Loving God Supremely Part 1 - Mark 12:28-35

0:34One of the scribes came and heard them arguing, and recognizing that he had answered them well, asked him, What commandment is the foremost of all? Jesus answered, The foremost is, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord, and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these. The scribes said to him, Write, teacher, you have truly stated that he is one, and that there is no one else beside him, and to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength, and to love one's neighbor as himself, is much more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices. When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, he said to him, You are not far from the kingdom of God. And after that, No one would venture to ask him any more questions. Well, Solomon said it in Ecclesiastes 12, 13. Looking at the end of his life, he says this: the conclusion: when all has been said and all is heard, is fear God and keep his commandment. Because this applies to every person. To Solomon, the whole duty of man boiled down to this one thing: fearing God or revering God and obeying his commandments. And Jesus takes this one step further in our passage this morning, and he takes us to the point of you are to love God supremely. He develops this: that the whole duty of man is to love God completely, totally, supremely. Well, this is the third round of questions. If you remember, Jesus went into Jerusalem, went into the temple, shook things up a bit, cleansed it, and then all of a sudden, we get these rounds of questions coming at him. First, it was the Herodians, the Herodians and the Pharisees. They came out, questioned him about taxes, trying to catch him in a trap over the issue of taxes. Then the Sadducees came out, wanted to catch him in something over the issue of the resurrection. And then now, here is this scribe that comes out, and he's got a question of his own. Look at it back at verse 28. His question is about the commandments. One of the scribes came and heard them arguing and recognized that he had answered them well, asked him, What commandment is the foremost of them all? There's something about this guy that's a little different than the approach of the Pharisees and the Herodians and the Sadducees. His approach is a little more aggressive. He'd been listening to their arguments. He'd been listening to what was going on. And he recognized that Jesus had answered well. The word is literally beautifully. Jesus had answered the questions and his antagonists beautifully. And so there is this developing respect from this scribe towards Jesus. But it was still a trap. It was still a trap. Both the Pharisees and Sadducees had argued their positions, but what they all held in common was the Torah, that they believed that the Torah and the commandments of the Lord. And so there is this ongoing debate within rabbinic circles: which of the commandments was the greatest. And there's a history of rabbis giving their thoughts. They had counted up 613 laws that were in the Torah, and they did so because there are 613 letters in the Ten Commandments. And so from that, they developed: okay, there are 613 laws, there were 365 prohibitions, one for each day of the year, and then there were 248 positions. Commands. You can imagine how cumbersome it is to keep all these or to just keep them straight in your head. And so there had to be this priority: which ones are more weighty than the others. And so many of the commandments were broken down into more weighty matters of the law and more lighter manners of the law. The weightier manners involved a greater taxation of your energy, of your being. And if you failed them, they had greater penalties. And then there were some lesser commands that weren't so taxing and weren't so penalizing if you failed them. But there is this ongoing debate: which of these is the greatest? What is the foremost of them all? What is the top of the list? What is the top of the 613? But it's more than just saying which one is in number pole position. It's more of a general statement that, like, what is the overarching principle of life? If we could sum everything in the commandments down to one, what would it be? So not only is it the top command, but it's kind of the overarching, summarizing principle of life.

5:39And let me pick on somebody here. I'll pick on Troy. Let's suppose I was leaving here today and I said, Troy, I want you to pack up your family and I want you to get in your car and I want you to take a ride out of the parking lot and I want you to go to the street corner up here at 29th and I want you to take a left. Very important that you take a left and I want you to get into the first lane and I want you to Get over to Highway 6, and then I want you to take a right, get on the on-ramp, get over, get in the second lane, go down. Okay, what is all this you're saying? I want you to come over to my house for lunch. You know, that's kind of the big principle, right? All those little things fall in that one. Well, that's kind of the gist of this question. What does God require? What is the most weighty command?

6:24And that answer is to love God supremely. That is the answer that Jesus gives. And so, my hope this morning is that you will become a person who loves God supremely and all that involves. And I want to frame our way through this passage this morning by asking four questions and then answering them. First question is: why is God worthy of your supreme love? Think about it. If here's God saying, okay, I want your supreme love, first question is, who do you think you are? God? Well, yeah, that's the idea. I mean, who can put these, who can come to you and demand, I deserve first place in your life, the totality of your being, I demand and I require your supreme love. First question is, on what basis does God expect this?

