| Introduction Last week we saw that God is an awesome God. Psalm 145 speaks of his greatness. Ps. 145:3, 8-10 – Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; and His greatness is unsearchable…. The Lord isgracious and full of compassion, slow to anger and great in mercy. The Lord isgood to all, and His tender mercies areover all His works. All Your works shall praise You, O Lord, and Your saints shall bless You. Today we will consider what the appropriate response on our part to that revelation. Our response to God's greatness is love for him. Who knows what love is anymore? Society in general definitely doesn't. Love has become one of those words that mean nothing, yet everybody needs to subscribe to it. Perhaps the best synonyms for the word love as defined by society today are tolerance for whatever is evil and a self-asserted right to fulfill every sinful desire one might have. The object of love is oneself. There could hardly be a more contrary definition of love to the Scriptures than this one. After 40 years of aimless wanders through the Sinai Peninsula, God finally brought Israel to the doors of the "land flowing with milk and honey." As the people were getting ready to cross the Jordan, the Lord graciously reminded them of the covenant that he had made with their fathers at Sinai (1:5-6). He tells them that the covenant he entered with their fathers was for them also, and for their children. At the heart of this covenant is the command to love and obey the covenant God. 16 times throughout Deuteronomy the Lord exhorts his people to love him. I. The Importance of Loving the Lord Mt. 22:35-40 – Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question,testing Him, and saying, "Teacher, which isthe great commandment in the law?" Jesus said to him, "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is thefirst and great commandment. And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets." A. Our Lord Jesus Christ calls this the first and great commandment. B. Everything else hangs or flows from it. C. This is not a commandment given to a small ethnic group waiting to cross a muddy river. D. This commandment is for every man, woman, and child that has ever lived on this earth and will ever live. "Moses' second address starts with 5:1, a summons to 'all Israel' to listen, not to be the advice or reflections of a sage, but to the recitation of God's standards." Victor Hamilton in Handbook on the Pentateuch, pp. 403-4 1. God doesn't invite you to love him; he commands you to love him. 2. He doesn't invite you to believe in him, he commands you. 3. It is our duty to believe and love God and this is important to realize for at least two reasons: a. It is not like we are presented with an invitation that we can answer or not depending on how we feel like – it's what we must do! 1) We have grown averse to the idea of doing things because we should. 2) A well-developed sense of duty is a good thing for us to have. II. The Lord Alone Is God, 4. A. I have often wondered why the Holy Spirit had put this verse right here. B. Since the first time I read this verse, I have thought this an affirmation of God's oneness in contrast to the polytheism of the nations around Israel (which it is). C. But how does that fit the context? D. Well, I think there is more to this statement. 1. The Holy Spirit is saying that Yahweh (the Lord) alone is God – there is no other. 2. There is also the emphasis that Yahweh is one God – he doesn't change, he wasn't something yesterday and something else today. 3. He won't change – the covenant he made with their fathers was true, it continues to be true for them, and will always be true for anyone who is part of Israel through faith in Christ. "If in facing the same situation he does one thing one time, and in facing that same situation another time he does something else, then we have two gods. A god who is inconsistent is historically polytheistic." Victor Hamilton in Handbook on the Pentateuch, p. 407 4. We are to love this God and no other, this God who doesn't change and remains faithful to his promises. III. Love Your God, 5. 1. God commands us to do something that left to ourselves we can't do. 2. But God himself provides to us the grace to obey him. Dt. 30:6 – And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live. B. This love is comprehensive. 1. Jesus quoted this verse and three of the evangelists recorded it for us. 2. Each one recorded it a little different than the other a. Mathew – Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. b. Mark – Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength c. Luke – Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind (the lawyer said it but Jesus approved it) 3. Putting all three together we have, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. 4. In other words, we are to love our God with our entire being. a. Every effort is to be directed to loving God. b. Every skill, talent, and gift is to be used for loving God. c. Every cell in our bodies is to be involved in loving God. 5. Implication – If we are to love the Lord with all our being, then every other person or thing we love must be a display of our love for God and how we love them too. C. This love is intelligent 1. Society defines love as purposefully refusing to acknowledge that there is anything wrong with anybody. 2. That it is contrary to facts, solely about what we feel at the moment. 3. So, society teaches that love is devoid of any intelligence. 