Daily Devotion, September 9, 2020

 

Devotion: Read Matthew 22:34-40.

In his “The Character of a Methodist” written in 1742, John Wesley writes that the heart of Christianity for him is to “Love God and neighbor.” He continues, “Dost thou love and serve God? It is enough. And neighbors include as Jesus says, neighbors and strangers, friends and enemies.”

These verses seem so simple to read and to hear, but living out these verses with our lives calls us to follow the ways of Jesus more closely and into a deeper walk of faith. We are enabled by the power of the Holy Spirit to “love God with our whole being and to love our neighbor as ourselves.”

We can be sure that anything Jesus asks us to believe and do is reflective of God’s ways already. God’s love unto us is  completely unselfish, self-giving and sacrificial. We rarely can begin to even understand this kind of love.

 

Dr. M. Eugene Boring writes that we understand this love is “God’s nature made known in Christ. It is from this revelatory perspective that we come to know love as unmotivated and unmanipulated, unconditional and unlimited. Such love is not a matter of feeling, which cannot be commanded in any case, but of commitment and action. It is related to the Old Testament word for ‘covenant love’ or ‘steadfast love.’”

We have the example of this kind of love through Jesus. And Jesus teaches us what this kind of love looks like lived in action toward others, as he teaches his disciples, “Forgive seventy times seven, love and pray for your enemies, and if someone asks you to go one mile to go the second mile.”

 

When everything around us is changing, these are truths to which we can anchor our core beliefs, not in words only, but in actions as well. Even when so much changes in your world, keep on “loving God and loving people.” Personal Worship Option:

Loving God, it’s so easy when everything is changing around us to become self-centered. Help us to re-center our lives in You, remember your great love and compassion toward us and to hear your call again to love You and to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Thank you for loving us and calling us back to you. Only in You do we experience true contentment and peace. Amen.