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regard that glorious and fearful Name, THE LORD OUR GOD. 39 AS JEHOVAH, the self-existent Being, He demands our most reverential homage, in soul and body. As our ALEHIM, our God in covenant for the redemption of fallen man, He demands our utmost love and gratitude. We are to consider

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Secondly, The manner in which this love is to be manifested and that is, not only in outward acts, but with all the heart, and with all the soul, and with all the mind. His demand is, My son, give Me thine heart. By the heart we are to understand our best affections, our utmost love. When we consider what the Lord our God hath done for us, and what He is to us, or the relationship which He has been pleased to reveal as subsisting between Himself and believers in Christ Jesus; we must acknowledge it reasonable that our best affections should be devoted to Him. His love called us into being, with the intention of making us happy in the knowledge and enjoyment of Himself. And when man had fallen, and by sin had forfeited His favour and blessing, again He was pleased to reveal His love, and to provide a remedy, by means of which the sinner might be reconciled to Him, and restored to His favour. The love of God to man is the grand theme of Divine

39 Deuteronomy xxviii. 58.

40 Proverbs xxiii. 26.

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revelation; and the knowledge of this love is that which induces man to love the Lord his God. We love Him, because He first loved us.11 When the love of God is shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us, then the heart is given up to God, then the love of Christ constrains43 to willing obedience to His word, His laws, and will. And if we give our hearts to God, we shall seek for continual intercourse and fellowship with Him. The society of those whom we love is always pleasant and agreeable. If we love the Lord our God, we shall seek for the enjoyment of communion with Him, we shall take pleasure in conversing with Him in praise and prayer. We shall thank Him for His goodness, and mercy, and grace; and shall cast all our care upon Him at all times, and in all circumstances. We shall look up to Him as dutiful and affectionate children to a kind and tender Parent; and we shall expect to receive the blessings of His grace, which He has promised to bestow upon them that wait on Him.

We are, further, to love Him with all the soul. The soul is the vital principle in man; and therefore, as distinguished from the love of the heart, or the devotedness of the affections to God, it may denote the energy and activity of this love being displayed as well as felt, being

41 1 John iv. 19. 42Rom. v.5. 432 Corinth. v. 14. 441 Peter v. 7.

manifested in the life, as well as lodged in the heart. If the heart be warmed with the love of God, the soul will be actively devoted to His service, a willing obedience to His commands will follow. The will of God will be the delight of the soul that loves Him. When there is no active obedience to the will of God in the life, the heart cannot have been given up to Him. How much less can His demand have been complied with, when there is active disobedience to His will in the life, when vice and ungodliness appear in the conduct, when opposition is manifested to His word and His ways.

Let

Again, we are to love Him with all the mind; that is, the understanding and the thoughts are to be devoted to Him, as well as the affections of the heart, and the energies of the soul. us consider what it is that chiefly occupies our thoughts. Are they taken up with the love of the Lord our God, with gratitude to Him, with a desire of devotedness to His service? Surely if we were to be judged by the rule of our obedience to the first and great commandment, as it is here described, every mouth must be stopped from boasting, and we must stand guilty and self-condemned before God.45 But blessed be His holy name, He has graciously promised to do for us what we are unable to do of our

45 Romans iii. 19.

selves. He has declared, The Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live. Let us seek for the fulfilment of this promise, and thus shall we be enabled in some measure to obey the first and great commandment: and to avoid every thing that is opposed to its require

ments.

If it be the first and great commandment of God to His creatures, that they should love Him, the Lord their God, with all their heart, and with all their soul, and with all their mind, it is surely incumbent upon us to ascertain for ourselves whether we have any such love for Him. For the Divine record further assures us, that if any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, he shall be accursed, anathema maranatha," when the Lord shall come to judgment. When there is among us such prevailing profanation of the Lord's day; such daring irreverence to the sacred name of God; so much of what the Apostle calls worshipping and serving the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever;48 such evidence of what the prophet terms setting up idols in the heart, in opposition to the true God; it is very evident that many "who profess and call themselves Christians," do not love the Lord God with all their heart, and

46 Deut. xxx. 6. 471 Corinth. xvi. 22. 48 Rom.i. 25. 49 Ezek. xiv. 3.

indeed do not love Him at all. For when the heart is not given up to God, He is not loved at all, although there may be great outward professions of regard to Him. It behoves us therefore to consider upon what it is that our hearts are set. If we are seeking our happiness in the things of time and sense, we are not seeking it in the love of God. We cannot serve both God and the world. They are two opposite masters; one or the other of which must be renounced. If any appear to be halting betwixt two opinions; the reason is, because the world has possession of their hearts, and they are unwilling to give them up to God. And while they observe lying vanities, they forsake their own mercy.50 May they see their folly before it be too late; and seek the Lord while He may be found, and call upon Him while He is near. Let them turn unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon them, and to our God, and He will abundantly pardon them; and they will find that in His favour is life, and joy, and peace, such as the world cannot give, and which it cannot take away. It is the privilege of those who love God, and desire to love Him with all their heart, and soul, and mind, to have communion and fellowship with Him here on earth; and to look forward in hope to the consummation of all their desires here

50 Jonah ii. 8. 51 Isaiah lv. 6, 7.

52 Psalm xxx. 5.

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