4. However, the Scriptures tell us that we are to love our God with our minds. a. Our love for our God is an informed love b. Our love for our God is based on what he has revealed to us. c. This also implies we cannot love him without loving his Word because that's where we find him, 6:6. Jn. 6:67-69 – Then Jesus said to the twelve, "Do you also want to go away?" But Simon Peter answered Him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. Also we have come to believe and know that You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." "To love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, we must know him, and therefore love him as those that see good cause to love him." Matthew Henry in Matthew Henry's Commentary, vol. 1, p. 751. "Love for God, if genuine, inevitably entails obedience to the word of God. One cannot love Him with all his heart but be lukewarm toward His word. Thus, Moses follows the injunction to love God with the injunction to put His word 'upon your heart.'" Victor Hamilton in Handbook on the Pentateuch, p. 408 1. Not just a feeling or emotion 2. True love for the Lord is always evidenced by what we do (body) 1 Jn. 4:20-21 – If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also. 3. The second great commandment is an evidence of the presence of the first. E. This love is worshipful (soul). 1. It shows itself in a desire and delight in worshiping God daily, but especially on his day. 2. We can't divorce loving God and worshipping him. Ps. 84:1-2 – How lovely is Your tabernacle, O Lord of hosts! My soul longs, yes, even faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God. F. This love is a response. 1 Jn. 4:19 – We love Him because He first loved us. Jn. 3:16 – For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. IV. Live Your Love for Your God A. God is God, and I am not! 1. Simple thought, hard practice. 2. Every time we sin we say, "I am God, and God is not." "God deserves to be honored, worshiped, trusted, feared, and loved as God. Our responsibility and privilege is to glorify Him – to enhance His reputation in the minds of rational creatures, to live our lives and order our days so that all who encounter us will have a higher regard for God than they might have had they never encountered us!" Douglas Bookman in Introduction to Biblical Counseling, p. 161. 3. We cannot have idols in our lives "An idol is any desire that has grown into a consuming demand that rules our hearts; it is something we think we must have to be happy, fulfilled, or secure. To put it another way, it is something we love, fear, or trust…Anytime we long for something apart from God, fear something more than God, or trust in something other than God to make us happy, fulfilled, or secure, we worship a false god. As a result, we deserve the judgment and wrath of the true God." Ken Sande in The Peacemaker, p. 109 B. When we live our love for our God, all the relationships that we are in will be affected. 1. The people in the church will love one another. 2. Conflicts will be solved biblically "Every time you encounter a conflict, you will inevitably show what you really think of God. If you want to show that you love him 'with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind' (Matt. 22:37), then ask him to help you trust, obey, imitate, and acknowledge him, especially when it is difficult to do so. This behavior honors God and shows others how worthy he is of your devotion and praise." Ken Sande in The Peacemaker, p. 33. 3. Husbands will love their wives with the same type of love that Christ loves the church – to do anything else is to not love God. 4. Wives will honor and respect their husbands in the Lord – anything else is a claim of deity. 5. Parents will not provoke their children to wrath; rather they will raise them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. 6. Children will honor and obey their parents in the Lord – not to do that is to not believe in God. 7. Older men will be "sober, reverent, temperate, sound in faith, in love, in patience" – Titus 2:1 8. Older women will "be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things." 9. Younger women will love their husbands, love their children, be discreet, chaste, homemakers, good, obedient to their own husbands." – Titus 2:3-4. 10. Young men will "be sober-minded," that is "self-controlled" – Titus 2:6. C. When we live our love for our God, all decisions and thought processes will be affected 1. How we choose to use, or not use, the gifts that God gave us will be affected by it. a. When we love the Lord with all our hearts, we will be consumed in his service and will not hide our light under a bushel or bury our talent. b. We will seek opportunities to serve in his church in whatever way we can. c. To decide not to use what God has given us for his glory is to put ourselves in the place of God. 2. What we choose for our children's education will be affected by it – Dt. 6:6-8 "Reformed evangelicals must therefore exhort the members of their churches to bring up their children in homes characterized by a gracious love for Christ and to provide a biblical education for these children." Douglas Wilson in Mother Kirk, p. 45 a. Any type of education that would be contrary to a biblical education would also be in opposition to loving God. b. Notice the sense of urgency given in verses 7 and 8. 3. Decisions in the area of self-control will also be affected by our love for our God. a. Decisions regarding eating. b. Decisions regarding exercising. c. Decisions regarding harmful habits. 4. How we choose to spend the money God has given us will also be affected. 5. How we choose to spend our time will be affected. e. Entertaining ourselves Conclusion
So, love God! Love him through believing in Jesus Christ. Love him with a committed love. Remember that he loves you with a love that will not let you go.
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