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 22:37-40 ESV
This all-in command—love the Lord your God with ALL your heart and with ALL your soul and with ALL your mind—leaves no room for divided affections. All means all, every part of you. Jesus said, “No one can serve two masters” (Matthew 6:24). God demands our total loyalty, above everything that our heart holds dear.
We were created to worship, the problem is we have such a tendency to worship the wrong thing. We worship when we place importance on something by giving it our attention over other things. Those things that come before God are our idols. When you think about your week, or even your day, what do you spend the majority of your time or energy on? Where are your thoughts most of the time? Many of us spend time thinking about our work, our marriages, our spouses, materials things such as our houses, clothes, cars, or perhaps we’re distracted by our appearance, so we focus our thoughts on our clothes, our weight, or our hair and makeup. The things we spend our energy on, or those things that consume our thoughts—those are our idols. It’s not wrong to think about any one of those things, but if you’re thinking about them more than you’re thinking about God, or if you are spending more time and energy on those things more than you’re spending time with God, you’re worshipping the wrong thing.
Our God is a jealous God. He wants ALL of our worship—ALL of our heart, ALL of our soul, and ALL of our mind. There’s no room for a divided heart in the word ALL. It’s fairly easy to discover where your love is divided, simply look to the reason why you haven’t had time to pick up His Word today, or why you missed church—you’ll most likely discover your idol there.
I know in order for all the other things I place so much importance on to fall into place, I need to start with Him. He needs to have all of me if I want of all of Him. If I want a marriage that glorifies Him, then I need to first give all of my heart to Him. You see, by giving all of my heart to my Lord, I have no need for my husband to fill any portion of it. I have no expectation for him to make me feel a certain way or do anything to demonstrate his love for me. My husband doesn’t need to reassure me, he doesn’t need to protect me, he doesn’t need to make me feel worthy because my heart is already full when I give it all to my Lord. When he does do those things, I am comforted and blessed, but my heart doesn’t long to be filled because it already is.
I am constantly trying to reflect on my heart, looking for those things I place greater importance on over Him—my comfort and my children rank among the highest. I am constantly laying those idols down at His feet, and returning Him to the rightful place on the throne of my life. But it’s a constant and daily battle as the things I love dearly in this world creep right back up there. I want Him to have ALL of me, not part of me, so I continue to meet Him here, surrendering and seeking his help every single morning.
Press on ~ you are loved 💗
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