First Love

The First Commandment: Love God

Within ancient Hebrew culture, the word “first” meant far more than just “first”. In many tournaments or races there are consolation prizes for the losers who do not win, but there can usually only ever be one actual winner. The word “consolation” comes from the Latin “consolari” which meant to offer solace or comfort to the losers who are disappointed that they did not win. It says in Mark 12:28-31 (KJV) “And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, ‘which is the first commandment of all?’ And Jesus answered him, ‘The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is One Lord:  And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these”. Hebraically, the first commandment to love God with all of one’s heart, soul, mind, and strength was not just “first” in rank, but like the winner of a race, it was the “first” commandment because it was set above all others. Jesus said to the Church of Ephesus in Revelation 2:4-5 (KJV) “Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou have left thy first love. Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent”.

Religious Losers with Loveless Hearts

There are no consolation prizes for losers with loveless hearts in the Kingdom of God. God is love and those who live in love live in God and God lives within them. The Ephesians had been winners who had lived in God, but they had become religious. By faith alone, they had become losers by embracing religion and therefore forsaking and forgetting their first love. Jesus said in John 13:34-35 “A new commandment I give to you, that ye love one another; according as I did love you, that ye also love one another; in this shall all [the world] know that ye are my disciples, if ye may have love one to another”. Jesus threatened to come and remove the lampstand of the light of God’s love from amongst them because the world no longer knew that they were Jesus’ disciples. They were no longer shining with the light of God’s love but because of the the religion of their tradition they had become enamoured with themselves. However, Jesus promised that those who repented from the “I am as god” pride of this self-love and overcame by returning to their first love, would be given the right to eat from the tree of life that is in the paradise of the love of God’s fatherhood. Those who did not repent would lose that right despite their religious faith-boasts and claims.

Heavenly Hearts

The Scribe who heard Jesus speaking about the first commandment of all replied in Mark 12:32-34 “‘Well, Teacher, in truth thou has spoken that there is One God, and there is none other but He; and to love Him out of all the heart, and out of all the understanding, and out of all the soul, and out of all the strength, and to love one’s neighbour as one’s self, is more than all the whole burnt-offerings and the sacrifices.’ And Jesus, having seen him that he answered with understanding, said to him, ‘Thou art not far from the reign of God;’” Within ancient Hebrew culture the reign or kingdom of God or Heaven was not something that people experienced after they were dead. Jesus was not saying that this particular Scribe was somehow loitering at death’s door. Jesus said to Nicodemus in John 3:3,5-6 “If anyone may not be born from above, he is not able to see the reign of God…If any one may not be born of water, and the Spirit, he is not able to enter into the reign of God; that which has been born of the flesh is flesh, and that which has been born of the Spirit is spirit”. Hebraically to see something was to experience it. Jesus was not talking about entering the reign or Kingdom of God by dying and going to Heaven. He was talking about experiencing the Kingdom of God by dying to pride in the waters of baptism and then being born of the eternal life’s breath or Holy Spirit of God’s fatherhood. In Matthew 12:28 Jesus said, “But if I, by the Spirit of God, do cast out the demons, then come already unto you did the reign of God”. The kingdom or reign of God or Heaven was within people’s hearts (see Luke 17:21). It was within the hearts of those who had repented from having self-admiring pride-poisoned puffed-up loveless hearts which only love those that love them and that were filled with the lying breaths of the prince of darkness and father of their rebellion. Instead they had the nature of their hearts changed by dying to the self-adoration and pride of self-worship and then being born of God’s love. It was then that Heaven filled people’s loving hearts. In Mark 9:47-50 Jesus said “….And if thine eye may cause thee to stumble, cast it out; it is better for thee one-eyed to enter into the reign of God, than having two eyes, to be cast to the Gehenna of the fire—where their worm is not dying, and the fire is not being quenched; for every one with fire shall be salted, and every sacrifice with salt shall be salted. The salt is good, but if the salt may become saltless, in what will ye season it? Have in yourselves salt and have peace in one another’”.

Hearts of Hell

The word “Gehenna” in Greek is the “Valley of Hinnom” in Hebrew, this was the local rubbish dump in Jerusalem where fires were not quenched, and worms continually ate the carcasses of the dead. The word “Gehenna” is often translated “hell” but that is not what Jesus was referring to. He was referring to Isaiah 66:23-24 “And it has been from month to month, and from sabbath to sabbath, Come do all flesh to bow themselves before Me, said Yehovah. And they have gone forth and looked on the carcases of the men who are transgressing against me, for their worm die not, and their fire is not quenched, and they have been an abhorrence to all flesh!” Jesus was talking about those who continue to wilfully rebel and transgress against the loving commandment of God to love God and love everyone else as well. That is why Jesus said in Matthew 5:44-45 “Love your enemies, bless those cursing you, do good to those hating you, and pray for those accusing you falsely, and persecuting you, that ye may be sons of your Father in the heavens, because His sun He doth cause to rise on evil and good, and He doth send rain on righteous and unrighteous”. Jesus was talking about the sons of rebellion or disobedience. He was talking about the religious community, people like the Scribes, Pharisees, and Teachers of the Law whom Jesus described as sons of the devil because they were full of hatred and bore the devil’s image or reflection in the way that they were inspired to behave. According to Luke 7:30, they rejected God’s purpose for themselves by not allowing the mercy and grace of God to lead them to John the Baptist to be baptised into repentance for the forgiveness of their sins. In the pride of their self-admiring “as god” hearts they could not see the need for forgiveness. There is no repentance in resurrection, the time for repentance and forgiveness is now. Because they did not believe or were established in the character, personality, or name of Jesus (see John 3:18) they remained under condemnation. Their behaviour in life will become their inheritance in resurrection. Just like Cain, the fires of their incensed rage at being condemned will not be quenched and the worms of their resentment that eat away at their self-admiring and loveless hearts will never die.

Loving from the Inside Out

Before the Fall, Adam would not have needed any commandments or laws. God is love, and Adam would have lived in love because God lived within Adam. It was only after the Fall, after Adam gasped out God, died to God’s love and replaced God’s love for him with the pride of self-adoration and idolatrous self-love that commandments were needed. That is why Paul said in Galatians 5:22-23 “But the fruit of the Spirit [breath of God’s fatherhood] is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law”. The Scribes, Pharisees, and Teachers of the Law who repeatedly confronted Jesus did not realise that if they had to be told to love from the outside-in, they were not sovereignly inspired by the grace of God to become Sons of God. The Sons of God live in love from the inside-out just like Jesus because He lives within them and they live within Him. That is why Jesus said in John 3:16 “for God did so love the world, that His Son—the only begotten—He gave, that everyone who is believing in him may not perish, but may have eternal life”. Hebraically, eternal life was not life that began after people had died, and “believing in” meant to become established “within” Jesus and sharing in his identity as the Son of God by being filled with the eternal life’s breath or Holy Spirit of God’s fatherhood. That is why he said to Mary, as recorded in John’s gospel, on the day he rose from the dead “…be going on to my brethren, and say to them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father, and to my God, and to your God”.

The Way of Love

Hebraically, as people walked through life they breathed, and as they breathed they spoke and accomplished words. The collection of their words or works as they habitually walked on the pathway of life were their ways, and the totality of their words and ways (or character, behaviour, and accomplishments) and everything else about them constituted their name. God is love, and the Sons of God are called by the name “the Sons of God” because they live in love. They follow the way of love because God is love and God will dwell within their loving hearts by the power of His eternal life’s breath or Holy Spirit, forever. To find out more about the way of love, click , here.