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When Other Devotions Look Like Hate
“Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” (Matthew 22.37)
What does it mean to love God?
We don’t have a good word for loving God. We use the word “love” so flippantly:
We love chocolate. We love Stella Artois. We love Monday Night Football. We love Tim Tebow. We love American Idol. We love Dilbert. We love our church. We love Barack Obama. We love Mitt Romney. We love to fly first class. We love to fly fish. We love the beach. We love Chick-fil-A. We love God.
But loving God—the love Jesus is talking about in Matthew 22.37—is a much different degree and quality than the rest. I’m sure Tim Tebow is a great guy, but we can’t really love God and Tim Tebow the same way.
But why?
In Luke 14.26, Jesus throws down one of his most challenging statements ever. He says, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—even his own life—he cannot be my disciple.”
Say what? What is Jesus getting at?
Well, he doesn’t mean we ought to harm our family, do mean things to them. He doesn’t mean we should actually hate them. And he doesn’t mean we should actually harm or hate ourselves. This would go against his other teachings.
Instead, what Jesus means is that the love we have for God should outweigh, outmeasure, outshine, and outlast our devotion to others. The measure of our love for God should make our other devotions seem like hate.
Don’t get me wrong—our love for others is still there. Yes, we love our father and mother and spouse and children, but we also love God. And our love for God should be so strong that compared to it, our devotion to family seems like hate. It’s a matter of comparison.
Our love for God is a Redwood, our love for others is a daisy. Our love for God is an ocean, our love for others is a drop. Our love for God is the sun, our love for others is a spark.
