A Question about the Commandments
The Gospel of Mark: Jesus the King • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 40:29
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One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”
“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”
“Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”
When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions.
Introduction
Introduction
From Hostility to Impressed
After Jesus dealt with the hostile questions of the Herodians, Pharisees and Sadducees, the third major group that comprised the Sanhedrin, the scribes ask Jesus a question.
The scribes were the theologians, the experts in biblical interpretation among the Jews.
However, this time the question isn’t trying to be hostile, instead the question from Scribe is because he was profoundly impressed by the way Jesus handled the trick questions posed by the others.
The Scribe’s Question
The Scribe’s Question
A Question of Priority
What is the single most important commandment that God has given to this world?
The scribe didn’t just want to know what God had commanded for the Jews, he wanted a bigger answer, what was it that God wants for every human being created in the image of God.
It was common in both the OT writings and in Jewish teachings at Jesus’ time for teachers to attempt to summarize our chief obligation to God.
He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
And what does the LORD require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God.
“See, the enemy is puffed up;
his desires are not upright—
but the righteous person will live by his faithfulness—
d. One Rabbi who taught twenty years before the ministry of Jesus, summed it up this way: “What you would not want done to you, do not do to your neighbour, this is the essence of the law”.
2. Jesus Directs the Question to the Shema
a. To answer the scribes question Jesus directs him to the most fundamental summary of man’s obligation that God gave His people in the OT, the Shema.
These are the commands, decrees and laws the LORD your God directed me to teach you to observe in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess, so that you, your children and their children after them may fear the LORD your God as long as you live by keeping all his decrees and commands that I give you, and so that you may enjoy long life. Hear, Israel, and be careful to obey so that it may go well with you and that you may increase greatly in a land flowing with milk and honey, just as the LORD, the God of your ancestors, promised you.
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
b. The call that begins the command is the word “Hear” which in Hebrew is shema.
c. The Jews would recite the shema as a call to direct their focus and affection on God. They were called to love God not simply for what He had done for them, but for who He is in Himself.
d. We are not truly growing in our Christian life until we understand that we are to love God simply because He is lovely and wonderful, worthy of every creature’s unqualified affection.
Comprehensive Love for God
Comprehensive Love for God
The Shema commands us to have a comprehensive love for God.
Love God with all our hearts - our love for God is to come from the very root of our being. Our love for God is to be an affection that is surpassed by no other affection. It is to be an undiluted, unmixed love for God.
Love God with all our souls - our love for Him is not to be lukewarm. It is to be blazing fire in our souls.
I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.
c. Finally the shema calls us to love God with all our strength - our love is not to be weak, we must call on all of the strength we can muster to express our affection for Him.
2. Jesus adds to the Shema
a. Jesus actually adds a fourth element to our love for God, Jesus says we must love with our hearts, soul, mind , and strength.
b. Jesus adds the dimension of loving with our mind. We are to love God with the fullness of our understanding. Many Christians never bother with this! We are called by God to apply our minds to the fullest extent to understand the riches and depths of His revelation of Himself in His Word!
If we are truly honest with ourselves, we have to admit that we have not kept the Great Commandment for even a single day of our lives. This causes us problems, because we see that no one actually loves God in this way, so we become lukewarm about it.
We think it’s no big deal, we are human, sinners, if we don’t keep God’s command it’s no big deal.
The Most Serious Sin
The Most Serious Sin
What is the most serious sin?
We love to put levels on sin, don’t we. If you were asked what is the worst sin you could do what would you answer? Is it murder? Adultery? Sexual Sin?
According to Jesus it’s none of those.
It seems to me that if the Great Commandment is to love the Lord your God with all our hearts, soul, mind, and strength, the great transgression is the failure to keep this commandment.
That’s scary, considering I have not truly kept this commandment for five minutes in my life! Have I ever really loved God with my whole heart, where nothing gets in the way of my love for Him? Has my soul truly ever overflowed with affection for God? Often my mind is lazy with respect to understanding God’s Word.
Thank goodness for Jesus! Were it not for Him I would be completely lost when it come to living my life by God’s commands.
Jesus is the only one to have ever truly lived like this!
The Great Commandment at it’s Fullest
The Great Commandment at it’s Fullest
Jesus ties another aspect into his definition of our true calling as created beings.
We are to love our neighbours.
“ ‘Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD.
b. So if we love God with our whole self, the manifestation of that love for God, is loving others. This summarizes the entire Christian faith. Love God, love others.
c. How we treat people shows how we love God. It exposes our true self.
Listen to how the text continues in Deuteronomy.
These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.
We are called to live the great commandment and pass it our to our children! To burn it on our hearts.
d. When we receive Christ through faith in Him, His Spirit lives in our hearts!
e. This means the commandment of loving God, is actually living in our hearts, it’s our true desire. But we can only receive that desire if we place our faith in Jesus, He is the only one who has truly lived this love.
Close to the Kingdom
Close to the Kingdom
Jesus tells the scribe he is close to the Kingdom.
The scribe reacted well to Jesus answer, he even agreed with Jesus.
The scribe was putting love for God and others ahead of the sacrificial system of the Jews.
The scribe was admitting that religion was not the point, and because of the scribes anti religious response, Jesus tells him that he is starting to get it!
2. Loving God and our Neighbour Starts with Jesus
a. Jesus gives us the strength, the ability to love God and others.
b. Because Jesus changes our hearts! Which means He changes us from the depths of who we are.
Big Idea: Our priority in life is loving God with our whole self, the results of this is loving others. Only through Jesus can we actually live this command. Jesus changes our hearts!