It’s Simple…

I was once told that loving God was simple: Just love God with all that you are.

I think this is a way people try to sum up the meaning of  Matthew 22:37 where Jesus says, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” But is this clarification of the verse (“just love God with all that you are”) really helpful to anyone?

How can you love something or someone with all that you are if you haven’t really figured out who you are yet? Or who you want to be. And doesn’t that change?

For the longest time I tried to figure out who I was, so that I could love God fully, with all of my being, but my approach turned out to be completely backwards. The truth is, I couldn’t understand who I really was until I fully loved the Lord.

Don’t put so much pressure on yourself to love God “correctly.” Think about your relationships with your parents or your friends- anyone you love. How often do you analyze how to love those people. We don’t think about love we just do it. We do it by investing our time and our hearts in those relationships. We just show up and care.

So here’s what I do. I show up for God and I care about what He has to say. Talk to Him, read what He has to say to you in the Bible, and care enough to respond to it by the way you live your life.