For all their differences, college students and circus performers have this in common—they can juggle. In fact, they are always discovering just how much they can keep in the air at the same time.
As a sophomore, I am well acquainted with the juggling act. Each responsibility I have is another ball in my hand, and each semester it seems like another one is tossed in. My current juggling act includes going to class, studying, participating in campus organizations, spending time with friends, and everything else that comes with college life. In the midst of this adroit routine, it’s easy to let one ball drop—my Christian responsibilities.
Part of the trouble is identifying what those responsibilities look like. Unlike completing a project for class or studying for an exam, my Christian life isn’t defined by checking things off a to-do list.
While it is tempting to determine the “success” of my Christian life by how many meetings I make or how often I read the Bible, Matthew 23 reminds me that developing my love relationship with Christ is my ultimate responsibility. Loving Christ is the key to expressing Him.
From the Inside Out
In order to genuinely express Christ, we need to to let Him work in us from the inside out. In Matthew 23:26 Jesus says, “First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.”
Unable to see beyond their rigid, religious concepts, the Pharisees and teachers of the law built up an outward behavior to impress others and win God’s favor. But Jesus chastises them for their lack of sincerity and love of attention. It is evident that taking the Bible as a list of laws to obey for our self-perfection inhibits the development of our love relationship with God.
Though it is crucial to read God’s word and obey His commandments, our inward condition when we do these things is equally crucial. 2 Corinthians 3:6 says, “For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” The Pharisees lived by a legalistic obsession with the law, but the Lord regarded them as hypocrites—the Greek word was used for stage actors, impersonators. Jesus tells them, “You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean” (Matt. 23:27).
Commanded to Love
Rather than searching the Scriptures for laws to obey, the Lord wants us to love Him and spend time with Him. The law God gave to Moses issued out of spousal love for His chosen people (Exo. 20). Jesus’s words in Matthew 23 prove that God still wants His people to approach His word to gain more of Him out of love.
The Pharisees loved the commandments, but missed the commandment to love—Jesus tells us the greatest commandment is to love God with all our heart, soul, and mind (Matt. 22:37). While love can be a spontaneous feeling, it is also something that takes practice and commitment.
The great command in this verse sometimes leaves me wondering if I love the Lord enough. Something that really comforts me though is realizing that in this love relationship, the Lord knows we are still learning to love Him. When we come to the word with a seeking spirit to know Him more, He is faithful to reveal more of Himself to us. Through these revelations, we are slowly falling more in love with the Lord Jesus.
The Law—An Engagement Contract
Moses perfectly illustrates this. In Exodus, Moses had his first interaction with God at the burning bush. Although God was calling him to bring the Israelites out of Egypt, Moses was afraid to even look at God and questioned his ability to do what was being asked of him (Exo. 3). However, despite Moses’s resistance and doubts, God brought him into an intimate relationship with Him. This process culminated in the monumental revelation of the Lord through the Ten Commandments, where God says He will show “lovingkindness to thousands of generations of those who love Me” (Exo. 20:6). Sometimes portrayed as a “Christian rulebook,” Moses’s experience shows us that the law is more like an engagement contract between the Lord and His people—it was the outcome of mutual love relationship.
“…The covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by their hand to bring them out from the land of Egypt… I was their Husband, declares Jehovah.” –Jeremiah 31:32
Moses’s story resonates with me. Sometimes out of my own fear of what the Lord will ask me to do, I can be too intimidated to have a genuine conversation with Him. But as I continue to fellowship about the Bible and grow as a Christian, I am slowly starting to see what my “Christian responsibilities” truly center on.
The Christian life isn’t just about going to church and following a set of rules. Mere outward appearances are not what God cares about. Instead, Romans 8:4 tells us the righteous requirement of the law is fulfilled by walking in the spirit, not in the flesh, and that spirit is a spirit of love (2 Tim. 1:7). By walking in the spirit and pursuing a genuine relationship with the Lord, love will fill us and the fulfillment of the law will naturally follow.
By: M. Cannizzo
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- God’s Purpose Throughout the Ages - September 15, 2016
Just an amazing point. The Eternal God is just looking for “those who love Me.”