Mark 12: 28 – 34

Mark 12: 28 – 34

The words of today’s gospel reading about loving God and loving our neighbour are very familiar to us as we hear them as the summary of God’s law most sundays.

This morning I’d like to try and look at how practically we can apply these two commandments to our lives – how we can love both God and our neighbour.

So just to set the scene, in the run up to today’s reading the Pharisees and Sadducees have been trying to trap Jesus in his words by asking him awkward questions – like whether the Jews should pay taxes to Rome.

But Jesus has answered them well and this scribe who has been listening, is impressed with Jesus’ answers.

And he has a question of his own – which perhaps as a teacher of the law – was a question he had mulled over many times.

And his question is, which commandment is the greatest or most important?

Now the Jews at that time had both the Law of Moses and the Ten Commandments. In total they had over 600 different laws to obey – so no wonder perhaps that this scribe wants to know what is at the heart of all these laws.

And Jesus answers him by saying that all God’s laws can be summarised by two simple principles – which are to love God wholeheartedly and to love our neighbour as ourselves.

OK, so that’s sounds fine - but realistically how can we sitting here in Brenchley today with our busy lives get anywhere near doing this?

Well first let’s look at loving God. Our love for God is a response to Him loving us. As John tells us in his first letter - we love God because He first loved us

Our love for God springs from our understanding of how much He has done for us in Christ.

When we really understand that Jesus loves us so much that he was willing to die for us; that he has paid the penalty we owe for our sins in full on the cross - and saved us completely and eternally - our response should be love and gratitude.

But how do we then show our love and gratitude to God? Well, Jesus tells us in John’s gospel. He says, "If you love me, you will obey my commandments."

As Christians, we demonstrate our love for God through obedience and through surrendering our own wills to His will. Through choosing to try and please Him rather than ourselves.

And really this is a continuation of the decision we made when we first became Christians.

When we first become Christians, it is generally because somewhere within us there is a genuine desire to do life from now on with God rather than without Him.

We’ve tried life without God and have come to the conclusion that it wasn’t making us happy – that we weren’t fulfilled – that there must be more to life.

So, we reach a point of what we call repentance – a point where we say by faith - OK God, from now on I want to do life with you – your way. And we’re prepared to allow God to direct and guide us through life.

In short we decide that from now on, to the best of our ability, we want to live in obedience to Him and to follow Christ.

And our willingness to be obedient is at the very heart of loving God.

This obedience has two parts to it. It’s both obedience in how we live our daily lives and its obedience to specific instructions that God gives us or things He tells us to do.

So firstly, how do we demonstrate obedience in our daily lives? We do it by choosing to do those things we know God wants us to do. By for instance putting aside time each day to be alone with God and pray.

By choosing to read our bibles in order to get to know God better. You might think that’s strange – but the bible is God’s written word.

And just as we get to know people by the words they speak – so we also to get to know God through His Word – the words he has caused to be written down in the books of the bible.

We can demonstrate obedience to God by turning up for prayer meetings – by choosing to give our time to praying for the needs of others; or by choosing to meet with other Christians – to encourage them in their faith and to be encouraged in our own faith.

When we make these small everyday choices to put God first – and make the effort to live in a way that is pleasing to God – we show Him that we love Him.

Loving God is essentially a series of small choices that we make each day. We can choose to get up a bit early to make time to be with God at the start of the day.

We can choose to make the effort – even if it’s a bit cold and rainy outside or there’s something good on telly - to go to some Christian meeting or event or course – because we know God would like us to, and we want to help our local church flourish.

Another part of demonstrating obedience – and love for God - in our daily lives, is seeking to honour God by the way conduct ourselves.

Paul says that we should aim to purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit and seek to perfect holiness out of reverence for God.

In other words, we should do our best to live in a morally upright way. Again, this is a series of choices that we make.

We can choose to drink too much or to watch unpleasant programmes on telly or to end up arguing and saying hurtful things to people.

