Most of us are probably familiar with the Greatest Commandment…
Now, to be clear, I don’t mean the second greatest one… about neighbors and such… I mean the Greatest one.
Jesus picked it out easily – not even a second thought. “Love the LORD your God with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your mind (Matthew 22:36-40).”
At first this seems like a no brainer… just love God!
Easy! Right?
As I take a moment to think about it I wonder: what does that mean? How do I make God feel loved? How do I know I haven’t missed loving him with a little piece of my heart… or soul… or mind?
What expectations does God bring to that command?
Yikes, now I’m feeling some pressure! What does he want me to do?
I find myself wishing this commandment came with a detailed “How-to,” some sort of instruction manual. Afterall, if its the greatest one I’d better get it right!
As I’ve gone about my ministry this year I’ve been reflecting on this "Greatest Command" text. Its one that I've taken forgranted for most of my life. I've assumed I just knew what it meant. But what I've been learning is that its not enought to love God on my own terms. It comes clear looking at the first time this command was ever given (in Deuteronomy 6), long before Jesus.
What's so exciting is that right here, in its original context, we find that God went on to give us just what I've been looking for - an instruction manual for how he wants to be loved! Take a moment and read it for yourself: Deuteronomy 6.
In my ministry this year we’ve been walking through a big chunk of Exodus. We’ve seen the power of the One True God. We’ve learned his name, YAHWEH, and enjoyed being on a first name basis with him (so when you hear me calling him YAHWEH that’s where it comes from). We’ve witnessed him bring his people out of the land of slavery, take them through the hot, dry desert, provide for them, establish a covenant relationship with them at Sinai, and as we come to Deuteronomy 6 we find the Israelites are finally ready to enter the land that was promised to Abraham so, so long ago - 40 years long ago! Pretty exciting stuff.
They’re on the brink of the promised land. They’ve lived the law for 40 years in the desert, and Moses is preparing them for their new life. He recaps where they’ve been, how they got there, and as we come to our passage we find him helping them understand how the rules are going to apply in this new life context: a great big family of people... with a home of their own!
This is where we find our how-to for fulfilling the Greatest Commandment. A list of instructions that can help us gauge our love for God. He starts by reminding them:
“These are the commands, decrees, and laws that Yahweh YOUR God, directed me to teach you to observe.” (v.1)
Then he tells them WHY to observe them:
“So that: you, your children, and their children after them may fear YAHWEH, YOUR God, as long as you live…” (v.2)
From here Moses goes on to explain what Jesus himself said is the Greatest commandment – the one that started our search for answers today:
Hear, O Isreal, YAHWEH… OUR God,
YAHWEH is ONE!
Love YAHWEH your God with ALL your heart,
and with ALL your soul,
and with ALL your strength.” (v. 4-5)
There it is… the Greatest Commandment is to love the One True God with our whole selves. Now thankfully it doesn’t stop there. Moses goes on to give us a nicely laid-out “How-To” Instruction Guide. These instructions give us a measuring stick to see if we truly love God the way he wants us to.
Love his commands; Impress them…
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Moses says that if we love God completely, then these commands should be ever upon our hearts, so much and in such a way that we impress them on our children!
So, great! Just be a great parent that passes on the faith successfully. No pressure there, huh!
I don’t know how you felt about the parenting role when you were a teen. Maybe I was the only one who thought about it. I figured I pretty much had it in the bag.
· I babysat all the time...
· Long hours...
· All kinds of kids...
· I had ALL the qualifications...
AND I’d put a lot of thought into how I’d raise my kids. TOTALLY. QUALIFIED.
During what was supposed to be my last semester of Seminary I was given the greatest blessing – a baby boy. Here was a tiny baby that God trusted ME to raise for HIM. And while I had been expecting him God had been speaking to me of the plans that he had for my child.
I named him Isaac to remind me that its my task as a parent to help him fulfill God’s calling on his life… whatever that would mean. Even if God were to ask for his very life.
I was ready. But what I didn’t expect was that when Isaac came I would become quite sick, and I did. I wish I had time to tell you the whole story, because it’s a beautiful story of God’s healing power and incredible design for the human body.
But at the time I didn’t know that would come. When Isaac was one it got much worse, and being a mom wasn’t working out the way I imagined.
Sometimes I’d have a bit of a stronger day and I’d get to play with him a little, but most days I was too weak and would need to lay down. There were days when I couldn’t get meals to Isaac or get to him to change his diaper, and when Nathan came home he would get us dressed, feed us, take care of us.
During these days when it was just me and Isaac at home I’d try to lay down on the floor for the day so I so I could feel him, and he could come and lay on me and play on me. I didn’t know if life would ever change. In fact, I was told by my doctors that I should expect to be like that for the rest of my life.
I remember big tears streaming down my face because I wanted so much to play with him and teach him things. I remember looking into his big one year old eyes in a moment of clarity and saying “Mommy’s so sorry Isaac. I really do want to play with you." And I just remember feeling the weight of all those things I knew I was supposed to be doing as a mom – how could I be that for him?
Really, at the core, I was wrestling with the question: How am I going to impress my faith on his life?
I didn’t know there was this “how to,” but I find a kind of retrospective encouragement in it.
