Love God with All your heart, Soul, and strength

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Call To Worship

Say: Let us now begin to worship the Father the Son, the Holy Spirit, Our Call to worship Comes to us from Reading

Psalm 34:22 ESV

22 The Lord redeems the life of his servants; none of those who take refuge in him will be condemned.

Introduction

300 Sermon Illustrations from Charles Spurgeon (You Find Time for What You Love (Ezekiel 33:5))

When Farmer Brown met Farmer Smith in the market one day, he said to him, “Farmer Smith, I can’t think how it is you find time for hunting. Why, man, what with sowing and mowing and reaping and plowing, and all that, my time is so fully occupied on my farm that I have no time for hunting.” Smith said, “Brown, if you liked hunting as much as I do, if you could not find time, you’d make it.”

And so it is with religion. The reason why men cannot find time for it is because they do not like it well enough

Text

Mark 12:28–34 ESV

28 And one of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, asked him, “Which commandment is the most important of all?” 29 Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” 32 And the scribe said to him, “You are right, Teacher. You have truly said that he is one, and there is no other besides him. 33 And to love him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength, and to love one’s neighbor as oneself, is much more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.” 34 And when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And after that no one dared to ask him any more questions.

Observations/Background

What is love, A biblical and contemporary breakdown

Last week I quoted Billy Joel, this week I won’t quote Night at the Rox Barries. This is something that is notoriously complicated in English. You may say, I love you love to, your dog, your Dad and Mom, your kids, your friends, your wife, your husband, to a plate of Nachos, your country, your sports team. In saying that you know already that those are all very different things and you don’t want to get them wrong.

Men if you love your wife, like you love Nachoes I can tell you that our first biblical counseling sessions going to last about 45 seconds.

Love in English can be romantic, it can be brotherly, warm, friendly, patriotic, familial, intimate (Let the adults understand). It is so many things that we need to really pay attention to what we are hearing or reading to get what kind of love we are seeing.

This is an English language problem, the only hints we have to differentiate between loves, is context and when spoken also tone or inflection.

The New Testament being written in greek has 4 different words for love.

Let me define them:

Tyndale Bible Dictionary (Love)

In the New Testament Of the Greek words available to describe love, eros (sexual love) does not occur in the NT.

Phileo, connoting natural affection, occurs some 25 times, with philadelphia (brotherly love) five times, and philia (friendship) only in James 4:4.

Storge, connoting natural affection between relatives, appears occasionally in compounds.

By far the most frequent word is agape, generally assumed to mean moral goodwill that proceeds from esteem, principle, or duty rather than attraction of charm. Agape is very similar in meaning to hesed in that both denote dedication. Agape specifically means to love the undeserving, despite disappointment and rejection. The difference between agapao and phileo is difficult to sustain in all passages. Agape is especially appropriate for divine love. Agape was long believed to be a Christian coinage, but pagan occurrences have recently been claimed. The verb agapao was frequent in the Greek OT. Though agape has more to do with moral principle than with inclination or liking, it never means the cold religious kindness shown from duty alone, as scriptural examples abundantly prove.

In Mark he uses love Apage love, dutifuly sacrfial love exclusively. This matches the book as Jesus who is the son of God who has come to share the good news. Mark describes Jesus and paints us a picture of Jesus by his drive towards his redemption of men and women from their sin.

The First use of of Agape is with the rich young ruler in Mark 10:21

Mark 10:21 ESV

21 And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”

Jesus saw this young man and loved him with a deeply sacrificial and dutiful love.

In our text today Jesus uses the same word for love of God. We are to love, truly, dutifully in our lives.

The way this love is shared by Jesus in Mark is that God must invoke in us, cause in us a responce of total love and devotion to him.

What God does in our love for him.

Now if you’re not sure how to do this don’t worry the Holy Spirit will lead you in the Love of the father and of the son. He is the divine helper who redirects our loves toward Christ.

