How Do You Love God?

Let’s examine the Great Commandment a little more. God commands us to love Him. Someone might say, “Well, Peter, I love God.” But, He didn’t say love God. He said, Love God with all of your heart, all your soul, all your strength, all your mind. Now, who does that? I don’t know anybody who does. So, to me, He is, at least, saying “I, God, want you, to love me more, and more, and more.”

Furthermore, God is not commanding us to possess thoughts of love about God, but rather, to love him, and here love is a verb denoting action on our part. Each one of us must have a personal relationship with God.

Question: How do you and I grow to love God more and more? I read somewhere that a lawyer or a counselor was talking about people who had trouble in their marriage, and he said a fellow will sometimes insist, “Well, I love my wife, but I don’t love her as much as I should. I can’t help it, I just don’t love her as much as I would like to.” And what the counselor said was instructive. He said, “Take a pad of paper and number 1 to 20 on it. Then write down a numbered list of what you do admire, what you do like, and what you do appreciate about her.” He said a man sometimes will say, “I can’t think of a single thing.” But when he puts his mind to it and starts thinking about it, he changes his mind. He finds much to write down. Those written thoughts of appreciation can help us act in love to one another.

I think we could do that with God—think expectantly and be confident in our search. If we are really looking for reasons to love Him, we could love God more tomorrow than we do today, if we put our mind to it. I think that is what God is telling us. It’s almost as if He is saying to us, “Love me more and more. Keep looking for reasons to 

love me. Your happiness depends on it. Your success in life depends on it. I know what is best for you. It is most important.”

I think of Albert Einstein once saying there are two kinds of people in the world. People who say they never have seen a miracle, and people like Einstein who say, “I see miracles everywhere.” So if we start looking for the goodness of God, we will find reasons for loving God more tomorrow than we do today. And remember, God really, really, wants that from us. He made it the First and Greatest Command to His people!