Love is amazing and yet it is very deep and one of the hardest things to do, to truly love God and others. Why is that? To truly love God and others requires to take yourself out of the equation. It is not about you and what you can get out of the relationship or getting praise or even thanks for things you did. I had someone tell me recently that he doesn't know how to love others, even family. The thing I admire about this person is he is very honest. I think most people can at least fake it. How do we know how to love? We can only know how to love because God first love us. We can see this demonstrated in the Old Testament all the way through to the New Testament. Some people may say, "I don't like the Old Testament because God is always angry. How can you say that God's love is demonstrated in the Old Testament?" I am so glad you asked.
In Numbers 14:18 - "The LORD is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression but He will by no means clear the guilty visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation" we learn a lot about God. God is slow to anger. We are to be so grateful that he is not quick tempered as WE are because who could stand. We sin against a holy God every day. If we got what we DESERVED, we would be killed instantly and go straight to hell. We should praise and thank God everyday that He is slow to anger. God is abounding in steadfast love. I love the word steadfast. It means it does not waiver. When you are the Lord's, His love will not move, waiver, or fail. It cannot fail because those that are in Christ have His name written on them and God cannot deny or abandon Himself. We also learn that God is not a passive, permissive parent. If you remember, God's chosen people are the people of Israel. God brought them out of Egypt and freed them from slavery. Instead of gratefulness and loving the Lord their God, they complained, disobeyed, brought their idols from Egypt with them, and after all the Lord did for them they did not trust Him. The Lord punished them throughout the 40 years in the wilderness. In fact, that generation did not get to enter the promise land that God wanted to give them because they did not trust Him. It is called their consequence for their bad rebellious behavior. We see this in our lives as we raise our children. If our children act rebellious and disobey we will give our children consequences for their behavior. Does it mean that we don't love our children, of course not. We want our children to learn to do what is right. God desired to bless the children of Israel and not to curse them, but they chose to disobey and rebel.
Deuteronomy 5:10 "But showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love Me and keep My commandments" If you are thinking with a human sinful view you would think God is selfish that He only loves those who obey him. That is NOT the case. Think of your children. I will share something that happened with my son. When our second son was little and my husband traveled a lot, our son always acted angry towards me and got angry when I asked him to do something. I asked him, "Why do you hate me so much?" He said, "I don't hate you." I said, "If you don't hate me why are you always angry at me and won't do the little thing I am asking you to do?" It hit me that day, the Lord is asking that of me as well. If I really love Him why don't I do what He is asking me to do? When you love someone you show it by doing what they ask. God is saying those that keep my commandments show they love me and I will continue to show my steadfast love towards them. All God wanted from the children of Israel is for them to love Him and to demonstrate that by keeping His commandments. That is in a nutshell the book of Deuteronomy. It is a beautiful book.
Now for the New Testament. The greatest example of all from the New Testament is God the Father sending the Son to earth to die on the cross for our sins so that we can now have a relationship with Him and enjoy Him forever. Jesus said in John 15:`13-14 - "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you." Christ died for our sins and how do we show our love for Him, by doing what He commands. As you can see it is what is paralleled in the Old Testament. If we truly love God we will demonstrate that by obeying Him. If you remember Jesus said in Matthew 22:37-39 " And he said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself." These are the commandments you are to obey. They fulfill the law and the prophets. Now, I want to focus on the second great command "You shall love your neighbor as yourself". This is by far the hardest. You are seeing in todays world hate is ruling. I remember when President Trump got elected I would see the sign "love trumps hate" I think an older person must of thought that slogan up. All I saw was hate trumping love. That phrase would require people to understand the game of Bridge or actually know what the word meant. The phrase was to mean basically what Jesus preached, "love your neighbor as yourself." It means love rules over hate or is greater than hate. I love how Jesus changed it with His disciples because he said in John 13:34 - "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another." This command sound very close to "love your neighbor as yourself" but what changed? The bench mark or the measuring stick! The measuring stick for loving others is not ourselves any more but CHRIST! What is His standard? He gave His life for us so that we may live and live for Him. That is a very high standard of love. We can only love others that way by being IN Christ and depending on Him every moment of every day. Can we do it perfectly? No, but by the grace of God as we grow in Christ we will become like Christ. Feed on the Word of God and let it transform you from the inside out. It is the only LIVING book we have. Let us strive to grow to know our Lord and Savior and love Him more and in loving Him we will love others as our Savior loves us.