7:23So that's the first question I want to answer. Why is God worthy of your supreme love? Verse 29 gives us. The answer. And if you'll notice in verse 29, the answer is direct. Notice he doesn't couch this one in a parable. Remember what he would do with parables? The purpose of the parables were to hide truth, right? He doesn't hide this in a parable. He answers them directly. Part of this is due to the sincerity of the scribe. The scribe was sincere, but it also is due to the sincerity or to the nature of the question. This is the most important question in life.

8:07Jesus, he didn't shrink back to give the answer, so it's very direct. And in verse 29, he kind of gives a prequel to the first command. The scribe is asking for the greatest command, and Jesus is going to give him his answer. But at first, he gives him a prequel to the answer, right? We're all into prequels these days, right? Star Wars, you know, they had their prequel. When your sequels kind of run out of juice, you go back and start doing the prequels, right? You know, The Hobbit, I even hear like maybe Narnia maybe doing some prequels, right? So you get the idea. Let's back up. And the prequel to the first command, or the prerequisite to the first command, is given in verse 29. Look at it. Jesus answered, The foremost is here, O Israel. The Lord our God is one. Here. That's actually the only imperative command in the passage. Hear, to listen. The word is quoted from the Shema, and that's because Deuteronomy, the first word of this verse in Deuteronomy 4 is Shema. Here. Hear, O Israel. So before you can do anything, you're going to have to listen. So it's kind of a prequel to the first command: you're going to have to listen to God. If you don't get that, first command and the second command aren't going to mean anything to you at all. But he quotes from Deuteronomy 4 and 5. And this is given on the plains of Moab. When Israel had come out of Egypt and had wandered around for 40 years, they were about to enter into the land. God says this to them in Deuteronomy 6:3, O Israel, you should listen and be careful to do it, that it may be well with you and that you may multiply greatly, just as the Lord the God of your fathers has promised you in the land flowing with milk and honey. And then he says this: You're going in. This is necessary for you, Israel, to be successful in the land in which I am giving you. This is essential and necessary. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all of your heart, with all of your soul, with all of your might. Three of them, with all of your heart, soul, and might. Deuteronomy chapter 6, 5. And so he calls them out of Egyptian bondage to be their God so that they can be their people.

10:42He created them, he delivered them. And this certainly makes him worthy of their supreme love. For sure, God provides, he is their deliverer, he has given good things to them. But that's not the simple reason. That certainly is included, but the simple reason is simply God is one. In other words, there is no other God, Israel. This is what God requires of you, period. That alone is enough to say, why is God worthy of your supreme love? And I'm going to talk directly to you this morning. Why is God worthy of your supreme love? Simply stated, he is God.

11:29He alone is God. He alone is your God. Whether you choose to love him or not, he is God, period. And as such, he deserves the unmitigated rights to your life because he is God. He is your creator. He is your sustainer. He is your provider. And we could add to this: he loves you with the supreme love. He loves you with his whole heart, and so he's not. Deserving of your half-hearted love in return. You bear his image. You were made in his image, and so you must bear that image. And because of this, you should love him. He is a God who loves sacrificially and totally. He is a consuming fire. He is all or nothing. He is not a half-hearted, lukewarm kind of God.

12:28And we bear his image, and so we are not to be half-hearted, but to be like him in that regard. And all this makes him worthy. The text boils it down to one simple reason. If you don't understand or get or all that, simply is, he is God, you are not, and he is worthy of your supreme love. Period. That's what this text is saying. So why is God worthy of your supreme love? He is God. Next question, as we work our way through this text, what does your supreme love involve? He is worthy of your supreme love. Now, what does your supreme love involve? Look at verse 30. And you shall love the Lord your God with all of your heart, with all of your soul, with all of your mind, and with all of your strength. Simple answer: supreme love involves your whole being. That's what Supreme Loves. And it's broken down into with all your heart, with all of your soul, with all of your mind, with all of your strength. There's four in this list. There is three in Deuteronomy. We'll talk about that in a moment. But first, we are to love God with the deepest kind of love: love. You shall love the Lord your God. The idea is agape love. Agape love is the love of preference. Brother Wiltons thinks that the closest synonym is esteem. That is, it's that you make a value determination of one over the other, and this is what you esteem the most in life. But it is a love of preference, it involves a preference of one object over another. The philosoph, the eros love, that all communicates a love of attraction. But agape love involves the preference of the mind, the preference of the will, a value judgment, a preference of obedience, a preference of purpose. And this is what underpins sacrificial love. This is what underpins God giving Himself for us.

