Do you know what to do? Loving God, part VIII
I sincerely hope you enjoyed last week’s 3 part series called “How Well Do You Know God”. Given all the messages that I’ve posted so far, do you know what to do? Do you know how to love God, how to be a true disciple, or what to do to have eternal life?
Other than going to church, what do we do that’s different?
Many people give us suggestions about what we should do, you know friends, relatives, neighbors, stock brokers, etc. We should invest in stocks, we should go to a baseball game, we should get on Facebook, we should watch a particular movie, we should go to the beach, we should… well, you get the idea. There are many things to spend our time doing and many people in our lives give us wonderful suggestions.
Have you ever thought about what God wants you to do? I am not saying not to do any of things I mentioned, but if I love God more than any person, then I shouldn’t I consider what He wants me to do?
There are a lot of commands of course such as “love one another” and “love your enemies”, but what does God want us doing with our time? Does God even care how we spend our time, as long as we are obeying His commandments? Does He overtly tell us to do something, other than the obvious Great Commission?
When reading the gospels I see that Jesus gives clear instruction on what we should be doing, so I thought I’d do a little study on it.
Luke 13: 24 “Work hard to enter the narrow door to God’s Kingdom, for many will try to enter but will fail.
Work hard? What does that mean?
To me, working hard is doing all that we can to enter the “narrow door”. For me, it is developing a daily reading habit, consistent prayer or as Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 5: 17 “pray without ceasing”, and consistently fellowship.
You can also look at it as Paul does:
1 Timothy 4: 8 “Physical training is good, but training for godliness is much better, promising benefits in this life and in the life to come.”
Peter says this:
2 Peter 1: 5 In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises.
Consider the greatest commandment…
I believe this “effort” is exactly what the Greatest commandment requires:
Matthew 22: 37 Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”
To be honest I still don’t know what it means to love God with all my heart, soul and mind. I’m still trying to figure that out.
In this passage of John, the disciples want to perform God’s works, I love how Jesus simplifies it.
John 6: 27 But don’t be so concerned about perishable things like food. Spend your energy seeking the eternal life that the Son of Man can give you. For God the Father has given me the seal of his approval.” 28 They replied, “We want to perform God’s works, too. What should we do?” 29 Jesus told them, “This is the only work God wants from you: Believe in the one he has sent.”
I’m not sure what other commentary is needed here. It’s clear that Jesus wants us to work hard, spending our energy to join Him for all eternity. That doesn’t sound like a bad deal, does it?
Now, do you know what to do?
“Dear Lord, I wish to please you. I don’t always work very hard on seeking you or sometimes even care about what You want. Please help me to be wiser with the time You’ve given me. Thank you for being patient with me.”