Or we can say no – I’m not doing that because I want to honour God.

‘No I won’t have another drink thank you’ – ‘can we switch the channel please because I don’t want to watch this’ – ‘no, I’ll bite my tongue even though I’d like to say something.’

Of course, we all struggle to do what we know we should and sometimes we will give in to temptations and do and say things we shouldn’t – but as Christians – we’ll then acknowledge our wrong doing and with God’s help try to do better next time.

The other part of demonstrating obedience to God – and therefore that we love Him, is being obedient to things that He asks us to do.

These may be small promptings to go and talk to someone or to go and visit or help someone who may be lonely or struggling or to pray for someone.

Or God may be asking us to do something – some role He wants us to play in the life of the church. He has a plan for each of our lives – and in order for us to walk in this plan we need to be obedient to what we believe God is calling us to do.

If you’re not sure what God is asking you to do – pray and ask Him. Ask Him to make it clear to you – and then having prayed and talked about it if need be with your spouse or Campbell or a Christian friend - take a step of faith – and do what you believe He is asking you to do. Give it a go.

Every journey involves lots of small steps. And God can only guide us as we’re actually moving and taking steps of faith. You can’t really guide someone’s footsteps if they’re not taking any.

As well as being focused upwards as it were on loving God we need to be focused outwards on loving those around us. In fact, the result of seeking to love God should be a desire to share our faith and show others God’s love.

Personally, I feel incredibly lucky to be a Christian. I feel very fortunate that God intervened in my life and revealed himself to me and saved me.

And I now want those around me to be lucky too. I want to help other people find a relationship with God and come to know Him for themselves.

And really, seeking to love others is the best way to share God and make him known – because God is love. If we can show people love, we show them something of the character of God.

To love our neighbour as ourselves is to treat people in the same way that we would like to be treated. It’s not doing or saying anything to others that we wouldn’t want people to do or say to us.

Its helping and encouraging and seeking to bless others in whatever way we can.

I quite like listening to Joyce Meyer who preaches on the TBN Freeview Channel on weekday evenings at 9.00 pm.

And Joyce says that when she wakes each morning she asks God to help her to be a blessing to the people she will meet that day.

And I quite like that idea. ‘Lord help me today – to bless and encourage the people I meet – to help them know your love.’

Obviously we’re not perfect – I’m certainly not - and some days far from loving the people we meet we can feel quite unfriendly and unloving – but at least we can aim high.

There are a couple of other things that I’d like to say that relate to loving God and our neighbour. Firstly, we desperately need God’s help to live as Jesus commands. We need the help of the Holy Spirit in order to love God and our neighbour. We can’t do it in our own strength.

So we need to keep on asking God to fill us with his power and love.

And the extent to which God will help us is very much tied in with our obedience and submission to God.

The more of ourselves we offer to God – and the more of our lives we open to Him – the more He can fill us and empower us. The less of ourselves we give him, the less He has to fill.

And secondly, the more we focus on living for God and loving others – the more we’ll find that God blesses us and our loved ones.

Because it is in answering the needs of others that our own needs are met. It is in blessing and helping others that we ourselves are blessed and helped by God.

As Proverbs 11 verse 25 says; “The one who blesses others is abundantly blessed; those who help others are helped.”

And Jesus said “Give – and you will receive a full measure, pressed down shaken together and overflowing; for with the measure you use it will be measured to you.”

As we give out – so we receive back from God. Sowing and reaping is a principle of God’s kingdom. What we sow in other’s lives, in time we will also reap.

So, to conclude, as Christians we should aim as much as we can – with the help of the Holy Spirit to love God wholeheartedly and to love those we meet each day as ourselves.

We should aim to give as much of ourselves – our time and effort - as we can to God and to whatever He is calling us to do.

And although we cannot earn our salvation or make God love us any more than He already does – as we seek to love God and our neighbour – we in turn will be blessed.

In the name of the living God. Amen.