14:50It is not a love that's emotionally driven, but it involves an emotional response as one eyes are open to the truth of God, of who He is. And what he has done. The Lagape form is the highest form of love. It is the most pure. It is your most noble. It is your most comprehensive. And it is your most supreme love that you have to give. And it is to be given to the one true God alone.

15:22But we are not only to love God with our deepest love, we are to love God with our whole being. And there are four aspects. First of all, you are to love your God with all of your heart. This is where it begins. You see, the heart is the core of your being, it's actually who you really are. It's not what happens externally who you are, it's what's inside you. And the heart is who you really are. It's the command center of life. It's the command center. You know, like a military operation where all commands go through. That is what the heart is. I remember when we bought our first house. You know, houses, they always look a lot bigger before you move in because there's no furniture. And there was this little room in the center of the house that had a little built-in table and it had cabinets. And Nancy went in there and looked and she said, This is great. This will be my command center where I will command all the fares of the home. You know, it'll be all that. It turned into a junk closet. It, by the way, but you get the idea. I mean, after you move all your stuff, and you know, there goes out the command center. But anyway, kitchen probably better fits that command now. But anyway, but you get the idea that it is the center. The heart is the center of human activity. It controls our feelings, it directs our passions, and it directs our pursuits in life. That's why in Proverbs 4:23, the writer says, Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life. Your heart, you are to love the Lord your God with all of your heart, with that core of your being, with the command center of who you are. It is your source of thoughts, it is your source of words. From that flow the directions in life, and that is to be exclusively and totally given to God, supremely alone.

17:30So, we're not only to love God with the deepest form of love, but also from the very depths of our being. I don't stop there. Also, to love God with all of your soul, with all of your soul. And he says it with all, with all, with all. The word there is the whole. So, you could say, you're to love him with the whole heart, the whole soul, the whole mind, the whole strength, emphasis upon the entirety. Of it. And this, the soul, is the seat of your emotions. It's the source of vitality, if you will. It's that motivating factor, that motivating power. It's that passion, that zeal. It's the jet fuel in life, all right? It's where that's that jet fuel. It energizes. Example of this is Paul in Philippians 3.8. He says, More than that, you can just see the energy and the zeal in his life, the power. More than that, I count all things to be lost in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish. And he goes on in verse 13, but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on towards the goal for the prize of the upward call in Jesus Christ. He had heard God's call, and that captured his heart, and then he pursued it with all his soul. That is the idea.

19:05But also, you're to love God with all of your mind. This is the one that is added. Interesting. Deuteronomy has three. Jesus throws the one to four and puts four in there. And this is the one that he adds. He's talking to a scribe. You're to love him with your intellect. And in Deuteronomy, this is assumed in the second one, the soul would also involve the mind. But here he is. Direct attention to this. And this is the faculty of perception, your mind. That is where judgments are made. That is where the intellect is. That is where the seat of your rational thought is. So this is the control center for the judgments, or our judgments that we make in life, or our opinions. So that's what the mind does. It is that faculty of perception, the intellect.

19:59This is where your judgments are made, and this is where you distinguish truth and error. That's why it's so important that your mind be renewed by the word. That is what speaks to your heart. It is what makes rational judgments about objective truth and then says, heart, you need to pursue this because this is true. It's the idea of the mind. It judges the heart. You see, your supreme loves involves your mind working at its very best.

20:32And listen, brothers and sisters, a faith that calls you to check your mind at the door is not biblical faith. D.E. Garland said, well, thinking about our faith is not something to fear. Let's throw it out there. Let's think through it. Let's apply our best minds to it. He says it like this: thinking about our faith is not something to fear. It is a requirement. God has no use for lazy minds. Minds. The early Christians were tough-minded. They not only outlived and outdied their enemies, the writings of the New Testament testify that they also outthought them. They read, they studied, they wrote, and they served God with all their minds.

21:19Such is what you are to do. Your best thoughts, your best energies. Fourth, you're to love Him with all your strength, the whole of your strength. And this is your complete physical capacities, including your resources. Every ounce of energy and power you have is to be supremely devoted to Him. I remember I had this little Chevy Love pickup. It had a little four cylinders. Some of you may remember the Chevy Love pickups, but got stuck in the mud one time and kept gunning it and gunning it and gunning it until I heard a little break. Okay. Well, then I was still able to drive it because it had three, and it just made a lot more noise. But as time went on, then that put an extra strain on the other cylinders. And then before too long, I mean, you could hear me coming a mile away. I mean, it was noisy, it was loud, and then one day the starter said, I just can't get this thing going anymore. Well, that's kind of a picture of what supreme love looks like. It operates on the entirety of your being, all of your heart.

