Love With All Your Heart

EVERYTHING YOU DO FLOWS FROM THIS

Love with all your heart (Matthew 22:37). The term “love” used here is the word “agape.” This word is one of four used to describe the feeling of love in Greek. The first three types of love all have to do with how you would feel towards family, friends, or even spouses. Agape love, on the other hand, is the highest and deepest form of love.You may have heard this type of love only used in relation to God’s love for you, but Jesus chooses the same word to dictate the type of love He wants from you. 1 John 4:19 also teaches, “We love because he first loved us.” Before you can love any thing else properly, you must understand His great love for you.

The word for heart in Matthew 22:37 translates to “the center of your physical and spiritual life.” Proverbs 4:23 teaches us to guard our hearts, for everything we do flows from it. Physically, we also know this to be true, as from our heart flows blood, which is transported to every cell of our bodies. What’s flowing from your heart? Is it love, purity, devotion to God? Or is pain, wounding, or offense flowing? Take time to evaluate this in yourself by praying the prayer David prayed in Psalm 139:23-24, “Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!”

Know that loving God with all of your heart means to love Him unconditionally with everything you have. First receive His love for you, then give it right back to Him! As He highlights impurities in your heart, repent and give more of your heart to the Father. As you radically love God, you are loving Him the same way He loves you, which impacts everything you do!

PRAYER

Father, thank you for loving me. Search me and know my heart. Keep offense far from me. I desire to please you. Give me your heart. Amen.

APPLICATION

• What area in your life needs to be touched by the love of God today?
• What’s hindering you from loving God today?
• Bring those areas to God and ask Him to teach you how to love Him through this.