Love the Lord Your God With All Your Soul

25 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” 27 And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” 28 And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.”

As just a brief summary and recap of this passage to relate directly to what I’ll be sharing with you tonight, here is the main give and take of this passage:

The lawyer was trying to justify himself through the Law.

Jesus pointed out the impossibility of such a feat.

When the lawyer tried to squirm his way out of being cornered with the blanket statement “love your neighbor as yourself”, Jesus brought the parable to his attention to indict him.

The lawyer knew the Law— told him to love God and love neighbor. To bind these sayings on your head and your hand, to bind it to your doorpost. Everywhere, remind yourself of these things. It’s very important.

You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

Deuteronomy 6:8–9 ESV

8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

Jesus agrees that what the lawyer said is true, but points out in the Parable of the Good Samaritan his own failure to keep these commands.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), .

Now that we have that recap, let’s dig into what loving God with your soul specifically means.

Define psyche (soul)

Let’s define the word being used in the Greek there:

Psyche (see-KAY) — the essence of a person, their life-force. Was also used to describe someone’s entire being and everything about them.

Jesus agrees that what the lawyer said is true, but

So when God says in His Law “love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength” he is more or less saying: love God with literally every part of you. Did I miss anything? Well, it’s covered by soul, that’s the rest of you.

But how do we do that? It’s a daunting task. How do we truly love God with our innermost being, with every part of us, so there isn’t a crevice or a crack left? Let’s look at a related word in the Greek that may shed some light on what is going on here.

Psychikos (see-key-KOS) — the natural or unspiritual. Our fallen state as humans naturally before we are changed by the Holy Spirit.

The same root word that describes the essence or life-force of a person is used here to describe a person who is functionally dead, at least spiritually. Cut off from God. We see this in the Garden of Eden when God tells Adam, “you will surely die” and in when Paul explains that because of Adam’s sin, sin and death have corrupted humanity so that we are dead spiritually.

This word is used as a dichotomy, the natural person or unspiritual person versus the spiritual person. Let’s look at where else Scripture uses this word.

1 Corinthians 2:14 ESV

14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.

We are unable to understand the things of God because are spiritually blind—this is why Jesus said that some wouldn’t understand His parables. They were psychikos, a natural person, dead in their sins and unable to understand the things that can only be spiritually understood through the help of the Holy Spirit.

1 Corinthians 15:44 ESV

44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body.

This verse is describing the Resurrection of the Dead, and the difference between our old body, still tainted by sin, versus our post-resurrection body, when we’ll be free from sin completely.

This term was used to describe the state that people are in before we come to Christ, before we are regenerated or caused to be born again by the Holy Spirit. This is an important concept for figuring out how to love God with our soul, because it illuminates for us once more the impossibility of loving God on our own, apart from the work of Christ.

All of Jesus’ ministry constantly pointing us away from ourselves and the works of the Law to Him and His perfection, to the fact that it was a work of God that would change a person. Our soul needs to change—we can’t love God with who we were before we were saved because Scripture says that no one seeks after God:

Romans 3:10–11 ESV

10 as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; 11 no one understands; no one seeks for God.

Let’s walk through where Jesus discusses this more fully

John 3:1–8 ESV

1 Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. 2 This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” 3 Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” 4 Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” 5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ 8 The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

Jesus is making the same dichotomy—between the natural man and the spiritual man. To truly love God with our soul, we must be born again, and go from merely psychikos to pneumatikos (lit. of the Spirit; non-carnal; spiritual)—it is a change that is so profound and deep that our entire being is different from what it was before. No longer are we oppressed by the power of sin but rather free to love God where we couldn’t before.

1 John 4:19 ESV

19 We love because he first loved us.

This change happens purely through the Holy Spirit—not of works, lest any man should boast.

Ephesians 2:8–9 ESV

8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

Not only

How Do We Love God With Our Soul

So now that we know the pre-condition necessary to love God with our soul (we need a new, redeemed, transformed, polished off soul), what does that look like in the life of a believer?

Love for God comes from our innermost being, it is a part of who we are, the central aspect of our life as a Christian, and the treasuring of God is essential to the Christian faith.

Matthew 13:44 ESV

44 “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.

Loving God involves finding joy in God. Not just doing things for Him, but delighting in Him. Obviously this was covered extensively, I’m sure, in “loving God with all your heart”, but I want to focus in on the aspect of satisfaction and contentment that love for God gives us.

Many times we can focus so much on what we need to be doing for God: The practical ways we can love God (caring about what he cares about, obeying his commandments, avoiding sin, etc.) that we forget one of the main reasons that God commands us to love Him. Because it brings us joy. Because it satisfies our soul. Because it gives us contentment. Loving God is good for us as His children. We were created to long for God, to find such joy and satisfaction in Him that when we discover Him, we give all that we have just so we can have God.

Let us meditate on David’s psalm, when he was in the wilderness of Judah:

Psalm 63:1–5 ESV

Psalm 63:1–8 ESV

1 O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. 2 So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. 3 Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. 4 So I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands. 5 My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips, 6 when I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night; 7 for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy. 8 My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.

Psalm 63:1–6 ESV

Is this sort of longing that you have for God? If not, why?

God is Everything We Need

The main problem that we face when attempting to follow the greatest commandment is the problem of idolatry. Other things that take our attention, affection, love instead of God. We need to point our entire life’s trajectory towards God, not just because God commands it, but because He commands it for our good. Nothing else can satisfy our soul like David proclaims, except for God himself.