22:30All of your soul, all of your mind, and all of your strength. And this is what it requires of you. So, why is God worthy of your supreme love? He is God. What does your supreme love involve? Your whole being. Your whole being. Third question. How is your supreme love to God expressed? We're looking at verse 31. How is your supreme love to God to be expressed? Well, first, as we've already seen, by listening to God, you can say that that's certainly stated and implied in the text, but also by conforming to his character, certainly that is implied in the text. You know, becoming what he despises is not loving him, right? I like to tell the stories in our engagement class to young couples of a story of a newlywed couple. A lady was brought up all prim and proper in her upbringing, didn't have any brothers. Well, she got married, and almost like on their honeymoon, the man comes in there, sits down at the table, and belches good morning to her. You know, he could belch the alphabet, so he just looks at her, opens his mouth, good morning, you know, like in a belch. And that just scared the daylights out of her. She had never seen anything like that. She got up from the table, went back to her room, and just started crying, not knowing what she did. Had married into. Well, I can tell you that becoming that which is unlovable or becoming that which is to be despised is not loving God at all, right? And eventually he had to change his manners, right? But that's the idea. I mean, it's like you can't become that which God despises and think that that's somehow an expression of love. So that's implied. Listening to God and conforming to his character. But here is the way Jesus lines it out right here, very clear. How is your supreme love to God to be expressed? By loving others as yourself. Look at verse 31.

24:40The second is this. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these. It's interesting. The scribe asked for one command, right? How many did Jesus give him? Two. Two. And this command is taken from Leviticus 19:18. You shall not take vengeance nor bear any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. So who is your neighbor? Well, Luke chapter 10, this question comes up, very similar context. And Luke chapter 10, Jesus answers by telling the parable of the Good Samaritan. It goes down and he sees the man in need and the others that passed him by. And the summary. Evaluation of that passage is: Jesus is saying, Is your neighbor is anyone who needs you, including your enemy. Including your enemy. So he tells him, You are to love your neighbor as yourself. And the Bible recognizes that you don't have a basic problem with loving yourself.

25:51You really don't. You are more prone to idolize yourself than you are to not love yourself. You idolize yourself and you think you are the one that is to be served. And when things don't go your way, you can enter into a self-loathing period and despise yourself. But in a sense, it's basically you did not bring yourself before God. You idolize yourself as the one to please above God. And so, but the Bible basically doesn't say you have a problem with loving yourself. You're more prone to idolize yourself. The question is, how do you want others to treat you? How do you want others to treat you? How do you want God to treat you? Do you want Him to treat you according to what you deserve? Or do you want God to treat you according to His highest ideals, His morals, perfection of goodness, ability to overlook your wrong and deal with you out of grace instead of deal with you on what you deserve? That is how we want God to deal with us, right? And this is really how we. Want others to deal with us. We don't want others to deal with us with exactly what we deserve, but we want them to deal with us according to their highest ideals. That they would deal with us kindly according to some standard of code, right? That's right. The highest ideal. That's how we want people to treat us.

27:23You see, we enjoy being treated better than we deserve. We want others to treat with graciousness, with kindness, with goodness. We want others to desire to help us. So the golden rule in life, stated another way, is: look, change shoes with the person next to you and ask yourself the question, how would I like for me to treat me? In fact, trade shoes with anybody that you come across and ask yourself the simple question, how would I want me to treat me?

27:58And that's a good, that's what Christ is saying here. Do you want someone to treat you half-heartedly? Do you want them to love you according to their kind intentions, with their resources, with their goodness? How would you like for me to treat me? Change shoes. That's the idea here. And the second command is not equal to the first, but it is how you love God or how your love for God is primarily expressed. That's how it's expressed. The love of others finds its rightful place under the supreme love to God. And to elevate the second command over the first is humanism. And you break both commands, by the way. Anytime you elevate any command, whether it be of the 613 or any of the principles in Scriptures, anytime you elevate that principle above loving God with your whole being, you break them both. You get them all out of whack because the bottom line is that all of the law, all of the prophets, all of the principles in Scripture are given to be expressions of our love to God. First and foremost, we love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and this is why we conform to his standards. To be lovely, not on a works base, but because this is what he desires.

