God First

Mar 12:28  And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all?

Mar 12:29  And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord:

Mar 12:30  And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.

Mar 12:31  And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.

Mar 12:32  And the scribe said unto him, Well, Master, thou hast said the truth: for there is one God; and there is none other but he:

Mar 12:33  And to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.

Mar 12:34  And when Jesus saw that he answered discreetly, he said unto him, Thou art not far from the kingdom of God. And no man after that durst ask him any question.

The Pursuit of God -  A.W. Tozer  'The whole course of the life is upset by failure to put God where He belongs. We exalt ourselves instead of God and the curse follows.'

Where does God belong?

The FIRST of ALL the commandments is-  LOVING GOD WITH ALL OUR HEART, SOUL, MIND STRENGTH. 

The second is loving our fellow man.

All the ten moral laws are encompassed in these two.

Loving God with ALL of ourselves!  Can we do this if we love our own selves more?  If at every turn we are considering ourselves before God?

Go a whole week without talking about yourself- your feelings, your wants, your needs, your likes, your dislikes, can you? Can we?  It'd be interesting to see how long we could go wouldn't it? But then again we are focusing on ourselves aren't we, even while hoping not to. We are so full of ourselves that even our serving others has become an extension of self-serving.

We are wretched, so very, very wretched. By choosing CONSTANTLY to serve God even in our extreme imperfection we place all our hope in CHRIST who served Him perfectly!

We choose, we constantly choose, over and over we choose.

The Pursuit of God -  A.W. Tozer  'The whole course of the life is upset by failure to put God where He belongs. We exalt ourselves instead of God and the curse follows.'

We need to exalt GOD, not ourselves. Please God, help us do this. We believe, help Thou our unbelief!

All through Jesus Christ our LORD and SAVIOR, now and forever!

Amen.