Mark Devotionals
[Please read and meditate on the passage before (or after) reading the devotion.]
Reminder: There will be no daily devotion tomorrow, Sunday. Hopefully most of you will be in a House of Worship listening to God yourselves. Go prepared with open hearts, though!
What really is this “Great Commandment”? We know it as “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” Jesus went on to say, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” But he wasn’t asking us to make a priority list. We as humans love to “mechanize” our lives with check-lists and priorities so that we can check them off one at a time with a sense of satisfaction, “Done! Now for the next thing…” However Jesus did mean love God with… all of ourselves – our desires, thoughts, actions, relationships… So where does church, family, job, pleasure and all those wonderful things that He has given us fit in? And that’s just the point. I believe we are to love our God more than any of them (he once even said we need to “hate” our family, if we were to follow him – obviously an exaggeration/hyperbole; cf. Luke 14:26). Thus there would be times we would love our families as an expression of loving Him. There would be other times when our love for God’s people (church) would be that expression – even to the apparent detriment to our families. Jesus does not want us to compartmentalize our loves, our lives; instead our lives need to be grace-filled by his Love. How do I know when to love whom as an expression of my love of God? I believe it keeps changing (that’s how Grace works!); but I would think He would show that too. And some of it is obvious – like when I have to go to work, or when my child has a fever, or when there’s a fire in the neighbor’s house…
Prayer: Lord, forgive me for choosing the easy way and loving you with only that part of me that seems convenient. Your love was not partial. Thank you Jesus, that when Scripture says you loved us, you gave all of yourself for us, to us. May I do the same to you. Amen.