29:28You see, the love of God cannot be separated from the love of people. The second law is how the first is expressed. Love of people is how you express your love for God. And it gives us a real way. The beauty of this, it gives us a real tangible way to measure love. See, love isn't this disembodied ethereal notion. Oh, I love God. Well, how do you know you love God? And it protects us. This outward.

30:00A manifestation of loving others like ourselves is to be an expression of God, and that way we don't get trapped in this disembodied ethereal love. That's how I love God. Well, how do you love God? Well, John 4:21 said, This is a commandment we have from him, that the one who loves God should also love his brother. And that is the outward expression of the first command, and that's why Jesus adds it to him. So you don't get off in this pure academic love, but there is a real, tangible side.

30:38Look at the scribe's reaction to Jesus' answer in verse 32. The scribes said to him, Right, teacher. Literally, beautifully stated, is how he would say. You hit it right on the head, teacher. You nailed it. Beautiful. Scribes said to him, Right, teacher. You have truly stated that he is one, and there is no one else besides him. And to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength, and to love one's neighbor as himself is much more than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices. Now, that's a profound statement. Think of the context. Think of the smoke that's going up at that very moment because of the sacrifices. They are in the temple. It's Passover time, the week before. I mean, there is a lot of activity. There is a lot of sacrifice going on. And this. Scribe is, yes, beautifully stated. Loving God with all of your heart, with your total being, and loving people is more important than all of this that's going on. Very profound. And he uses the word burnt sacrifices. Let me tell you something about burnt sacrifices. You know what was left out of burnt sacrifice? Well, ashes, right? Just gone. I mean, some sacrifices, there were some leftovers that were used for various purposes, but the idea of a burnt sacrifice is that it was completely exhausted. It was gone.

32:09A lot of people today have a problem with burnt sacrifices because we so want, we think the worthiness of our sacrifice is inherent in the person receiving it. And yet, what God is saying is, no, sacrifice of a burnt nature is that you pour it out, nothing comes back. And even the Jews started having some real problems with some of the burnt sacrifices. This is why they started bringing in blemished animals. Why in the world would you waste a good heifer? Why would you break it, wait, you know? It's kind of our thinking, too. You know, and somehow, as if the value is intrinsic in the one we're making the sacrifice to.

32:51Or pouring ourselves out for somebody. No. No. He takes this love of God down to some practical brass tap. That we are to love our neighbor as ourselves. And it answers a very profound question. How does one give back to God? How do I give to God? Psalm 50:10 says this: For every beast of the forest is mine, the cattle on a thousand hills, I know every bird of the mountains, and everything that moves in the field is mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell you, for the world is mine and all it contains. So, what do I have to give to God?

33:30And in Psalm 8:3, the psalmist says, This, When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon, and the stars, which you have ordained, what is man that you take thought of him? And the Son of man that you care for him, yet you have made him a little lower than God, and you crown him with glory and majesty. You make him to rule over the works of your hand, and you have put all things under his feet. Everything that I have is given from God to me. So, what can I give God?

34:01Acts 17, 28 says, In him we live, move, and have our being. So, how in the world can I give anything to God at all? Where? Where can I pour my love out for God? Where can I go to pay him what I owe? He owns everything. He doesn't need anything from me. And with what can I pay him anyway? And the answer is given in the second command. Love your neighbor as yourself. You know why God puts needy people in your life? It's because you need them.

34:41You need them. Because it is there. You need the needy. You need a place to give to God. You need a place to give sacrificially, to lay out those burnt offerings. And I can tell you what, there's not anybody in this room that God hasn't placed a needy person in your life. It is your expression of love. See, loving and serving others has nothing to do with the merits of the one you serve, but it is an expression of love to God. And our problem is we just don't like to give burnt offerings. We want something back. We want the merits of the person to justify. Well, I'm going to serve this person because this person's going to give this back, or this person's worthy. No, it has nothing to do with that. It's about the worthiness of God.

35:33And the very nature of burnt sacrifices is that they're gone. And see, the reason you don't like to give to the needy and their irritants is because you don't love God as much as you think. You see them as irritants, and God brings them in your life because, because He gives you an opportunity to express love to Him. There's no other place that you have to express this kind of love. Love your neighbor as yourself. And there's not anybody in here that God hasn't brought needy people in your life. So, why is God worthy of your supreme love? Number one, he is God. What does your supreme love involve? Your whole being.

