Devotions this week based on the Message: “BELIEVE: Week 21: LOVE”
(NOTE: This sermon series and devotional series is based on a book by Randy Frazee entitled, “BELIEVE.”
You may choose to download or purchase the book as a supplement to your worship and devotional emails.)
What could be so important that you would have to talk about it every day…perhaps a few times a day? So significant that you would have reminder wall hangings posted in various traffic points of your house? So impactful that you would want every generation after you to have it? So significant that it would consume all of your very being from your heart to your mind to your actions?
Here’s the answer:
Deuteronomy 6:4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.
The commands of the Lord.
But it wasn’t just to be a set of rules that you memorize, post or pass on. That was secondary to the condition of the heart:
“LOVE the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.”
Jesus was asked about the commandments and which were the most important…as if to discover if I run out of time to think about them, or have minimal wall space to hang them, or my kids grow up before I have a chance to share all of them…which was the most important?
Here’s the answer: (Mark 12:28-33)
28 One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”
29 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 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: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”
32 “Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. 33 To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”
But what if even TWO are more than I can remember or post or pass on?
Here’s the answer: Romans 13:8-10
8 Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not covet,” and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
LOVE is the fulfillment of the law.
One word: Love.
That’s what God wants us to understand, to post, to pass on…to live. Take time to listen to Sunday’s message (Link in the header above)…read the rest of this week’s devotions to reflect on God’s love for us and the power to love others.
Apply: What makes it hard for you to love others? Easy? Identify the joys and challenges of loving God fully and loving others regularly. Pray for God’s Spirit to open your heart more fully to God’s love and your hands to more fully share that love.
Prayer: Spirit of God, fill our hearts and minds with the love of God to motivate, empower and equip us to live, post, and pass on the love of God to others. AMEN.