“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” – Rom 12:2
Some notes and highlights in my understanding about what Jesus wants in our relationship with God:
“29 ἀπεκρίθη ὁ Ἰησοῦς ὅτι Πρώτη ἐστίν, Ἄκουε, Ἰσραήλ, κύριος ὁ θεὸς ἡμῶν κύριος εἷς ἐστιν, 30 καὶ ἀγαπήσεις κύριον τὸν θεόν σου ἐξ ὅλης τῆς καρδίας σου καὶ ἐξ ὅλης τῆς ψυχῆς σου καὶ ἐξ ὅλης τῆς διανοίας σου καὶ ἐξ ὅλης τῆς ἰσχύος σου.”
-Mk 12:29-30
- If love does not come from knowing God, there is no point in calling it love for God.
- When God’s glory becomes our supreme pleasure, we begin to prefer above all else to know him, see him, and be like him.
- True love for God will always bring about love for people.
- Loving God is a strong inward emotion, not a mere outward action.
- Jesus does not equate loving God with serving God. He roots serving God with loving God.
- “Heart” highlights the center of our volitional and emotional life without excluding thought (Lk 1:51). “Soul” highlights our life as a whole, though sometimes distinguished from the body (Mt 10:28). “Mind” highlights our thinking capacity. And “Strength” highlights the capacity to make vigorous efforts both bodily and mentally (Mk 5:4, Lk 21:36).
- Every faculty and every capacity treasures God above all things in such a way that our treasuring of any other thing is also a treasuring of God.
- That any pleasure is not also a delight in God, then we have not loved God with all that capacity.
– Augustine.
