How to Love God

When the disciples asked Jesus, what’s the greatest commandment? Jesus replied, “the first and greatest commandment is to love the Lord God with all your heart, all your soul, and with all your mind.” The second is like it: “You are to love your neighbor as yourself” Matthew 22:36-40

Who can love an invisible God more than himself? Most people think this is impossible. An unbeliever cannot love a God he can’t see, not with all their heart, mind and soul; not 24 hours a day. It’s almost as difficult for many unbelievers to love another as themself. 

Only By Grace We can Love God

It’s only by the grace of God can a believer love God with all his heart sincerely, without dissimulation and hypocrisy. Because of Jesus’ sacrifice, we have access to His grace through faith. It’s because of grace that believers can have an intimate relationship with Him. It is the Will of God for Man to have a loving close relationship with Him.  After we first come to Christ, we experience His great love and we love Him. But it is through the witness of God’s faithfulness during times of struggle and trial that a deep abiding love for God grows. Over time, we witness His compassion, mercy, grace, and love for us, as well as His hatred for sin, His holiness, and His righteousness. 

But we don’t have to wait for a trial or tribulation for Him to come and display His mercy, grace and love toward us. When you love someone you want to know them intimately it’s the same with Jesus. To love God with every fiber of your being, you have to know Him intimately. You get to know God by spending time with Him reading, studying and reflecting on the things of God.

Loving God is to love Him for who He is. Loving God is an intentional setting of your affections on Him. A person who loves God loves truth, righteousness, and holiness. When you follow the first commandment, you fear Him; you don’t continue in sin. Believers revere and glorify God, like a child to His heavenly father. 

Love and Sin

When you love God and commit sin, you regret or repent toward God, because you know God hates sin and sees everything. We work for rewards Colossians 3:23,24. Also, you will not deliberately sin for yourself nor will you sin for anyone else whom you love. You will not continue in sin because you love God foremost and your desire is to please Him.

Or do you love someone or something else more? When you love Jesus and His righteousness first, it means you love God above all others. 

After we are born again, it’s our responsibility to know the object of our affection. You want to know intimately the One you believe and receive salvation from. If the spirit of God is really in you, your soul will be transformed by you renewing your mind with the word of God. As you grow in faith and knowledge of God, you will experience the goodness and faithfulness of God toward you. It is this action by God for you that causes your love toward Him to grow. “We love Him because He first loved us” 1 John 4:19

It’s next to impossible to love your neighbor as yourself unless you first love God with all your heart, mind, and soul. You may love your child, friend or spouse as yourself, but loving a neighbor like that, who you barely know, is not a straightforward task without the grace of God. Loving your neighbor as yourself springs from our loving God above all else. When you love God above all else, you want to do what pleases Him; which means loving your neighbor as yourself. 

A lover of God will love the things of God; a lover of Him loves truth, righteousness, and justice over himself or his neighbor. Why? These are the things of God. It is who He is. He is the One most deserving.

I sometimes say to my friends, “I love you, but I love Jesus even more than myself.” Which is an updated version of the 2 great commandments. What I mean is I love and trust Jesus completely with my whole heart, mind, and soul.

We live in a generation of self love. Their favorite word and subject is “I”. When you love yourself first, you cannot care for your brother as yourself, and certainly not our Lord who no man has seen, above all others.