{"id":626,"date":"2007-02-28T20:06:22","date_gmt":"2007-02-28T20:06:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2007\/02\/midweek_lesson_3.shtml"},"modified":"2021-05-29T02:45:35","modified_gmt":"2021-05-29T02:45:35","slug":"midweek_lesson_3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2007\/02\/midweek_lesson_3.shtml","title":{"rendered":"Midweek Lesson"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We&#8217;ve been studying, as a church, the greatest commandment from Mark 12:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, &#8220;Of all the commandments, which is the most important?&#8221;<br \/>\n&#8220;The most important one,&#8221; answered Jesus, &#8220;is this: &#8216;Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.&#8217; The second is this: &#8216;Love your neighbor as yourself.&#8217; There is no commandment greater than these.&#8221;<\/p>\n<div align=\"right\">Mark 12:28-31<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>In the Sunday lessons, we&#8217;ve covered many aspects of this scripture outside of the four parts of ourselves that we are to love God with.  Of those, the lessons have covered two \u2013 our hearts and our minds. Lessons on our soul and strength are yet to come.<br \/>\n<strong>Q &#8211; Looking at the things mentioned in verse 30, which if those do you feel is most important?  Why?<\/strong><br \/>\nAn argument could likely be made for each of the four:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Heart \u2013 Our heart is the essence of our devotion and consciousness.<\/li>\n<li>Soul \u2013 It represents our very being.  It&#8217;s what will live on in heaven for eternity.<\/li>\n<li>Mind \u2013 Our intellect, our reasoning power.  It can overcome the ups and downs of our emotional heart.<\/li>\n<li>Strength \u2013 It is with our strength, through prayer, study, charity, etc, that we act on the convictions of our heart and reasoning of our mind.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Each of us has strengths and weaknesses.  Some might be logical and find that makes it easy to give our mind to God, but hard to invest emotionally.  Others find that hard work for God comes easy, but deep thinking and study is challenging.<br \/>\nIn reality, the question was a bit of a trick.  In my view, the most important thing mentioned in verse 30 is &#8216;all&#8217;.  The point is that God wants all of us, period.  No one aspect is more important than the others.<br \/>\nAll of these aspects work together to draw us nearer to God as we practice them.  Focusing on one over the others may actually not accomplish what God intended.<br \/>\n<strong>Q \u2013 Can you think of some ways that might that be?<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A focus on the heart might lead to an emotional, rollercoaster faith<\/li>\n<li>A focus on the mind may lead to a cold, legalistic faith.  Bible worship instead of God worship.<\/li>\n<li>A focus on our strength may lead to a performance based faith where our worth to the Father is determined by our deeds.<\/li>\n<li>A focus on our soul is a little more challenging.  Perhaps it may manifest itself in the &#8216;God created me like this, so it must be acceptable to him&#8217; philosophy.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These aspects of our selves are intertwined and inseparable.  God intended that we devote all of ourselves, every aspect of ourselves, to him.  We must be careful to not let our preferences, our strengths or our weaknesses make our devotion to God one or two faceted.<br \/>\n<strong>Q \u2013 What areas do you find it easy and hard to give God all of?  Why?<\/strong><br \/>\nI feel as though God is teaching me this very lesson.  I tend to be ruled by my thinking and reasoning and my emotions.   (Perhaps a strange combination, but there you go.)  I tend to give God all my heart and mind, but neglect my soul and strength.  I tend to think about spiritual things quite a bit but neglect the actual spiritual work of Bible study, prayer, relationships.<br \/>\nRecently, I&#8217;ve felt him calling me to give all of my strength in these areas.  A renewed call to study and pray \u2013 to give Him all of my strength as well.  It&#8217;s a realization that the acting out of our faith is not just items on a check list, they are real spiritual activities.  They work together with my emotions, mind and soul to draw me closer to God.  They complete the work of my mind and heart.<br \/>\nIn closing, I thought it would be good to turn this around and think about how God loves us.<br \/>\n<strong>Q \u2013 How would you describe God&#8217;s Love?<\/strong><br \/>\nThere&#8217;s a song by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.matthewwest.com\/\">Matthew West<\/a> called More (Windows Media clip on his website <a href=\"http:\/\/www.matthewwest.com\/music\/happy\/More_60s_64.wma\">here<\/a>) played on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.1049theriver.com\/\">The River<\/a> that just blows my mind each time I hear it.  <a href=\"http:\/\/www.anychristianlyrics.com\/index.php?cmd=6&#038;recid=38\">The lyrics<\/a> are sung from God&#8217;s perspective:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>I love you more than the sun<br \/>\nAnd the stars that I taught how to shine<br \/>\nYou are mine and you shine for me too<br \/>\nI love you yesterday and today<br \/>\nAnd tomorrow I&#8217;ll say it again and again<br \/>\nI love you more<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I don&#8217;t know of a verse that teaches that explicitly, although Jesus did say that we are worth more than many Sparrows.<br \/>\nBut \u2026<br \/>\nWhat mountain, star, planet, galaxy, ocean or continent was made in God&#8217;s image?<br \/>\nWhat tree, flower, vine, weed or grass was given the emotions and reason of man?