#4 The Greatest Commandment

I. Introduction
A. Six week series: Gold from God
B. Today: #4 The Greatest Commandment
C. Matthew 22:36–40 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” 37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
D. Jesus never referred to the Golden Rule as the Golden Rule, nor the Great Commission as the Great Commission. These are names Christian people attributed to these sayings of Jesus. But He did refer to this as the greatest commandment, by saying, “This is the first and greatest commandment.”
II. God wants us to love Him with everything.
A. 37-38 “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment.
B. To love Him with all of your being – that is what He requires — loving with ALL your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.
C. “heart, soul, mind” These aren’t a series of specific ways in which we are supposed to love God. They express the totality of our being. We are supposed to love God with everything we have, everything we are.
D. The problem is always not loving God enough, never loving God too much.
E. If you are married, you should long for your spouse to love God more than you. The spouse who loves God most is going to be the best spouse. You don’t want to be someone’s idol.
F. Your friends might think you take this God-stuff too far. But you can never love God too much. And when we hear this, we need to be ready to say, “Oh no! In light of how much He has loved me, my problem is that I don’t love Him enough!”
G. We all love many things. But what do we love more than anything else? Of all the things we love is there one thing we would be willing to give up everything else for?
H. The greatest obligation of life is not to do something but to love something – or to love Someone.
I. The greatest obligation of life is not to believe something. In fact, the distinguishing characteristic of saving faith is that it includes love for God. The demons believe in God but they do not love Him. In fact, they despise Him.
J. The greatest commandment is not:
1. Fear the Lord
2. Obey the Lord
3. Trust in the Lord
4. Humble yourself before the Lord
K. Aren't these really all the same thing? Well, yes. But not completely. It is not accidental that the greatest commandment is to love God. Because whom you fear & obey & trust and humble yourself before springs from who you love.
L. When Jesus gives this answer, He is not only resolving a theological dispute. He is giving us a glimpse into the heart of God. He’s showing us what is most important to Him.
1. You see, God is relational. Love is at the heart of God’s heart.
2. God is love (1John 4:8, 16).
3. God doesn’t demand we love Him out of a desperate need to be loved, like many earthly rulers. He commands us to love Him because He loves us so much.
4. God wants us to love Him so much because He is supremely loveable. He made us for love. He knows we are cut out for love, that love is the highest dynamic of human existence. He knows that loving Him is the greatest way we can be blessed, because He made us for this purpose — to find our greatest fulfillment and joy by loving Him.
5. He knows that loving Him is what we were made for – it is the supreme happiness of human life.
M. Failure to love God is at the heart of human sin – and human misery.
1. When a man looks at the One who is supremely loveable and beautiful and worthy, and instead of loving Him, turns away from Him as if He is disgusting or looks the other way as if He is nothing or curses Him as if He is evil, that is the greatest sin — and the essence of all sin.
2. In my heart there is a treason, one that poisons all my love.
3. Sin involves loving things which shouldn’t be loved, and not loving the One who must be loved.
4. It is what defines what is wrong with the human race.
5. The heart that is straight/right/true sees this ultimate Beauty and loves it. Only when there is something very off and twisted in a man’s mind & heart can He look at that which is surpassingly beautiful and worthy and not love it.
III. The command to love our neighbor is also essential.
A. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
B. Jesus was unwilling to answer the question as it was asked.
1. They asked Him what the greatest commandment was. And He answered them. They never asked him what the second greatest commandment was. But He answered anyway.
2. He wouldn’t leave it at that. He refused to leave it at that. He was unwilling for the second one to go unmentioned.
3. What does this tell us about the second commandment?
a. It tells us that, even though it’s not number one, number one does not stand alone, number one is not sufficient by itself.
b. It is so important that Jesus insisted that it be included in His answer as to the most important commandment.
c. Though number One is ultimate & supreme, number one was not enough.
C. Why was He so insistent? Why must there be two commandments?
1. He wants us to reflect Him in His love by loving others. He made us in His image.
2. The test of true love for God is love for neighbor. If you have been given love for God, which only comes as a gift, then you will also have love for your neighbor, and if you don't have love for neighbor, it proves that you don't actually have love for God, not matter how much you might say you do or even think you do.
a. 1John 4:20 If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.
b. It’s not enough to love God. Well, that’s a little too bold. Here is a more careful and sound way to say it: It is enough to just love God. But, if you truly love God, you will also love your neighbor. And this is such an essential characteristic of true love for God that Jesus doesn’t think it’s enough just to say, “Love God.”
c. Just saying, “Love God,” can be a cop-out. It is very easy to deceive ourselves into thinking we love God while there is actually none of it in our hearts. So, Jesus gives us a litmus test.
D. It can also be a cop-out to just say, “Love your neighbor.”
1. So many more people would love Jesus if He just said the greatest commandment was to love your neighbor.
2. But He didn’t. He said it was to love God. And the second was to love your neighbor.
3. The liberal church emphasizes love of neighbor and minimize the love of God.
4. But the conservative church often does the opposite — emphasizing love of God by minimizing the love of neighbor.
5. But Jesus doesn’t do that at all. He insists on both.
6. Presbytery mom who said, “At my funeral, I just want people to say, ‘She loved Jesus and she loved me.’ That’s all.” I really like that.
E. Notice that this isn’t about just loving the brethren. It’s not about just loving the ones easy to love or the ones you're comfortable with, not just loving the ones of our own race or our own country or our own values or our own age. Remember Jesus’ commentary on the second greatest commandment – in the parable of the good Samaritan.
