But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they came together. And one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, to test Him. “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?” 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. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets.”
Matthew 22:34-40
In the Old Testament, there are 613 commandments. Many of us are familiar with the Ten Commandments. And even if we are familiar with them, many of us cannot say them all from memory. It’s even harder to keep them all. There are 603 other commandments in the Old Testament. How could one possibly remember all of them, let alone be able to faithfully do all of them.
The Pharisees and the Sadducees were groups of people who were in charge of the Temple and making sure people adhered to the Law. Since many people were not able to read, they would interpret the Law to them, which left open the possibility of abusing the people, who wouldn’t know any better, as they couldn’t read, or challenge what was being told to them. They were also demoralized by their inability to keep the Law. It’s like they were set up to fail.
Jesus summarized the entire 613 “commandments” in the Law with just two. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind,” and “love your neighbor as yourself.” We usually summarize these two commandments even further. We say “love God” and “love your neighbor.” Jesus, however, did not summarize these two commandment that succinctly. He said that we are to love the Lord with all our heart, all our soul, and all our mind. (Matthew 22:37) In the Gospel of Luke, He will add for us to love God with all of our strength as well. Most of us have many people we love—spouses, children, parents, close friends. But do we love them with ALL of our heart, soul and mind. When I think of loving people, I think of loving them with my heart. I don’t really think about loving with my soul and my mind. I’m sure most of us don’t think like this. Because to love with our whole soul, our whole being, means that we are willing to alter the entire course of our lives for someone and most of us are unable or unwilling to do that, even for those who are closest to us. Thus, when we think of loving God with our whole soul, mind and heart, this means that we are willing to alter the entire course of our lives for the Lord. Are we? Do we have a line in the sand with God? In other words, when we pray “Thy will be done” to the Lord, do we really offer our entire lives and put them under His will? Or in reality, do we say to the Lord “leave my family, my house, my career, my retirement and my friends alone, but the rest is Yours”? This is a tough question.
Let’s take the second commandment, to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. It doesn’t say only “love your neighbor.” I confess, I’ve been guilty many times, even on the Prayer Team, of saying “Love God, love neighbor.” But this is not what these commandments say. The commandment to love our neighbor commands us to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. If we want the best for ourselves, then we want the best for our neighbor as well. Many people think that to love our neighbor means to offer loving gestures to our neighbor. When we do for ourselves, we don’t generally do token things. We look for quality things for ourselves—whether that is material wealth, or entertainment, or fun experiences. No one sets out to treat themselves with mediocrity. To love our neighbor means that we treat our neighbor with the same excellence that we treat ourselves. To love our neighbor means that we see our neighbor as a reflection of ourselves. We not only see our neighbor as an “entity’ but we see our neighbor in a personal way, because we see ourselves in our neighbor. It also means that we extend to our neighbor the things we hope the neighbor extends to us. If we expect our neighbor to be patient and forgiving, then we extend the same. And “neighbor” doesn’t just mean the person next door, or someone we like, it extends to everyone, whether we know them or not. If I expect to be treated patiently at the doctor’s office, then I need to treat people at the car dealership with patience. Love of neighbor is not an exchange of love with a specific neighbor. It is a posture of love to all neighbors, whether we will ever receive something from them or not. And this is why following two commandments is just as hard as following 613. What is easier is that we only have to remember two commandments. What is hard is doing these commandments at all times. And what is even harder than that is to do them not under compulsion, but out of joy, to find joy in keeping them.
Lord, thank You for summarizing a complex Law into two commandments that are easy to remember. These commandments pose a challenge when it comes to keeping them in the way You intended. Help me not to only love You, but to love You with my heart, soul and mind, all of me. And help me not to only make gestures of love to my neighbor, but to see myself in my neighbor and to love my neighbor as I love myself, to serve my neighbor as I would want to be served. Amen.
The two great commandments are to love God and to love our neighbor, but they extend even further. We are to love God with all our heart, soul and mind, and we are to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.
