Today’s Devotional: “Focusing On God”

When pressed for an answer to which commandment was the greatest, Jesus answered that it is having a loving relationship with God.

“‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment.” (Matthew 22:37-38)

Only in a loving relationship with Jesus are we able to keep the commandments. Therefore, our love for God should be our focus.

Years ago, circuses featured lion tamers. Now, while they cracked their whips and shot their pistols, those were not the most important tools. The stool was. Holding the stool with its four legs pointed at the lion paralyzed it, as the lion tried to focus on all four legs at once, fragmenting its attention and making it relatively tame.

Like the lion, fragmenting our attention through various distractions paralyzes us. By stating the greatest commandment to love God, Jesus took the stool out of Satan’s hands, helping us live a focused life.

Jesus takes away what the world wants us to focus on and places it squarely on a loving relationship with God. When Jesus commands us to love God with everything we are, He means a love so fervent and so alive that we’ll do anything for Him.

This commandment reveals that God wants us to direct our love toward Him and away from the world.

“Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” (1 John 2:15)

Seeing how easily our focus is drawn away from the Lord and how difficult it is to love God in a focused way, Jesus refers us to a second commandment, which He likens to the first.

“And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” (Matthew 22:39)

The act that focuses our love for God is to love our neighbors, as we would like to be loved.