In principle, the purpose of
existence almost seems simple.
“Jesus answered him, The
first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord:
and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul,
and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.
And the second is like, namely
this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is none other commandment
greater than these” (Mark 12:29-31).
In practice, no greater
challenge confronts us than God’s call involving unselfish devotion to Him and
to people. Our bent toward
selfishness, passed down through the ages from Adam, motivates us to the
pleasing, promotion, and protection of ourselves. We naturally flow with the current of
“All seek their own” rather than setting sail in the river of Divine love, which
“seeketh not her own” (Philippians 2:21; I Corinthians 13:5).
One Man made the
voyage of unselfish devotion to God and others.
“The Son of man came
not to be ministered unto, but to minister and give His life a ransom for many”
(Matthew 28:20).
The Spirit of this
same glorious One fills and overfills our hearts when we believe (Romans
5:5). Through the Lord Jesus
Christ, born again believers possess the capacity to obey the two great commands
of both Old Testament and New. We
can love God and we can love others.
A challenge too great to fulfill becomes an adventure too thrilling to
miss. “To live is Christ” declared
the Apostle Paul, meaning to live is to love (Philippians 1:21).
Certainly, the challenge
remains because we live in a fallen world wherein a fallen devil and fallen
flesh (including our own) still press us to the black hole of self-centered
narcissism. We’d all admit that too
often we have succumbed to the temptation.
However, the events of the past do not nullify the promise of the
present. I may not have loved God
and others a minute ago, but the redeeming power of Christ’s blood and Spirit
mean that I can love God and others in
this moment. And I must, if
life to be truly lived because, again, to live is Christ (a.k.a. - to live is to
love God and others).
The love of this moment
relies on the faithfulness of God and our faith in His faithfulness. Is He who He declares Himself to
be? Is He as present with us and
within us as Scripture promises? Is
He working in us “both to will and to do of His good pleasure,” that is, His
good pleasure of love? Is the love
of God truly “shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given unto
us?” We know the answer to these
questions. All that awaits is the
determination to believe with our hearts that the love of God for us has become
the love of God in us, and the love of God awaiting to lead, motivate, and
enable us. To live is to love. To live is Christ. In this moment.
“In this was manifested the
love of God toward us,
because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live
through Him.”
(I John 4:9)
No comments:
Post a Comment