Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Simple Discipleship

…love the Lord God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence and energy.
Mark 12:30 (The Message)

Jesus makes things simple for us. By the time Jesus shows up in history the religious leaders had accumulated over 600 laws that you needed to follow in order to be in right relationship with God. It was impossible for anyone to remember all of the laws, so they were constantly trying to distinguish between the major and the minor laws. When asked which is the most important, Jesus answers, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” Jesus goes on to teach that the second most important law was to, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Mark 12:31)

Jesus lets us know that the ultimate Christian creed is to love God and love others. That’s it. Period. Simple isn’t it? And yet, so difficult to accomplish.

I believe more than ever, in our moment in history, we need to be reminded to follow the Great Commandment. Sometimes we have the tendency like the religious leaders of Jesus’ day to make discipleship tedious. The reality is Jesus said, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:30) Ultimate discipleship is simply loving God and loving others. Take time this week to check your heart. How is your passion level for God? How’s your heart toward your family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, schoolmates, etc.? Let’s be doers of Jesus’ words this week.


One final thing I would like to ask you to do this week… please sign up to pray for our nation and President-Elect Barak Obama at www.presidentialprayerteam.org. You can also join others at Christian Life praying in the prayer room on Tuesday Evenings at 7PM.