F. And it’s not about just loving a little. We are to love our neighbors as ourselves. And you know how much we love ourselves!
IV. Love is the summary of the law, and the summary and the specifics of the law are both essential.
A. Referring to the commandment to love God and to love neighbor, Jesus said in v.40, “On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
B. All the law is fulfilled in one word, and that is, love.
1. In the sermon on the mount He said, “In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.” (Matt.7:12)
2. In Romans 13:10, Paul said, “Love is the fulfilling of the law.”
C. Now some people take this to mean something very different than what Jesus meant. They take it to mean that the laws aren’t important, only being loving. But that’s not at all what Jesus is saying.
D. Jesus wants us to be big on obeying the law. “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments” (Jn.14:15). He wants us to be deeply committed to obeying God’s commands.
E. What He’s saying here is that the law is the details of how we’re supposed to love.
1. He is telling us that the law – rightly understood – is actually all about love.
F. And this tells us something important about the law — and something important about love.
1. Love does not replace the law, but it does help us to see the spirit and intent of the law. It does help us to understand how we’re supposed to go about obeying God’s law.
2. We are to obey God’s law in light of the fact that He intended it to be a guide for love.
a. And we are to obey God’s law in a manner that is consistent with the love-intent of the law.
3. Jesus wants us to not just outwardly conform, He wants us to obey from a heart of love, love for Him and love for our fellow man. This is real obedience. This is the real law of God.
4. And if we view God’s law as a set of outward rules, or if we merely obey in an outward sense, we’ve missed the heart of the law. And all we are is a bunch of Pharisees.
5. This is why Jesus kept stressing His commandment to love.
G. So, there are two dangers here.
1. There is a fallacy in thinking that the summary – to love – is all you need.
a. There is a way of using love to undermine or erase our duty to the law, and we need to be aware of that and avoid it at all costs. It’s easy to do that. But it is evil.
b. People have different impressions and opinions about what love requires in a given situation.
(1) How do we love in this situation? How do we love when that happens? How do we love a person who is like this? How do we love a person who does that?
(2) Everyone has an idea about what is the loving thing to do. But God doesn’t just leave us with the command to do what we think is the loving thing. In His word He tells us how to love; He tells us what to do in order to love.
c. It’s not just a motive of love that’s important, it’s also the right actions which are loving.
d. When God has spoken, we don’t just do what seems to be loving, we lovingly do what God has commanded, trusting Him that He knows best how to love, and that in His word He tells us what He means when He says to love.
e. For instance, some people think it’s extremely unloving to suggest or imply to someone that they might be on the path to eternal punishment. But according to Jesus and His word, this is sometimes an important act of love.
2. The other danger is the fallacy of thinking that the particulars of God’s law are all you need.
a. When you’re trying to obey God’s law, it’s easy to forget that all of God’s commandments are ultimately about love.
b. If you obey the laws without doing it out of love for God and man, you have missed the big thing.
c. Obeying the rules without it being all about love makes obedience wooden or even cold.
d. It can be easily a way of using the law to ignore our duty to love, and we need to be equally afraid of that error & danger and avoid it at all costs. It is equally evil.
e. When Jesus came, one of the things He found deficient in the way the law was being handled was that it was being followed without regard to love. And this is a violation of the essence of the law. And Jesus helped us to see that.
3. You can’t grasp love without grasping the law, and you can’t grasp the law without grasping love.
V. So, this is the greatest commandment.
A. There is One who is supremely loveable – and cherishing Him, adoring Him, having affection for Him is the first duty of all beings.
B. We sing the hymn, “More love to Thee,” asking God to help us love Him more. And that’s a great prayer to pray. It’s His highest command, and we need His grace to love Him more than we do.
1. But the Bible doesn’t have many prayers like this.
2. What the Bible does have is prayers for our eyes to be opened to see HIS love.
3. You see, that’s the best way to grow in our love for God — to realize how much He loves us, to realize all He’s done for us, and continues to do for us, and promises to do for us in the future, to
4. The person who loves God most is the person who best grasps the love of the Lord.
5. Loving God isn’t really something you do by trying to do it. Loving God is something you do by investigating, and pondering, and enjoying the love of God.
6. I would suggest that this is what doing theology is ultimately about — or should be about. It’s an investigation of the deep and multifaceted love of God for sinners like us.
7. If that’s not what theology is, what good is it?
8. And if that’s what theology is, then all of us should want to be theologians.
C. We love Him not just because He is in charge and commands us to do so, but because He is so supremely and eminently lovely and adorable and worthy of being cherished.
1. Has He not made Himself loveable to us – by loving us with so great a love?
D. But it is possible to be blind to love. It is possible to be loved deeply and faithfully by a parent, by a sibling, by a friend, and yet be blind to that love, treating it as trivial and insignificant.
1. And so many are blind to God’s love. Every breath they take, every bite they eat, every beauty they see, every bit of human love they experience is a gift of God’s love, but they don’t see it.
E. And yet, in the end, because of sin, even our love for Him is a gift He gives.
1. Romans 5:5 God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.
2. The new birth – by which we come to see His love, by which we come to love Him – is God's gift of love to us.
3. Do you love Him? That didn’t come from you. It came from Him.
4. Every true believer loves God (Rom.8:28), but none of us love Him with all our whole heart, soul and mind – as He deserves to be loved.
5. But at least by God’s grace He’s gotten us started!
6. And one day those who love Him now will love Him more, not held back by sinful limitations.