Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. Deuteronomy 6:4-9
God wants all of you, all the time, sitting, walking, waking, resting. “With all your might” is the Hebrew expression for totality. Not 75% or 95% but 100%. It’s easy to keep back an area of our life and try to hide it in darkness, but God wants our whole self in the light of his grace. He commands it, it’s possible, and we have his help.
To illustrate, let’s look at the wholeness wheel. Divide a circle into eight pie shape slivers. Each one represents a part of your life: the spiritual, emotional, physical, mental, vocational, financial, social, and recreational. Now color in each pie shape from the center towards the outer edge in proportion to how much of that area you estimate belongs to God. Do that for each pie shape area. Your circle will look like some spokes coming from the center point for each pie shape. How do your wheel’s edges look? Are all the areas colored in close to the outside edge or some just barely colored in? Now if this circle tried to roll like a wheel, how smooth would its movement be? If your life feels bumpy and turbulent, less than whole, perhaps there are too many big differences in the areas on your wholeness wheel. If every area is totally given to God the wholeness wheel will roll as God intended. What areas are you strong in and what ones need strengthening?
Jesus said that loving God with all ourselves is the first and greatest commandment (Matthew 22:37-39). “With all your might” is the language of devotion not just outward obedience to the law but heartfelt love and response by your whole being toward God. Wholeness is being single-minded. These verses summarize the first four of the 10 commandments about worshiping God alone. Is your life worshiping God alone? Are you allowing God’s transformation in 100% of all the areas of your life? Join us at South Fellowship for the eight week sermon series on how to give God all your life.
The world is anxiously waiting to see what Jesus Christ can do in, by, for, and through one man wholly given to him – God-led. You can be that man. Rev. Dr. Frank Buchman (Protestant evangelist decorated by the French and German governments for his contributions to their reconciliation after World War ll).
By Donna Burns
