How do you demonstrate that you fully love God?

 9 Mar 26

Today's devotional: taken from YouVersion, Devotions on F.I.R.E. Year One

Readings:

Deuteronomy 8

Deuteronomy 9

Deuteronomy 10

Mark 12:28-44

And the second, like it, is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these (Mark 12:31). 

How do you demonstrate that you fully love God?

Jesus is asked to give the “first commandment of all” (Mark 12:28). He quotes from Deuteronomy 6:4-5 and gives the Shema (literally “hear”). The Lord says, “The first of all the commandments is: ‘Hear, O Israel, the LORD our God, the LORD is one. And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength’” (Mark 12:29-30).Then Jesus adds, “And the second, like it, is this: ‘You Shall love your neighbor as yourself’” (Mark 12:31). The adjective “like” means one and the same. In essence, to demonstrate that you love the invisible God completely you must equally love your visible neighbor. 

Employment Point: Love your neighbor as yourself to demonstrate that you love God.

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Reflections

“Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands.”Deuteronomy‬ ‭8‬:‭2‬ ‭NIV‬‬

• One of my favourite verses is “The crucible for silver and the furnace for gold, but the Lord tests the heart.”Proverbs‬ ‭17‬:‭3‬ ‭NIV‬‬
• That is His usual. He wants to make sure our heart is set in the right places and in the right things. However, 40 years of testing is not short and you can imagine the amount of frustration, grief or even anger that had gone through their hearts. But did you think about why the Lord wants to do this? He’s got nothing better to do? He loves putting people to the tests? Of course not!!
• I believe in all these tests, we learn and we grow. Even in the tests that may be repeated, He is cross checking our understanding on the issues on hand. He wants to make sure we truly understand why and be able to still trust Him in all things. None of the testing is in vain.
• May we able to persevere through testing and also keep trusting in Him

“Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so the Lord your God disciplines you.”

‭‭Deuteronomy‬ ‭8‬:‭5‬ ‭NIV‬‬

• We are His, that’s why He cares and He loves.

I remember the words “true love knows no bounds”. It would not care or calculate how much was given. No, it doesn’t mean to be like this. True love is all about giving. The giving of our time, energy, love, money and in fact everything. To show that we love the Lord, we should be willing to give up our all and our very best to Him. He deserves our first fruits, not the leftovers.

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Going with Jesus

BY OSWALD CHAMBERS

March 09

“You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve. — John 6:67

Our Lord’s words hit home most forcefully when he talks in simple ways. Like the disciples in this passage, we are aware of who Jesus is; we know him and love him. But he still asks if we are going to leave him. Why? Jesus wants to drive home that the attitude we have to maintain toward him is one of total trust and abandon. We must always be journeying forth in his name, following wherever he leads. “From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him” (John 6:66). These disciples lost the bold and reckless commitment Jesus wanted them to have. They didn’t stop believing or fall back into sin, but they gave up their intimacy with him.

Many of us today are guilty of this. We may be spending ourselves and being spent in Jesus’s name, but we aren’t walking with him; we aren’t drawing close to him with perfect trust and confidence. Yet this is the one thing God holds us to steadily: that we be one with Jesus as Jesus is one with the Father.

After Christ is formed inside us, the discipline of our spiritual life centers on this question of oneness. If God gives you a clear and emphatic message about something he wants you to accomplish, let oneness be your guide in how to pursue it. Don’t struggle to find any particular method; don’t create a plan that isn’t his. Simply live a natural life of absolute dependence on Jesus Christ, and God will bring about the thing he wants.

Never try to live in any way other than God’s, and remember that God’s way is absolute devotion to him. The certainty that I know I do not know—that is the secret of going with Jesus.

Deuteronomy 8-10; Mark 11:19-33

WISDOM FROM OSWALD

Defenders of the faith are inclined to be bitter until they learn to walk in the light of the Lord. When you have learned to walk in the light of the Lord, bitterness and contention are impossible.

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Reflections

“Simply live a natural life of absolute dependence on Jesus Christ”- these words really stood out for me when I read this devotional. It felt that the whole time this is what the Lord has been trying to tell us, through different means and way or even parables that all He wanted from us, is to just trust Him!

It says simply live. Not live a life that is complicated that needs to be mapped or planned. Nope. The Lord already has it all settled even before it happens. He wants us to just simply follow! No need for detailed planning, itinerary, budget or taking leave. It is about going with the flow and letting things happen as is.

It felt like a spontaneous road trip that the Lord is inviting us to go with Him. But would we be willing to put everything down and sit in His car, without knowing where we are going, where we are going to stay, what we are going to eat. Not even thinking about if we may be fit to travel wherever He is bringing us to or the clothes we may need to bring. No it’s nothing of that sort. He is calling us to just trust Him. Get into His car and let Him bring us wherever He wants to. We just need that willing heart to say yes, to follow. The rest, He will provide. 

