Readings for today: Matthew 22:15-46, 23:1-39, Mark 12:13-44, Luke 20:19-47, 21:1-4, 13:31-35
You can spend a lifetime learning to love and still never plumb her depths. You can spend years training yourself to scale the mountain of love and never reach the summit. You can work on love every hour of every day and still never reach the end. The love of God is infinite. It is boundless. It is eternal. It is steadfast, faithful, loyal, and true. I could preach every sermon from here to eternity about love and still not scratch the surface. That’s how I feel every time I get to this part of the Gospels and read the words of Jesus in response to the question about the greatest commandment.
“‘Love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence.’ This is the most important, the first on any list. But there is a second to set alongside it: ‘Love others as well as you love yourself.’ These two commands are pegs; everything in God’s Law and the Prophets hangs from them.” (Matthew 22:37-40 MSG)
These two commands are the pegs on which hang not only the Law and the Prophets but all of life itself. From the beginning, we were created in love to love. We were created to love God first. To walk with God in the Garden in the cool of the day. At the end when Jesus returns again, we will walk before the Lord once more. We will see Him face to face. We will dwell in the light of His presence. We will live in the midst of His glory. We will worship and adore Him continually. We were also created to love one another. It is not good for human beings to be alone. It’s why loneliness creates an existential crisis. We were made for relationships. Made to relate to those around us. Made to relate to other human beings. We see this reflected in our biology. Male and female literally made to fit together. We see this reflected in our psychology as our emotions are specifically designed to help us engage with those around us. We see this reflected in our neurology as the brain literally fires up every time someone smiles at us or waves. God fearfully and wonderfully and specifically making us to live and move and have our being in love. Love is the foundation of all creation for God is love and He is the Creator. Love is what sustains all of life for God loves the world so much He will never let it go. Love is the antidote to our fear and anxiety because God’s perfect love casts those things out. Love is the basis for our foundation for it is love that drove Jesus to lay His life down on the cross. Love is power for it is love that conquered the grave and raised Jesus from the dead. It’s why Paul says to the Corinthians, “Love bears all things. Love believes all things. Love hopes all things. Love endures all things. Love never fails.”
How are you cultivating love in your life? Love for God? Love for those around you? Do you spend time with God each day, basking in His great love for you? Resting in His delight in you? Worshipping Him from a place of devotion and adoration? Do you worship God each week with God’s people? Loving those around you even though they may be different? Loving those around you even though they may be at a different stage in the journey? Loving them even as you express your love to God through music and prayer and self-offering? How are you intentionally loving those around you? Your family? Your friends? Even those you are in conflict with right now or your enemies? Love is the answer, friends. It is always the answer because it is God’s answer to the problem of human sin that corrupts everything in our world. Take courage today and press into love!
Readings for tomorrow: Matthew 24-25, Mark 13, Luke 21:5-38