Yes your God causes you to love him, we have a wonderful Christ who comes to us even now to spur on our love. He loved us first so that we may love him.

How to respond to his love with your love

Application note:

Mark Contemporary Significance

God does not love only certain portions of us, but the whole person; therefore, we are to love God with our whole selves. God does not save us by fractions, and we are not to offer to God a mere fraction of ourselves. Jesus warns elsewhere that as the slave cannot serve two masters, so it is impossible to divide our allegiance between two masters, God and Mammon (Matt. 6:24; Luke 16:13). We will be ruled by one or the other. The one who is double-minded will inevitably fall sway to Mammon. One cannot seek power, wealth, empire, and sensual gratification and at the same time be submissive to God’s will.

Those who present to God a few moments worship in church once a week while ignoring God in the rest of life—at work, at home, at play—will suffer from a religious schizophrenia. Those who try to straddle the fence by allotting God only token love while maintaining a bosom friendship with the world are doomed to be frustrated in this world and doomed in the world to come. With God, it is all or nothing. Love cannot be tithed like money. Few can honestly sing “All to Jesus I Surrender,” but God requires nothing less.

Point 1 Loving with Heart

Mark Contemporary Significance

We must love God with all our heart. In the Bible, the “heart” is more than a pumping station. It is the command center of the body, where decisions are made and plans are hatched. It is the center of our inner being, which controls our feelings, emotions, desires, and passions. The heart is where religious commitment takes root. It is in our innermost being, where we decide for or against God. We can give assent with our mind and lips, but it is the telltale heart that betrays our true loyalties

Jesus is quoting the Old Testament in this section specifically Deut. 6:1-3

Deuteronomy 6:1–3 ESV

1 “Now this is the commandment—the statutes and the rules—that the Lord your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it, 2 that you may fear the Lord your God, you and your son and your son’s son, by keeping all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long. 3 Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.

When he says this act of loving God and neighbor is the the whole of the law and the prophets.

To Do this in your life will lead to increase in your life.

The Jewish people had they obeyed God’s commands would not have been removed from the land. They had they obeyed God would have had more babies, not killing them with the Baals that required death. They would have had more peace in their relationships

Application:

How do I keep the commandments? Well you are not saved by your commandment keeping. The Jew’s put the cart before the horse, they made the actions all that matters not the faith that spurs on the actions.

I saw a pastor on a video that tried justifying cutting back snacks in the kids ministry so they could give more to international missions. In that case they made their own children suffer, so that others may possibly be blessed. The whole church cut expenses for missions, but what it did was impact the people of their church, no one was willing to cut their own salary for missions.

Performative Holiness is not loving God with all your heart. Let me put it another way hypocrites. For our older saints in the room you need to know this about people younger then 40. They’re very impacted by this. If you act fake, you act a Christian, act anything really they will know you’re not trustworthy. Being internet generations they can wee through fake in a second.

You must really love God with all your heart.

If you play act, larp as a Christian you will not be blessed of God. In fact I’d go as far as to say you’ll be miserable. Putting on a show, instead of true love will cost you dearly.

Christ is worthy on you hearts full affection. Rev. 22:16

Revelation 22:16 (ESV)

16..... I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.”

Walk in the light, actually love him with your whole heart

Point 2 Loving with Soul

Mark Contemporary Significance

We must love God with all our soul. God gave breath to the soul of humans. The “soul” is the source of vitality in life. It is the motivating power that brings strength of will. Together with the heart, the soul determines conduct. When we are commanded to love God with all our soul, it refers to the power of our lives. The apostle Paul provides a good example of someone who loved God with all his soul. All of his energies were focused on pursuing God’s purposes in his life. He wrote, “But one thing I do” (Phil. 3:13). It was this commitment that drove him to do and suffer all that he did for Christ (see 2 Cor. 11:23–29). His soul was so consumed by God that he was constrained to preach, to press on, and to fight the good fight. Those who love God with all their soul will, like Paul, commit all of their energy and strength to him.

