A Heart Full of Love - A Reflection on Matthew 22:34-40


When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

A few days ago we looked at discipleship, and one of the things that Jesus said it would cost us to follow him was this: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26). What he was essentially saying was that we had to put him first. If there was any doubt that this is what he meant, today’s passage should clear it. He says we need to love him with all our heart, our soul, and mind. Mark includes ‘strength’ as well (see Mark 12:28-31). 

Now, I very often have people telling me they find this difficult because they can’t “see” Jesus. “I can see father and mother and brother and sister and sweetheart and friend,” they say, “so it is easy to get into a relationship with them, but how does one get into a relationship with Jesus? I can’’t see him!” Ok, I understand the problem, so let me see if I can offer a solution to all of you who might be struggling with a similar problem. It’s a simple enough solution, really, and one that can be easily adopted.

Have you ever fallen in love? If you are not a child, I am presuming you have. Do you remember what that was like? Even if you met the person only once, you were constantly thinking of them. And what did you think about? Didn’t you think about being with the person: at a coffee shop, or a cinema, or in your kitchen? Couldn’t you visualize everything clearly? Then, didn’t you mentally engage in conversations with the person? They were long conversations, weren’t they? Now, if you can do this with a person you may have just met, why can’t you do this with Jesus? The conversations can be about anything. You can talk to him about your worries, your troubles, whatever. 

Now, I also have people telling me they can’t hear his voice. Well, that might be because you’re the one doing all the talking, but seriously, if you spend long enough time with Jesus, you WILL hear him speak. But until then, there is another great way of listening to what he has to say and that’s though the Bible. And you might hear him saying a lot of stuff you don’t understand, but be like the apostles. Tell him to explain what he means. For instance, you could ask him what he meant about hating mother and father and everybody else! 

The more we get to know Jesus, the more we love him. And the more we love him, the more we want to know him. And the two keep feeding each other until we will get to the point where we feel we do love him with all our heart and mind and strength and soul. And then service follows almost naturally from this love. When you love somebody so much, what is more natural than wanting to do things to make them happy. And this is the key to discipleship, really. Love.  

It makes everything a joy. 

Watch a video of this reflection by Aneel Aranha here:  https://youtu.be/1WFYyUZSru8



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