<br \/>\nWhat tiger, eagle, dinosaur, chimp, dolphin or whale did God send his son to Earth to die for?<br \/>\nRead those lyrics again and picture God speaking them to <em>you<\/em>.  In my mind, God doesn&#8217;t speak, He simply observes.  Every time I hear that song, I see him singing to me and it gives me chills.<br \/>\nGod loves us with everything.  He&#8217;s only asking the same from us in return.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We&#8217;ve been studying, as a church, the greatest commandment from Mark 12: One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them<a href=\"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2007\/02\/midweek_lesson_3.shtml\" class=\"more-link\">Read More <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Midweek Lesson<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.8.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Midweek Lesson - salguod.net<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2007\/02\/midweek_lesson_3.shtml\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Midweek Lesson - salguod.net\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"We&#8217;ve been studying, as a church, the greatest commandment from Mark 12: One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. 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He felt that the ministry was not for him and resigned, moving to Florida to be a teacher. We are left to decide what to do. The board, the Deacons and the Evangelist met last Monday to discuss it. We are are a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;God and Church&quot;","block_context":{"text":"God and Church","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/god-and-church"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":669,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2007\/05\/a_good_sunday.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":626,"position":1},"title":"A Good Sunday","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"May 1, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"This past Sunday, the Holy Spirit was at work. No, there was no fire from heaven or anything like that, it was just how the service came together on a theme of God teaching us through suffering. It wasn't planned, at least not by us anyway. You can listen to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Family and Friends&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Family and Friends","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/family-and-friends"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":497,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2006\/05\/bible_talk_less.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":626,"position":2},"title":"Bible Talk Lesson &#8211; Safety","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"May 19, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Notes from a Bible Talk originally delivered on 12\/16\/2005. Inspired by David Underwood's post to New Wineskins here. What does it mean to be 'safe'?Protected Sheltered Closed, locked. IsolatedLet's look at some spiritual concepts:If you want to live, you must die. If you want to be first, you must be\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Articles, papers and lessons&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Articles, papers and lessons","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/articles-papers-and-lessons"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":359,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2005\/07\/house_rules.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":626,"position":3},"title":"House Rules","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"July 14, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Things with our kids haven't been going as well as we'd like. My wife, because she spends more time with them, was more acutely aware of it. I frankly hadn't paid enough attention, to the kids or to her telling me they needed attention. (That's another post in itself.) Maria's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Family and Friends&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Family and Friends","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/family-and-friends"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":830,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2008\/07\/mark_12_tenants.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":626,"position":4},"title":"Mark 12 &#8211; Tenants, Taxes, Greatest Commandment","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"July 18, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Mark 12:1-12 - As I read this, I can't help but think of this blog. I guess it's been on my mind lately, as the days go by and there isn't anything new. I spend plenty of time online and most of that on blog. But I'm a consumer, not\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Quiet Time Journal&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Quiet Time Journal","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/quiet-time-journal"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":511,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2006\/06\/what_does_total.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":626,"position":5},"title":"What Does Total Commitment Look Like?","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"June 21, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"The idea of total commitment is not new, and it goes back farther than those infamous 30 'would be' back in 1979. Right after delivering the 10 commandments to Israel (Deuteronomy 5), Moses said this to the people:Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. 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