Loving God

Kidz World Today - Children’s Church

John 13:35 NLT

35 Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”

Confession of Faith

I am not moved by what I see or by what I feel. I am moved by what I believe. I believe the WORD of God! The victory is mine! I have it now! I can see it through the eyes of my faith! In Jesus name

Last Week we looked the the Acrostic for LOVE

1.Listen, 2.Offer Assistance, 3.Value People, 4.Emulate Jesus

Today I want to look at our Love for God and His Love For Us and our love for our neighbors!

As believer’s The importance of a personal relationship with God cannot be overstated.

1) It is the greatest, it is the sum and it is the substance of all commandments.

2) God demands that He be loved. It is His first commandment, and to love is both personal and active.

3) The commandment to love God is given by Christ, the Son of God Himself.

Matthew 22:34–36 NLT

34 But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees with his reply, they met together to question him again. 35 One of them, an expert in religious law, tried to trap him with this question: 36 “Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?”

Mat.

Commandment

"Which is the great commandment in the law?" Through the years Jewish teachers had set up six hundred commandments. No one could keep them all, so the question was often asked and discussed: Which commandment or commandments must be absolutely obeyed? Which ones are important and which ones are not? Can the failure to obey some be condoned or not?

James 2:10 NLT

10 For the person who keeps all of the laws except one is as guilty as a person who has broken all of God’s laws.

All of God's laws are important—equally important. There is one that is first because it includes and embraces other laws

Here is the Love Command!

Matthew 22:37 NLT

37 Jesus replied, “ ‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’

Love God: "Love the Lord thy God." Love God as your very own God. The word your is a personal relationship, not a distant relationship. God is not impersonal, far out in space someplace, distant and removed. God is personal, ever so close, and we are to be personally involved with God on a face to face basis.

The command is to "love the Lord thy God." Loving God is an act that is alive and active, not dead and inactive. We are, therefore, to maintain a personal relationship with God that is alive and active.

Jesus Christ breaks our love for and to God into three parts: the heart, the soul, and the mind

Love God With All Your Heart

Heart: the place of man's affection and will (devotion). The heart attaches and focuses our will and devotion. The heart causes us to give either good things or bad things. The heart causes us to devote ourselves to either good or bad. Therefore, Jesus says we are to love God "with all our heart." We are to focus our heart, our affection, and our will (devotion) upon God. We are to love God supremely

Matthew 6:21 NLT

21 Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.

Where your object of affection is

Matthew 12:34–35 NLT

34 You brood of snakes! How could evil men like you speak what is good and right? For whatever is in your heart determines what you say. 35 A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart.

Matthew 15:18–19 NLT

18 But the words you speak come from the heart—that’s what defiles you. 19 For from the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, all sexual immorality, theft, lying, and slander.

Love God With All Your Soul

Soul : the place of persons breath and life or consciousness. The soul is the life of a person, the consciousness, the breath, the essence, the being of a person.

Jesus said we are to love God "with all our soul," that is, with all our life, our breath, our consciousness.

Love God With All Your Mind

Mind is the place of reasoning and understanding.

God has given intellectual powers to us. We think , reason , and understand. Jesus says that our minds and thoughts are to be centered upon God. We are to love God "with all our mind."

Philippians 4:8 NKJV

8 Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things.

Love is our chief duty. We are responsible to maintain a loving relationship with God.

Very practically, loving God involves the very same factors that loving a person involves

True love is commitment and loyalty to one another

A loving relationship involves the giving and surrendering of yourself. The drive is to give yourself, to surrender yourself to the other, not to take and conquer.

We are to love God, to give and surrender ourselves to Him

Very practically, loving God involves the very same factors that loving a person involves Preacher's Outline and Sermon Bible - Commentary - The Preacher's Outline & Sermon Bible – .

Love God With All Our Heart Soul And Mind

Next Week - Love Your Neighbor

Next Steps:

Read 1st Corinthians