How many of you have a goal to read through the Bible this year? Excellent! I applaud you and I pray that you are able to stick it out. I have been truly blessed by each full and sequential reading of the Scriptures.
However, if I’m honest, when it comes to portions of the Law and the Prophets, my eyes get a little glossy and I am grateful I don’t have to remember all the details of each of those instructions, as God passed them down to the Israelites. Don’t misunderstand me. God, as our Creator and Heavenly Father, knew what He was talking about as He instructed His chosen people to live in a certain way, based on these laws. Then, through the prophets, He warned them of what would happen if they did not keep those laws.
Thankfully, God’s master plan and original design was not for us to be subjected to every detail of those laws for all time. The sacrifices were inadequate until the perfect sacrifice came to earth, Jesus Christ, God’s own Son.
Jesus was asked one day which was the greatest command. He simplified and summarized the entire Law and the Prophets in this way (Matt. 22:35-40):
35 And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?”37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
When we simplify all of Scripture, it all comes back to love.
A four-year-old, begging to learn to read, began to memorize some sight words and phrases. As her mom patiently helped her write out the letters and sound out the words, one of the first sentences she learned to recognize was “I love you.”
Inspired by her daughter’s enthusiasm, and fueled by the love for her child, the mom left Post-Its saying “I love you” around the house for her daughter to find and read.
A few days later, the little girl carried her mother’s Bible into the kitchen, “Mommy! Mommy! Guess what?!”
Ignoring the sticky fingers were crinkling the pages, she replied, “Yes, sweetheart. What are you doing with mommy’s Bible?”
“I read mommy’s Bible. And it says, ‘I love you’ on every page!”
Humbled by the realization of this truth, the mom sat down with her daughter on the kitchen floor and affirmed this simple teaching of Scripture that truly is the underlying message on every page of God’s love story.
#IronRoseSister, #simplify, #love