The Great Commandment
What does God require of us? What is the greatest commandment in God’s law? How should the follower of God live their life?
To live obedient and fruitful lives, we must love God and our neighbor. Jesus summed up the entire law this way, “love God and love your neighbor.” The greatest and first commandment is love God. The second greatest commandment is love your neighbor.
A Pharisee and lawyer sought to test Jesus, calling him “teacher,” and asking, “‘Which is the great commandment in the Law?’ Jesus said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.’” (Matthew 22:36-40, ESV).
How are we supposed to love God? We are to love God with all that we are and with all that we have. We are to love God with our whole heart. We are to love God with all our soul. And we are to love God with all our mind.
How are we supposed to love our neighbor? We are to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.
If we love God, we will obey him and we will love him with everything we are and with everything we possess. If we love God, we will love ourselves, and we will love others as we love ourselves.
May we be obedient to the first and the greatest commandment to love God, and may we be obedient to the second great commandment to love our neighbor as ourselves, fulfilling “all the Law and the Prophets.”
A Collect for the Twenty-second Sunday after Pentecost, (Proper 25): “Almighty and everlasting God, you govern all things both in heaven and on earth: Mercifully hear the supplications of your people, and in our time grant us your peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.” (Book of Common Prayer, 2019).
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