The Covenant of Love

"Know therefore that the Lord your God is God, He is the faithful God, keeping His covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love Him and keep His commands." Deuteronomy 7:9

A quick run through before I share something about love, since this verse comes after verse 8 where Moses shares with the people that God swore an oath to their forefathers that He would love them, even though they were small in number, were enslaved and were disobedient, He delivered them and made a covenant to love them. So they should "know" that because God is God and is faithful, unlike other 'gods', He would keep His covenant. And, not only that, He would keep on keeping His covenant for a thousand generations. (We aren't quite there yet, although I think the number meant as many as would come until time ends).

Then comes a caveat of sorts, like other promise/obedience mutual relationship verses that God gives us to keep us ever mindful that He expects something in return. Salvation is free, but God does expect us to respond to His free gift with some appreciation and some transformation and conformity. Here is what we need to do to respond to His never-ending, perfect, redemptive love and sacrifice. We should love Him back. That sounds easy enough. I try to tell Him each day that I love Him and appreciate what He did, does and will do for me that I can't do for myself. Loving Him is really the easiest part of the relationship; except that He goes on to explain how to do that. Oh yeah, by obeying Him, specifically His commands.

His commands were understood to be The Ten Commandments as we know them. Jesus boiled those down to two for us. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and your neighbor as yourself." Again, loving God, who is my Lord Jesus with everything, seems like a no-brainer. Heart, mind, soul and strength... everything I've got, right? How can we possibly argue with that? I know it is easy to say and harder to do, given how very much we love other things that often come before Him. Aha, then comes another caveat of sorts, 'and your neighbor as yourself '. Oh boy! Hey... easy for me I have the sweetest neighbors, mother and daughter who help with the sound/tech ministry at Saddleback Church. They are perfect neighbors. No problem.

Wait, I think a broader definition of neighbor is implied. All the people in Woodcrest Apts.? I would call them my neighbors. How about all the people I saw at the Tustin Chili Cook-off? They for the most part were my Tustin neighbors. The more I think about it the harder it gets. So what are my points today? I should appreciate God's love for me so much that I love Him completely in return and everybody else too. Wow, that is a big expectation. God expects and deserves for us to obey Him and do what He wants. It is actually for our own good you know. Anyway, we know He is faithful and we should be willing to try harder and care more and follow through and do the right thing, even if it is a big expectation. After all He paid an awfully big price to be able to ask us. I need to work on this a little harder myself. I just thought of a couple of neighbors in the broader sense that are going to take a special effort.
He deserves that.

In His Service,
Pastor Fred

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