36:25How is your supreme love to God expressed? By loving people as yourself. Which brings up the fourth question: How do I love God supremely? How do I love God with this kind of love? Look at verse 34. Look at Jesus' response to the scribe's response. When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, he said to him, You are not far from the kingdom of God. You are not far from the kingdom of God. There was a praise. He could hear it. It was commendable. He was commending this scribe for where he was, especially in contrast to the Pharisees, the Herodians, and the Sadducees. He was close. So there was a praise in Jesus' words, but there was also a warning because he was not there yet.

37:20There's a danger in not acting upon convictions. We don't know what happened to this guy. We don't know. But we met another guy back a couple of chapters in chapter 10 who was. A rich young ruler, and we kind of liked him too. And here's another likable guy, but the rich young ruler couldn't go to God or couldn't follow Christ because he had a love of possessions. Well, if there was a problem in the scribe's life, it was the love of the intellect, the pride of the intellect. And we don't know what happened, but I can tell you there's a real danger. You don't want to get to heaven and say, You almost made it. Might as well miss it by a mile. But there is a danger in not acting upon convictions. Today, if you hear God's voice, do not harden your heart, but act upon it. Let your mind bring your heart out on the table and judge it and say, Heart, give over to God.

38:20You see, convictions, if not acted upon, fade with time. Truths that are not followed right away are forgotten. So there's a real danger. Today, if you hear God's voice, you do not harden your heart. Where are you? You near or are you far? Doesn't really matter. You need to be His. And here's our problem: here's the definition of a Christian. You know what a Christian is? Someone who's Christ-like, a little Christ. Let me tell you what, biblical definition. This is a Christ-like. Individual, one who loves God with all their heart, with all their soul, with all their mind, with all their strength, who even loves his enemies as himself. Does that describe you? Do you love God with the totality of your being, your whole heart, your whole mind, everything about you, all your resources? This is what Christ-likeness is.

39:26Can you do this? The answer is, cannot. We read about the issue of taxes, render to God the things that are God. We must be like that publican that falls down on our knees and says, There is no way, God, I cannot on my own become like this at all. In fact, when Moses first uttered these words in the plains of Moab, at that point about going in, Israel had already had 40 years of historical track record of disobeying God, not loving God with their whole heart. And when they first heard these words, it should have been, drop to your knees. There is no way we're going to keep this up. There is no way we can. Something has to change. And that is at the end of Deuteronomy. God told Moses and Joshua that Israel was going to go into the land and they were going to fail. Because the bottom line is they didn't have a heart to obey. So the question is, how do we love God's Supreme? We're no better than they are. But we do have the promise of a better covenant. And it begins with a new heart. This is what Ezekiel 11:19 says. And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within them. And I will take the heart of stone out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes, and keep my ordinances, and do them. Then they will be my people, and I shall be their God.

41:01We need a new heart. That's where it begins. We must agree that we owe God our supreme love, and we must admit that we cannot pay what we owe. This is the first mountain that needs to be moved in our life: this inability to love God. And it takes place by grace through grace and continues in grace. First, you must place your faith, trust in Christ for salvation, but you also must put your faith and trust in Christ for sanctification.

41:32Grace and grace alone. And then I would say this: be a good steward of what He has given you. How do you love God supremely? It begins with a new heart, but it also starts employing, start putting that mind and that will into action. Choose to love Him with your mind. If you see something you have a hard time believing, choose to believe. Choose to believe Him. Choose to put your heart into it. Take the baby steps.

42:03Be a good steward and serve others. Begin to serve others, not for their sake, but as an expression of love to God. So, how do you love God supremely? You must be given a new heart. Set that in motion by choosing to love him. And then rest. Rest knowing that the Holy Spirit is going to bring this about. He is going to sanctify. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, give you thanks. For the time we have this morning, we give you thanks for your word. God, and to love you supremely is beyond anything that we can do in and of ourselves. But we do ask that by your Holy Spirit, by your great grace, that you will bring about. We desire this. God, if there is those here today who do not know you, pray that this will be that day that they will come to know you and cry out, recognizing, Lord, that all of us, the duty is to love you supremely, and without your help, we're not going to do it. So, God, have mercy in Jesus' name.