Application:

Point 3 Loving with Mind

Romans 12:2 ESV

2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

This is loving God, you actively submitting your mind to Christ, letting him drive your thoughts your conclusions.

Mankind in Sin is spiritually dead, so we must after salvation submit our thoughts to Christ. That which formerly you would have partaken in you find vile.

An easy way to do this is that when you hear something taht confronts what the Bible teaches your mind starts working.

An easy observation is the age of the earth. My wife loves teaching biology, marine biology is one of her favorite studies. But when she sees something that says the earth is billions of years old she rolls her eyes so hard you can feel it! You change your affactions change, your mind no longer is comported to this world.

You will begin to change in your thoughts. I used to think that the prohibiting of hunting in PA on Sundays was wrong, but God calls it a day of rest and devotion to himself, God so loves his creation that he gives the white tail a day of rest as well.

I want to care for creation the way God does. I’m not going to eat my cat!

Application

As you examine your life are you seeing thoughtsd that you have that are not of the Lord. Men your goal in marriage is to wash your wives in the word. Are you setting up the life of your family to wash them in the word? Would God say to you, you’ve lead your wife well!

Ladies your life is to be a helper to your husband and family first! Do you have the order of the Lord in your heart?

I was listening to a book on schooling this week and the conversation of Dress came up. The point was great but what struck me was when Jesus encountered the demoniac he was naked. When Jesus saved him from the demons he was quickly clothed!

Immodesty is part of the devils plan! Repeatidly you see God acting and clothing those he loves.

Adam and Eve, naked in the Sin of rebellion, clothed in forgiveness. Noah naked in Drunken sin, covered by his faithful sons, You and naked before a wrathful sin hating God, clothed in the righteousness of Christ.

Immodesty amongs Christians is sinful and devilish. Yes the enemy of your soul wants you exposed. He knows that it will bring you to destruction. It might make you feel good, or help you fit in, but that is a devilish thing in nature.

Literally the bikini is named after a atoll that was destroyed in Nuclear testing. No model at the time would wear one because of how immodest it was and so they had to hire a prostitute to display it.

We must change our thoughts, we must shape them around the Lord. So for me I wear a sun-shirt to the beach. I have them for all my children, I’m leading the way. Men you lead the way in obedeince.

Ladies if it’s just you in your home, demonstrate your faithfulness that your husband may be blessed by you!

Loving with Strength/all your facities

You will put your full facities into what you love, what is the apple of your eye. So when we look at ourselves as a whole person how are we expressing our love tottally to God?

Here are a couple of examples....

The variations show that we should love the Lord with all our faculties.

• We love God with heart and soul when we embrace him in our deepest convictions and commitments.

• We love God with the mind when we understand our past and our present as he does and dedicate our future plans and goals to him.

• We love God with our strength when we dedicate the physical body, its muscles and energy, to him. We love God with our strength if we follow him with a determined will and with moral resolve in the face of adversity.

In short, we should love the Lord with all our faculties. If we (unlike the ancients) regard a sense of humor as a faculty, then we should love the Lord with our humor. We eschew coarse and degrading humor. We laugh with people, not at people. We ridicule what is ridiculous and evil and laugh with joy at what is excellent and noble. In these ways we love God (and neighbor) with our humor.

Doriani, Daniel M. 2008. Matthew & 2. Edited by Richard D. Phillips, Philip Graham Ryken, and Daniel M. Doriani. Vol. 2. Reformed Expository Commentary. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing.

A great test for parents and grandparents is to see what your children really value what do they do with their time?

Do you find that which you previously would have enjoyed, no longer disrable? Do you find yourself renegotating your schedule your life so that you can love the Lord with all your facilties?

Benediction

Say: As we close our service of worship dear brother and sister please stand for our benediction and receive by faith this blessing from God

Psalm 16:1–2 ESV

1 Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge. 2 I say to the Lord, “You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.”