Do You Really Love God?

As I was studying for my Sundown lesson this week I came across a story told by C. W. Bradley. If you come to Sundown you’ll probably hear it again, but I thought I’d share it this week in my Thursday Thoughts.

As he tells it there was once a young lady who purchased a book and began reading it. In a short time in disgust she threw the book aside saying, “This is the most uninteresting book I’ve ever seen.” A few months later she fell in love with a young man, they dated and were finally engaged. He was a writer and one night as they were talking, he casually mentioned the name of the first book he wrote. It happened to be the very one she had tossed aside. That evening, when she returned home, she rushed to the attic and fumbled through several boxes until she found the book. In the early morning hours as she finished the final page, she made the comment to herself, “This is the most interesting book I have ever read!” So what happened to change her viewpoint? The answer is simple, she was in love with the author.

When asked about the greatest commandment, in response Jesus gave two to the inquisitor. The first was to love God with all your heart, soul and mind. Jesus then quickly adds that a second commandment is coupled with this one, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” He then points out that everything hinges on the single concept of love for God and man.

So now to the question, “Do you really love God?” “Do you think that those we as leaders lead love God? Before you answer give it some thought. I did as I was studying for this lesson. How much we love God hinges heavily on how we love one another. Jesus said, “By this everyone will know you are one of my disciples, if you love one another.”

As leaders are we doing a good job in teaching us to love one another? We will answer “yes” of course. We teach people to take meals to the sick. We teach them to visit the hospitals. We teach people to visit shut-ins. The list can go on, but these are just acts of kindness. Paul wrote that if we speak in tongues of men or angels, if we have great faith or give all we possess to the poor, they are just empty acts if we don’t have love.

When people are talked about behind their backs, is that love? When people criticize what others are doing or not doing, is that love? When we are envious of other’s successes, is that love? When we allow ministers to be criticized without stepping in, is that love? When we allow elders to be complained about over decisions, is that love? Do we hold grudges or ill will? Do we look for faults? Do we allow things like this? Do we do it ourselves? If so that’s not love. In the case where we do this we are actually telling God we don’t love Him. As John wrote, “whoever does not love, does not know God, for God is love.” He adds “whoever does not love their brother or sister who they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen.”

When people truly love the Author, we will change the way people look at each other. Realizing that God showed his love by giving his son, nothing stood in the way of God’s love for people, even when they were in the midst of sin. In the same way if we teach people to love God, we first must teach them to love each other.  When you love someone the faults and blemishes may not vanish, but will be unnoticeable or diminished, because love covers them up.

A church that becomes known as a bickering congregation or one that if full of turmoil is telling the world they are only “clanging gongs and banging cymbals”.  If someone walks into an elder’s meeting they should feel the love in the room. If someone walks into a church office they should feel the love in the room. If someone walks into a minister’s meeting they should feel the love. When someone walks through the foyer or into a class they should feel the love in the air. When someone hears the conversations of members in the foyer, over a meal, at school or at their office they should feel the love.

In short the place to start loving God is teaching everyone to love each other in word and deed. As we fulfill the second commandment we will at the same time be fulfilling the first. Fulfilling the greatest commandment can only be done in reverse order.

Now, again the question, “Do you really love God?” The question cannot be answered by anyone with words. It can only be answered by loving one another, the Jesus way.

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”Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. “

1 John 4:11-12