Loving God with All Your Mind

I love it when Scripture as absolutely clear on things. There is room for discussion on a lot of areas, but when it is clear, it is a beautiful thing. So when they asked Jesus, "What is the Great Commandment?", we got a clear and straightforward answer. What is the most important thing that God thinks we should do? "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind" (Matt 22:37). That is, love God with every part of your being. (Another reference, for instance, includes "strength".) And, you know, I don't think we're unclear on this. I mean, most Christians can answer the question satisfactorily. "What is the great commandment?" "Love God with your whole being." Something to that effect. We got it.

What concerns me is when I stop there. I tend to do that. "Yeah, I got it. Let's move on." When, in fact, I don't. I mean, sure, I understand the words, but I don't understand the concept and I certainly do not carry it out. That's a problem.

The concept is confusing because we tend to confuse the terms. We do that because we don't think them through. What does it mean, for instance, to "Love the Lord your God ... with all your mind"? How do you love God with your mind? Many of us don't. We don't even start that. Thinking, in some Christians circles, is basically taboo. "Reason counters faith," they say or "You're too heavenly minded to be any earthly good." But Jesus disagrees. We are commanded to love God with our minds. The other side also tends to confuse it. "Oh, you guys are so wrong. We are commanded to love God with our minds. So, thinking is loving God." This group assumes that simply using your brain is loving God. And that doesn't make any more sense than those who argue against thinking at all.

So, let's hold on a moment. Let's begin at the bottom. Let's ask first, "What does it mean to love God?" You see, we have an excellent description of loving our fellow man in 1 Cor 13, but it isn't quite as helpful when it comes to loving God. In the 1 Cor 13 passage there is a lot about getting past their faults (patient, not bearing a grudge, enduring, etc.) and there is a lot about my selflessness (not proud, gentle, meek, not self-seeking, etc.). Since God is without faults, that part isn't helpful. Still, we should be able to find a useful definition of "love" in Scripture. And, basically, it is the concept of valuing someone (or something). Loving someone means we consider them of great value, we enjoy them, we appreciate (that's a term meaning "to increase in value") them. We seek what is in their best interest and depreciate our own interests ... because our own interests become their best interests.

Working up from that concept of "love", we should be able to see that loving God with all of our being is pretty straightforward. But don't confuse yourself. What I do for God using my heart, soul, mind, and strength is not love. These are simply the tools I use to express it. For instance, simply using my mind is not loving God. Using my mind to draw closer to God, to lose myself in His magnificence, to examine His glories and proclaim His wonders, those would be exercises of love. Think of it like a shovel. If I told you that you were to dig a hole with a shovel, you would understand that the shovel itself is not the hole, nor is simply possessing or even using the shovel the answer. The shovel is a tool that, used in the proper fashion with the proper force for the proper purpose, will produce the result intended. In that way, I am to use every facet of my being to give to God everything that He deserves for His glory. That's my first task. I'll get on that right away.