Our Motivation Is Love
Faith in God is very important, as is obedience to God, and the fear of God. However, all of those take a back seat to love. If we know that God is love, then, we should know that what He wants us to do first is to love Him with all of our heart, soul, and strength.(Deuteronomy 6:4,5) Even Jesus affirmed that this was the greatest commandment, and that on it hung all the Law and the Prophets.(Matthew 22:37-40) Why is love so important? We need to have a correct understanding of this truth.
God loved us first, and He wants us to decide to love Him back. Love is the only really pure motivation for having a relationship with God. We can't have a deep, personal relationship with the Lord without loving Him. Then, once we have that relationship, we will want to trust Him and obey Him and fear Him. We trust Jesus as our Lord and Savior, because we understand how He loved us and died for us. We can fully trust someone who loves us, and whom we love. We obey Jesus because He loves us, and we love Him. It is much easier to obey someone when we know they love us and would not ask us to do anything harmful to us. We even fear the Lord correctly when we see His love. We know He hates sin and its destructive power, so He has to punish sin severely out of love to save us from harm. Therefore, even our fear of God is better when we love Him, because we know He loves us.
I could go on and on, but I will just ask one question, "Is love your motivation in your relationship with the Lord?" Make sure you do not trust Him just because you want to go to heaven. That is selfishness, seeing what you can get from God. Make sure you don't obey Him to get blessings or approval, because that is selfish, too. Of course, we do not fear God simply because He is powerful. That involves no relationship at all. Let's make sure we love Him completely, because He loved us enough to give us His all, and He is worthy of us loving Him enough to give Him our all joyfully and willingly.
Tomorrow, I intend to read Deuteronomy 9-11.
God loved us first, and He wants us to decide to love Him back. Love is the only really pure motivation for having a relationship with God. We can't have a deep, personal relationship with the Lord without loving Him. Then, once we have that relationship, we will want to trust Him and obey Him and fear Him. We trust Jesus as our Lord and Savior, because we understand how He loved us and died for us. We can fully trust someone who loves us, and whom we love. We obey Jesus because He loves us, and we love Him. It is much easier to obey someone when we know they love us and would not ask us to do anything harmful to us. We even fear the Lord correctly when we see His love. We know He hates sin and its destructive power, so He has to punish sin severely out of love to save us from harm. Therefore, even our fear of God is better when we love Him, because we know He loves us.
I could go on and on, but I will just ask one question, "Is love your motivation in your relationship with the Lord?" Make sure you do not trust Him just because you want to go to heaven. That is selfishness, seeing what you can get from God. Make sure you don't obey Him to get blessings or approval, because that is selfish, too. Of course, we do not fear God simply because He is powerful. That involves no relationship at all. Let's make sure we love Him completely, because He loved us enough to give us His all, and He is worthy of us loving Him enough to give Him our all joyfully and willingly.
Tomorrow, I intend to read Deuteronomy 9-11.