In Numbers 14:18 - "The LORD is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression but He will by no means clear the guilty visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation" we learn a lot about God. God is slow to anger. We are to be so grateful that he is not quick tempered as WE are because who could stand. We sin against a holy God every day. If we got what we DESERVED, we would be killed instantly and go straight to hell. We should praise and thank God everyday that He is slow to anger. God is abounding in steadfast love. I love the word steadfast. It means it does not waiver. When you are the Lord's, His love will not move, waiver, or fail. It cannot fail because those that are in Christ have His name written on them and God cannot deny or abandon Himself. We also learn that God is not a passive, permissive parent. If you remember, God's chosen people are the people of Israel. God brought them out of Egypt and freed them from slavery. Instead of gratefulness and loving the Lord their God, they complained, disobeyed, brought their idols from Egypt with them, and after all the Lord did for them they did not trust Him. The Lord punished them throughout the 40 years in the wilderness. In fact, that generation did not get to enter the promise land that God wanted to give them because they did not trust Him. It is called their consequence for their bad rebellious behavior. We see this in our lives as we raise our children. If our children act rebellious and disobey we will give our children consequences for their behavior. Does it mean that we don't love our children, of course not. We want our children to learn to do what is right. God desired to bless the children of Israel and not to curse them, but they chose to disobey and rebel.
Deuteronomy 5:10 "But showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love Me and keep My commandments" If you are thinking with a human sinful view you would think God is selfish that He only loves those who obey him. That is NOT the case. Think of your children. I will share something that happened with my son. When our second son was little and my husband traveled a lot, our son always acted angry towards me and got angry when I asked him to do something. I asked him, "Why do you hate me so much?" He said, "I don't hate you." I said, "If you don't hate me why are you always angry at me and won't do the little thing I am asking you to do?" It hit me that day, the Lord is asking that of me as well. If I really love Him why don't I do what He is asking me to do? When you love someone you show it by doing what they ask. God is saying those that keep my commandments show they love me and I will continue to show my steadfast love towards them. All God wanted from the children of Israel is for them to love Him and to demonstrate that by keeping His commandments. That is in a nutshell the book of Deuteronomy. It is a beautiful book.
Now for the New Testament. The greatest example of all from the New Testament is God the Father sending the Son to earth to die on the cross for our sins so that we can now have a relationship with Him and enjoy Him forever. Jesus said in John 15:`13-14 - "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you." Christ died for our sins and how do we show our love for Him, by doing what He commands. As you can see it is what is paralleled in the Old Testament. If we truly love God we will demonstrate that by obeying Him. If you remember Jesus said in Matthew 22:37-39 " And he said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself." These are the commandments you are to obey. They fulfill the law and the prophets. Now, I want to focus on the second great command "You shall love your neighbor as yourself". This is by far the hardest. You are seeing in todays world hate is ruling. I remember when President Trump got elected I would see the sign "love trumps hate" I think an older person must of thought that slogan up. All I saw was hate trumping love. That phrase would require people to understand the game of Bridge or actually know what the word meant. The phrase was to mean basically what Jesus preached, "love your neighbor as yourself." It means love rules over hate or is greater than hate. I love how Jesus changed it with His disciples because he said in John 13:34 - "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another." This command sound very close to "love your neighbor as yourself" but what changed? The bench mark or the measuring stick! The measuring stick for loving others is not ourselves any more but CHRIST! What is His standard? He gave His life for us so that we may live and live for Him. That is a very high standard of love. We can only love others that way by being IN Christ and depending on Him every moment of every day. Can we do it perfectly? No, but by the grace of God as we grow in Christ we will become like Christ. Feed on the Word of God and let it transform you from the inside out. It is the only LIVING book we have. Let us strive to grow to know our Lord and Savior and love Him more and in loving Him we will love others as our Savior loves us.