Thursday, June 18, 2009

Today's Passage: Mark 12

Whenever I read a chapter like Mark 12, I really question how the chapters of the Bible were put together. For the most part it usually makes a lot of sense, but there is so much in Mark 12, I find it impossible to talk about the chapter as a whole. There is so much in this one chapter. We cannot begin to really do each section justice. In light of that, we are going to focus on a small…huge section.

For today I want to look at the greatest commandment section. This section is actually something that I have really been thinking about lately and when I sat down to study the chapter, I was so excited and amazed how God provided this chapter for me today. There are some parts of the Bible that are so foundational for us. I think once we get those parts down, then we can look at the big picture of the whole Bible. I equate this to teaching a child. They do not need to know exactly how an oven works, just that it is really hot. We do not have to understand the entire Bible, but there are some key parts we need to have a grasp on before we can go look further. One of those is this section in Mark 12.

When I read this section, I hear, “If you only understand one thing I say, let it be this!!” Jesus tried to make everything so simple in His teaching. In this section of scripture He basically says if we cannot understand anything else, then understand that you are to love God and love people. It sounds simple enough. But, it does not seem that many people today really have this down. Imagine if we all did have this down. Think about if Bear Creek became a place where we all loved God fully and we all loved our neighbor as if they were ourselves. What kind of an impact could we make? Think about how easy it would be to walk into a place like that. If it helps to make it more personal, think about if just you said that your were going to start loving God with everything you had and completely surrendering, and loving people with everything you had. What kind of impact would that make?

I will be honest; I am not sure what this actually looks like. I do not know that I have ever been in a place where this was happening. I think if it can happen, then Bear Creek is a place that it can. I do not know if personally I have been where this scripture is describing either. There have been times in my life that I look back on and see that I was really seeking after God or other times when I see that I was really trying to pour into people, but I do not know that there is a time when I can look back and say that I was loving God with all I had and that I was loving people with all I had. I realized today that, I do not want to get to the end and get a fifty on this test. I am ready to see what can happen if I start completely loving God with all I have and start loving people with all I have. Every week I like to find the one thing for us to pray for or encourage you to do one thing, today it is that you and I would start loving God with everything we had and that we would start loving people like we love ourselves. I think if we do these to things, everything else spiritually will just fall into place. If we seek after God with all our heart, and pour out to others with all our heart, I really do believe that everything else will take care of itself. I hope today’s passage has lit a fire under you like it did me.