Title: A Lesson for Valentines Day: Loving God above all else Text: Matthew 22:34-40 Scripture Passage:

34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36 Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law? 37 Jesus replied: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments. I. Introduction a short film (about five minutes long) on love language where in a guy was trying to communicate to a girl and was unsuccessful in his first tries until he started passing out post it notes only to find out that the woman was deaf. II. Background Love is in the air. This is the time of the year when flowers are in demand, when greeting cards are being valued, when the giving of chocolates and sweets are high, when a lot of men would wish they wouldn't be "forever alone" and ladies would want not to be "Friend-zoned". Communication is necessary for a relationship to survive. It is necessary for a couple to be talking to each other and learning how to understand one another to make the relationship work. Picture this...a husband, reading the newspaper, with coffee on the table while the wife is talking, that isn't communicating. Or how about the husband is talking to his wife about computers and the wife is talking about cooking at the same time? That isn't communicating either. Communication involves one who is listening and taking a proactive approach. Sometimes, we communicate with God in a one-way street. Sometimes we communicate to God in the way we think is right but is not Godhonoring and God-pleasing. III. Biblical Foundation: Matthew 22:34-40 Jesus was in a situation where his enemies are trying to trap him. The wisdom of Christ is beyond the Sadducees or the Pharisees and he was able to evade the traps. Now one of the Pharisee asked him, "what is the greatest commandment in the law?" The question may seem harmless but in truth, the question is really loaded. Jesus answered what a Jew would have known for all his life. He answered by

quoting the Shema. He said "you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind." A Jew would recite the Shema when he wakes up, before sleeping, to ward off intruders (in our day, this would mean "para walang malas"). a. LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD. Jesus is pointing the attention back to God! The point is not about the commandments, the law was given for man to know that it is impossible to please God by our own works, by our own actions. It is not about keeping the commandments, it is about knowing the giver of the commandments! We may be so engrossed in doing our work, our FED assignments, our daily devotions, our chapel activities, and yet forget why we are doing all of these. We may learn to love the school and forget our reason why we are in here in the first place. b. WITH ALL YOUR HEART. In the formation of the embryo, while it is still a cell, there would be a tiny beeping sound...the heart is the first to be formed. Georgetown University researchers came out with a very interesting study. They studied some heart transplant patients and found some interesting discovery... - A gentle, soft spoken woman who never drank alcohol and hated football got a heart from a crashed biker donor and turned into an aggressive beer drinking football fan. - A lazy male couch potato received a heart from a stuntman and became an athlete. - A man who could barely write suddenly developed a talent for poetry. - A 47-year-old Caucasian male received a heart from a 17-year-old AfricanAmerican male. The recipient was surprised by his new-found love of classical music. What he discovered later was that the donor, who loved classical music and played the violin, had died in a drive-by shooting, clutching his violin case to his chest. (http://projectavalon.net/forum/showthread.php?t=1623) (http://sue-adams.hubpages.com/hub/your-second-brain-is-in-your-heart) The heart is not just about feelings and emotions. What would happen if one day, we die and our hearts are transplanted into another human being? What do you think will that person be doing? I would love to hear that the person who got my heart became active in the things of the kingdom! What about you? What is in your hearts? Girls? Money? Showtime?

c. WITH ALL YOUR SOUL. I do not want to battle it out with the dichotomists nor with the trichotomists. Everyone has a soul. This is the part of us which goes on to eternity when we leave our bodies behind. Plato believed that the soul composed of reason (logos), emotion (thymos) and desire (eros). Augustine believed that man composed of body(soma), soul (psyche) and spirit (pneuma). Psychology on the other hand, can be traced to the study of the soul. To the Greeks, they used the same word "alive" for "ensouled" or relating the living being to having a soul. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul) As evangelical Christians, we believe that when believers die, our soul leaves the body and goes to the presence of God. The soul is what is left of us and that is the substance that goes to the afterlife. What is one thing that keeps you going? What keeps you alive? What drives you? What would you bring with you to the afterlife? Having a relationship with God matters because that relationship is valuable in the life after earth. d. WITH ALL YOUR MIND. We discussed the value of the heart (it is more than emotions), the soul (what is valued in the afterlife) and now we go to loving God with all our mind. This means that we are to be conscious, or to make a conscious effort to know God. They said that the "eyes are a window to the soul" and with the mind, what are we feeding ourselves with? Have a conscious effort to love God. I ask myself time and again, and I ask the question Marcus Aurelius asked his sister, "which is better, to be feared or to be loved?" I ask the question to people in a relationship, which is better, to be driven by fear or driven by love? Fear is a good motivator. You can study because you are afraid to fail, afraid to repeat the same subject, afraid of the teacher. Fear can also be the motive for obedience. You obey because you are afraid of punishment. You do things because you do not want the pain. Similar to ROTC, you do not want the punishment of push ups, sit ups, crawling in the ground, etc so you obey. In a relationship, fear can be the motivation too. You are afraid of offending the other party so you make a conscious effort to do things as not to offend. But the other side of the coin means, you will be careful not to get caught. You will be careful as to conceal your crime, careful enough not to speak your mind out, let all the fear make you like a caged bird. or you can be driven by love. You would choose not to do things because you love the person and don't want to damage the relationship. In the process, you learn to love what the person loves, you go on your way to study what that person likes, in facebook...you like what she likes, in retaurants...her meal is your meal, in taste of clothes, you adjust to what she finds cute or neat.

It becomes a conscious effort to find what the person wants, and that is what loving with all your mind meant. You study to a point that it becomes your lifestyle of finding what she wants. And in relationships, they say it takes a lifetime to know a person. You could not possibly know everything in one date! Same way with God. We cannot know God on Sundays only, or on chapel time only, or in our devotionals only. We learn to know God day by day, by spending time with him in prayer, in reading of the word, in meditations, in songs. What occupies your mind? What is the first thing in our mind when we wake up and what is the last thing in our mind before falling asleep? IV. Conclusion When Jesus Christ pointed us back to God, he meant to love God with our entire being. With our hearts, our soul and our minds. That is love God with our all! When he mentioned LORD, he meant one who is in control of our lives, every aspect of it. And when we learn to love God with our all, that is the time we can love our neighbors as well. If our relationship with God is right, our relationship with our fellow human beings would follow. We cannot claim to love a woman, yet on the other end not love God. That would be lust. We cannot claim to love our parents, when we don't love God because that love would be for our self-interest. We cannot claim to love the unlovable unless we love God first because we would be no different from a politician. Love God. Then we can love our neighbors as well. =