In the passage Moses gives four ways that God expects us to impress our faith on our children – and by so-doing, prove our love for God.
The first instruction Moses gives tells us: We love God with our whole self when we impress his commands on our children during time together at home.
What the passage says literally is “talk about them when you sit at home,” but I think God would accept a different posture here. The important thing is that we take that time where we’re at home just being together, enjoying each other’s company, to talk about life together and look at it through the lens of God’s action in our lives.
Many of us probably feel like we don’t have a lot of time to just sit together at home. I know since I’ve been healthy it’s taken a tremendous amount of effort to clear time for “sitting together.” And we’ve even had to make some tough decisions to rearrange our lives to protect this time… and still, too often we fail!
Inspiration in God’s Design
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What Moses is telling us is that we were designed to develop faith in the context of relationship, in family.
The Israelite concept of family was a little different than ours. It extended far beyond the mom and dad. Grandparents and extended family, and really the whole community were part of that.
In a similar way, we are the family of God, and we really do need the whole family! So while this might be speaking to parents, its also speaking to everyone in the family of God.
The bible tells us that relationship, sitting together, sharing our faith, is the place we were designed to grow our faith. And I want to share something with you that has just opened my eyes so much. If you've been reading my blog you've heard me talk these things before.
My background is in psychology, and lately I’ve been just fascinated with God’s design of the brain, where the pleasure centers are.
Maybe you don’t get as excited about a region of the brain as I do, but I’ve been just enamored with it, because it gives us insight into WHY this is God’s first instruction to us! The Relational-Learning connection is literally built right into how God designed our minds to develop.
The septal region is one of the pleasure centers in this area of the brain, and its activated when:
· Pleasant subjects are discussed...
· We feel loved...
· We see a picture of something beautiful...
When this area is activated it releases a type of euphoria experience. In fact, when the pleasure centers are turned on, EVERYTHING we experience gives us pleasure! It’s part of the brain’s build-in reward system. And... when the pleasure centers are turned on while LEARNING, learning happens more easily because it feels rewarding!
Maybe you’ve noticed how kids are motivated by fun… yes? They want it. And they tend to resist anything they don’t see as rewarding.
We’ve seen how the entertainment industry, and what’s cool, draws them in – to the point that they’re fixated. They’ll even fight for these things with great fervor. And we think: If only our kids felt that way about God!
And we reason: If fun and entertainment can draw them in to those things, surely it can do the same thing for their faith!
There’s a problem with this reasoning, though.
In these situations, while the attachments formed seem strong, it’s almost always short-lived. It lasts only until the next shiny thing comes along.
It’s not a good way to teach long-term commitment.
What we find is that the attachment made is actually to the “flashiness” and not to the item or idea itself.
Another problem is that the attachments formed are driven by a selfish desire for more – a lust for the things of the world, and the values of the world. For Isaac it was Lego Star Wars last year. This year, its Pokemon cards – it’s all about having more, more, more… that one I don’t have yet… that one with more life, or power. My kids have a lot of fun with these things, and fun is great, but when I think of church I know that if it’s the reason they’re staying, they’ll leave when fun isn’t central anymore. If our hope is to help our kids build a long-term committment to God, than fun and excitement is really not the best choice.
I think Romans 12:2 is a great reminder. “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be ABLE to test and approve what God’s will is!”
We’re called to train our kids, because kids aren’t DESIGNED to know what they need automatically. Don’t kids tend to want the pattern of this world? I know if I set a delicious, nutritious meal in front of my kids next to a dessert (even a dessert they don’t think they’re going to like) they’ll choose the dessert every time, for every meal if possible!
Faith is meant to be intentionally modelled and taught the way the Bible describes it. It takes work. Sometimes its fun, but its not always fun. And the context of a loving relationship is so, so important.
In the Bible Paul reminds Timothy that “the goal of our instruction is love” (I Timothy 1:5), and he urges Timothy model a godly example… in “speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity (1 Timothy 4:12).
1 John reminds us how we know if we love the children of God, “By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe his commandments!”
This theme of loving relationships as the means to model and impress these commands on our children is found throughout scripture. And going back to how God designed our brains, what’s been found is that LOVE is a more powerful trigger for the pleasure centers than fun is!
And what’s even more amazing is that the attachments formed are deep, strong, long-term. When love triggers the euphoria experience it spreads – we enter into a more enthusiastic state, feeling more optimistic about literally everything. If you’ve been in love before, you know this is true! And because of this, it cultivates a heart that moves from loving self above all to a heart that feels compassion for the hurting, the poor, the sinner. I wish I had more time to tell you about how it works up there!
But God knew we are designed to learn through relationship because he made us to be that way, and the most influential relationship in any child’s life is the one with his or her own parents. So, lets show our love for God by impressing his commands on our children while we spend time together at home!!
At that time, when I noticed things going south, I chose to pull over the van each time something was going wrong and one of us prayed. And, you know, I don’t remember the details
of that day, what the plans were, but I remember clearly that that each
impossible situation resolved, and at the end of the day Isaac was able to say
to me, “Mom, see? God answered our
prayers 5 times today.” 
So there we
have it, God's instructions for how to love him with our whole selves! By impressing his commands on our children...