It is like that for the apostles even. Jesus just calls them to follow Him. He did not mentioned which hotel they will be staying, He did not provide any itinerary. What were the apostles thinking? It has to come from a place of faith and trust.

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Lent devotion Day 20/53

taken from YouVersion, Lent for Everyone

Lent for Everyone is a devotional created and written by N.T. (Tom) Wright. For each day of Lent, there is a reading chosen from the Gospel of Matthew, plus a reflection by Wright. These readings have grown out of a project encouraging Lent reading in Northern England. This is the second in a three-volume series based on the Revised Common Lectionary of the Church of England.

Today’s reading:

Matthew 14

WEEK 3: MONDAY

Forty years ago I sat in my college room with a friend and we read this passage together. He had come to a living faith in Jesus just a week before. He was still wide-eyed with delight at the sense of Jesus' personal presence within him, and at the changes he could feel happening in his heart and head. But he was also anxious. Is this just a fad? Can I keep it up? Will this just be one of those things that is very exciting for a few weeks, and then will fade, leaving me a bit sad and cynical?

This passage might have been written for someone in that frame of mind. Peter is one of the few characters in the gospels, other than Jesus himself, whom we really get to know. This story is typical of the man we see all through — loyal, impetuous, wanting to do the right thing, then getting it embarrassingly wrong and having to be rescued once more. Many of us can identify with him only too easily.

But before we even get to Peter's bit, notice what has happened. Jesus has just fed five thousand people with what started out as next to nothing. As we know from the other gospels, the crowds were, not unnaturally, very excited at this. Jesus as always was anxious that things shouldn't get out of hand (John tells us that the crowd wanted to seize him and hail him as king then and there, which would have been disastrous). So he quickly sent the disciples away and disappeared up the mountain.

Then it happened. Some time after midnight, as they were still tugging at the oars and getting nowhere, he came to them. Walking on the water.

This is such a strange story that many have sneered at it, but Matthew and the other writers knew perfectly well how strange it was and told it anyway. We have been learning, bit by bit, to see that Jesus seems to have possessed a kind of sovereignty over creation itself. Though our minds boggle at the thought of what that might mean, the story fits this pattern. The disciples, not unnaturally, are scared out of their minds: it must be a ghost! But no; Jesus tells them it's all right. They are not to be afraid. ('Don't be afraid,' by the way, is the most frequently repeated command in the whole Bible — something we all need to remind ourselves in our worrying and frantic world.)

Then it's Peter's turn. Triumph, disaster and rescue. Peter the fisherman knows perfectly well you can't walk on water. But, as we saw in chapter 10, Jesus gave the Twelve power to do the things he'd been doing . . . so maybe with this as well? And, amazingly, it happens. Peter walks towards Jesus. That is the walk of faith which we all take when we hear Jesus' voice and begin to follow him. We know perfectly well the world isn't like this; that money, sex and power are what matters; that we can't possibly give up our bad habits or keep up a life of prayer and holiness . . . but perhaps we just might, if Jesus himself called us to do it? Yes, he says, I am calling you; and off we set.

But then it all goes wrong. The wind had been there all along, but now Peter noticed it as if for the first time: what am I doing? I must be mad! I can't possibly . . . and he starts to sink. That's how it is for us, too. But the crucial moment is the next one. 'Lord, rescue me!' The simplest of prayers, and one which Jesus loves to answer. That's what he's come for, he said on another occasion, to look for people in need and rescue them. He may then smilingly remind us that we shouldn't have doubted. That's the lesson we need to learn, and it will take time. But he comes into the boat with us; the wind stops; and the result, of course, is worship. I doubt if the disciples quite knew what they meant by 'Son of God' at this point. But there wasn't much else they could say.

I lost touch with my friend after we left college. But just the other day I met someone who attends the same church. He is still going on, trusting Jesus, walking with him, helping others in their own faith. No doubt there have been times when, like Peter, like you and me, he's been tempted to doubt, and has started to sink. But Jesus loves rescuing people. That's what he's come to do.

TODAY

Lord, give us the faith we need to attempt the impossible for you; and rescue us when our faith suddenly gives out.

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Let’s pray:

Father we truly thank You for the personal experiences that we have with You. Something that is so personal it could probably meant nothing to others. Thank You Lord for caring and loving us so personally, even though we are so small and insignificant. Yet, You are willing to come down to our level and walk with us. Thank You Father for Your love and grant us the faith we need to walk on water. Help us to trust You, the Lord who is above all things, is in all things and knows all things. Help us to ready whenever Your car comes to pick us up. In Jesus’s name we pray. Amen 🙏🏻