A quote from C.S. Lewis that I thought was very poignant:

“No, your desires aren’t the problem. The weakness of your desires are the problem. You are like a child fooling about in slums with your mud pies because you can’t imagine what a holiday at the sea is like.” - C.S. Lewis

God doesn’t want us to be miserable. He doesn’t ask us to deny ourselves and pick up our cross to follow Jesus because He’s a sadist and He likes hurting His children, but rather He knows that the only true contentment, peace, and joy is found in Him and Him alone. He knows that any pain or suffering we go through following Him is only for our good, so that we can proclaim with Paul “I count it all joy when I go through suffering.”

Sometimes I think we understand this mentally but we don’t believe it. Of course, it makes sense that God should be enough for me, should satisfy my longings and my desires, should give me contentment, but I don’t think we understand why that’s the case, and it leads us to confusion.

Loving God, delighting in God with all of our being doesn’t bring us joy because when God sees us loving Him He says “Ah, perfect! Since you have loved me, I will give you joy through this, that or the other thing.” That’s not how this works. We can wholly satisfied in God because it is God himself that satisfies us. The very act of loving God, of putting our affections squarely on God, of pointing our entire being towards Him, is the thing that should and does satisfy us.

Olympic runners spend their entire lives, sometimes starting when they are three years old, all so that they can run 100 meters and get a shiny piece of metal. How more so should we be spending our entire lives, devoting every part of us, to a cause so much greater than that, for a reward that is so much better than that—our reward isn’t just heaven or the promise of eternal life, but God himself. Having a relationship with Him and being completely satisfied in Him forever.

Let us read from to help us understand what that means and why that happens:

John 4:7–15 ESV

7 A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” 8 (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) 9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) 10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” 13 Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.”

John 4:7

What is the living water in this passage? Is it riches? Is it the rewards that we have laid up in heaven? Is it the good things on this Earth? What is it?

In , Jesus uses this analogy again, and he says “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.” Jesus is the Living Water! It is God himself that satisfies our soul. Loving God with all of our soul isn’t a means to an end. We don’t love God to get the joy that He promises us after we love Him. Loving God with all our soul is both the means and the end. It is the act of loving God itself that gives us joy, because experiencing God is the ultimate delight, the ultimate pleasure, the ultimate treasure.

Two glorious truths are evident from Scripture: The purpose of our lives as Christians is to love and glorify God, and glorifying God is the most satisfying, joy-filled experience in all of the universe. It will fill us so that we will never be thirsty again.

John Piper says it best: “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.”

God wants us to be happy. But not in the way that most people think. God knows better than we do, and so He commands us to love Him with all of our heart, soul, mind and strength, because in loving Him we find joy and peace. The very experience of loving God is a delight to the soul of a Christian.

What are practical ways that I can give you to be able to put this into practice? First, read Scripture.

Reading Scripture is reading God’s love letter to you, and it helps you to fall more in love with God as a result, resulting in a never-ending cycle of joy where as you draw closer to God, He draws closer to you, and you find that you are losing the taste for the things of the world and want only that which can truly satisfy, the Living Water Jesus offers, Himself.

Second, view everything that you do in this life as an opportunity to glorify God by taking delight in Him. Give thanks to Him in every circumstance, rejoice always, put God at the center of your life. Make every activity an outgrowth of your affection for God. Understand that nothing else can truly satisfy your soul like God himself, and so don’t put your hope or your delight in the things that are perishable, but in God himself.

That doesn’t mean you don’t take delight and pleasure in the good things of the world that God has given for us to enjoy, but rather, it means that we have the right priorities and a right understanding of what is truly satisfying. We enjoy the good gifts God has given us as an outgrowth of our overriding love for God himself, not just to enjoy the gifts for their own sake.

Olympic runners spend their entire lives, sometimes starting when they are three years old, all so that they can run 100 meters and get a shiny piece of metal.

How more so should we be spending our entire lives, devoting every part of us, to a cause so much greater than that, for a reward that is so much better than that—our reward isn’t just heaven or the promise of eternal life, but God himself. Having a relationship with Him and being completely satisfied in Him forever.

Psalm 103:1–5 ESV

1 Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name! 2 Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, 3 who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, 4 who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, 5 who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

Psalm 16 ESV

A Miktam of David. 1 Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge. 2 I say to the Lord, “You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.” 3 As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight. 4 The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply; their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names on my lips. 5 The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot. 6 The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. 7 I bless the Lord who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me. 8 I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken. 9 Therefore my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure. 10 For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your holy one see corruption. 11 You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

Christians, loving God is not some dreary command that we need feel simply an obligation to do, but the loving exhortation and encouragement of a father who desires His children’s happiness, satisfaction, and contentment. That does not mean that we will not have difficulty or we will not still struggle with sin, but it is a promise that if we seek to put God first in our lives we will find peace, and our soul will be satisfied just as we glorify God by loving Him rightly.

For those of you here who may not yet have tasted of this amazing love and joy to be found in Christ, I pray that you would put your faith in Christ, His death on the cross, His Resurrection, proving He had power over sin and death, His perfect atonement, legal “not guilty” status that He gives to His children, and take hold of the love, joy, peace, and contentment that is only found when our souls are transformed to be free from sin’s power and made right before God. Just like the woman at the well, Christ will satisfy your thirst forevermore.

John 4:13–15 ESV

13 Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.”

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