Love: The Motor of Right Relationships
Written by Ed Allen
Saturday, 05 February 2000 19:00
Making Key Relationships our Priority
Matthew 22:34-40
When I was young I thought that being a follower of Jesus meant behaving a certain way... But that's like saying that playing football means wearing a uniform... Playing football means dividing into two teams and running, blocking, passing, catching, tackling trying to score and prevent the other team from scoring ... Wearing a uniform simply shows which team we are on.
Similarly, our behavior is important because, in a sense, it shows which team we are on, but following Jesus means loving God and loving the people around you. In fact, Jesus summarizes all that the Bible has to say about being religious by saying
Matthew 22:34-40
(34) Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. (35 ) One
of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: (36 ) "Teacher, which is the
greatest commandment in the Law?"
(37) Jesus replied: "`Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul
and with all your mind.' (38 ) This is the first and greatest commandment. (39 ) And the
second is like it: `Love your neighbor as yourself.' (40 ) All the Law and the Prophets
hang on these two commandments."
Concerning the love of God
1. The love of God involves our whole selves.
- Heart, soul (life, energy), and mind. Love God with all that you are. Think of this as going deep and wide with God.
- Wide = stretch out to the edges of who you are. (heart, soul, mind)
- Deep = to the very bottom of who you are. (all)
- John Piper was right when he said: "Love God with all your heart" means: find in God a satisfaction so full that it fills up all your heart. "Love God with all your soul" means: find in God a meaning so rich and so deep that it fills up all the aching corners of your soul. "Love God with all your strength" means: spare no strain or exertion to put yourself in a position to see the all-satisfying grace of God poured out on you and through you. "Love God with all your mind" means: find in God riches of knowledge and insight and wisdom that guide and satisfy all that the human mind was meant for."
2. The love of God is not a burden; it is a privilege.
- Some of us read this as a burden.
- Imagine a single woman faced with the perfect guy - Now go love him! This would not be a hard or burdensome thing. This would be a privilege.
- So God as the source of all good loves us!! What a privilege to be in a love relationship with Him.
3. (As a corollary to the last point) The love of God is completely satisfying.
- We are creatures who, by nature, love to be in love. We were designed that way.
- To be in love with perfection is to be perfectly satisfied.
- Sin is not the pursuit of pleasure or happiness or satisfaction. Sin is the pursuit of those things outside of loving God.
Love is the motor of right relationships. It is what drives relationship in the right direction.
Our relationship with God is not driven by guilt, or fear, or performance, or duty. The motor of our relationship with God is love.
1. Some of you are thinking, "I don't always feel like I love God." It's important to remember love is both an action and a feeling. I love Diane. I know I do. I feel lovingly toward her and I act lovingly toward her. Sometimes when I don't feel lovingly toward her, I still act it out because I know the payoff of that action and I know that over the long run the feelings will return.
2. Somebody here is thinking, "I don't really love God. I mean I believe He exists, but I don't love Him."
- Diane - didn't know her. Heard about her. But as soon as I had met her, I knew this was someone special. To know God is to love Him.
- Seek God out. Ask him to show Himself to you. And know that loving him involves a decision.
3. For some of you the love of God has waned in your life. You have let it slip away. You have loved God halfheartedly and from a distance. You have been too busy to spend any time with God. You have sought your meaning and purpose in other things. You have felt a great distance between you and God and in some cases you have been right.
- This situation is very simply corrected by acknowledgement (what the Bible calls confession) and deciding to redirect your energies (what the Bible calls repentance).
Love is the motor of right relationships. It is what drives relationship in the right direction. Our relationship with God is not driven by guilt, or fear, or performance, or duty. The motor of our relationship with God is love.
And so our relationship with others. Right relationship with others is driven by love. "Love your neighbor as yourself."
1. Jesus gives the command to love others as the flip side of the command to love God.
- He had been asked "Which is the greatest commandment?"
- He answers that by giving 2 commandments. In reality the second is the flip side of the first.
- John makes the point you cannot love God and hate your brother or sister.
- If Jordan and I come into a dark house and I turn on the light, both of us are now in light. If Jordan claims to still be in darkness, then something is wrong with his eyes.
- Similarly, if I am unable to love others, then something is off in my love relationship with God. God is love. Where He is, love happens!
2. We are to love others to the same degree as we love ourselves.
3. We are to love others in the same way as we love ourselves.
Right relationship with others is driven by love. Not by sex, not by manipulation, not by control, not by rules and regulations.
1. Somebody will say "I sometimes don't feel like I love others."
- One of 2 things. As we said this may be an indication of a problem in the love relationship with God.
- It may be simply that we must act on our love and know that the feelings will follow.
Everything that you and I are and everything that we do as followers of Jesus is summarized in these two commandments. Does you life match up? Is this the motor that drives your relationship with God and with others? If not, this is the day to crank up!