feelings, gratitude and request to God! It allows for us to connect with God one a more intimate level. Prayer is an expression of our faith in God. When we pray to God on regular basis it indicates to God that we desire a personal relationship with God which is a trademark of loving someone. Another way that we can show love for God with all of our soul is to worship God. When we worship God help me to take the time to praise his name and make melodies in our hearts, we study his word and we meditate on it day and night! We fast and wait patiently for God to speak into our lives and direct our paths. And we reflect on just how good God has been to us. See faith, prayer and worship serve as an expression of our souls love for God. Through our faith we embrace his presence, trust his love and believe in his promises. When we pray we engage in heartfelt conversations that bears innermost thoughts which shows our desire to commune with God. When we worship it is a testament that we love and reverence His greatness! And when we do these three things it shows a genuine profound love for God that comes from within, that comes from the breath of life that God has given us, This type of love can only come from the soul. We must love God with all of our soul!

Now that we know how to love God with all of my heart and with all of our soul there's one last thing Moses tells the people of Israel. If we really really really want to show that we love God we must love God with all of our might. Which means we must love God with our strength and force. Now why would Moses tell the people of Israel to love God with all of their strength and force! Maybe Moses knows that when you love someone is not an easy task! I love my wife we're supposed to be on the same team! So can somebody please tell me how she a Cowboys fan and I’m an Eagles fan! Do you know the embarrassment that I have to go through when she walks out of the house with a Cowboys jersey on? I'm like god why would you do this to me and he reminds me that I have to keep loving her with all that I got and with all that I am regardless of her mistakes. See no one is telling us that the road is gonna be easy for loving God, there's gonna be challenges that come along the way! See every time we want to do right evil is always present! There's gonna be times when we have faith in God and doubt starts to kick in. Doubt ma kick in when we pray in seems like we don't get the answer that we're looking for! Doubt may kick in when we loose a loved one and we wonder why a loving God would allow such a thing! Doubt may kick in when we don’t study the word of God for ourselves and some tells us something different than what we read in our own Bible. And it's not always doubt that kicks in when we love God distractions are going come too! We may get distracted from loving God. Y’all know how it go, oh I'm tired I just got off of work I'm not going to Bible study tonight. Or I don't feel like praying but can talk on the phone for hours at a time about some foolishness. We got to be more careful because anything could take us away from loving God including sundresses and grey sweatpants. We have to love God with all that we have within us we have to be focused on the mission, which is loving God. And when we love god with all that we have with in us we can see the benefits that come with loving God. When we love God with all of our might we get to have intimacy or belonging with God! Our hearts began find contentment with his love and presence. When we love God with all of our might we”ll begin to see the blessings start to flow in our lives! Will begin to see the favor that God has for those that truly love him! When we love God with all of our might we can start to see God's wisdom in guidance take control of our life! He becomes our source of direction! When we love God with all of our might he'll give us peace that's a pass all understanding. When we love God with all of our might we begin to grow spiritually! We no longer put the world first instead we choose God first in our lives! When we love God with all of our might we begin to find purpose in our lives! We no longer have to be a thug or a thot! We are the children of God! We have to love God with a determination and our minds that nothing is going to separate us from loving God. We have to be fully persuaded that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor hight nor depth nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus! We have to love him with all of our might!

Some of us might be wondering what has God done for us to love him. I’m glad you asked. In the beginning there was nothing and when God spoke everything came into existence. He said let there be light and there was light. He said let there be a

fir-ma-ment between the waters and there was the sky! God said let there be land and the land appeared. God said let the land bring forth grass and guess what it brought forth grass. I think you know the rest! God created the heaven and the Earth. He made the earth to float in the middle of space and time with no strings attached. Every morning he causes the sun to rise as the sign of a new day!! He created air for you to breathe and water for you to drink! He gave you eyes so you can see, ears so you can hear. He gave you a mouth to eat and hands to grab the food. He gave Legs and feet so you can walk and run! He gave you a brain to think and hands so you can write. If that's not enough for you will you allow me to dig little bit deeper! He kept your electric on when you couldn't pay the bill! He put food on your table when you had no way to eat. He allowed you to drive all week on $10 worth of gas. When the rent was do you didn't have to call Nate like Stony did in the movie set it off. All you had to do was call on Jesus. If that's not enough please allow me to dig just a little bit deeper. See the reason why we should love God because God first loved us! While we were yet still sinners Christ died for us! For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son in whosoever shall believe in him shall not perish but have everlasting life! That's passion that's affection that's love! What greater love than for a man to lay down his life for a friend! If that's enough for you somebody say yes say yes say yes