October 23, 2025

Hey guys,

I hope you’re having a great week. This week’s Thought comes from Deuteronomy 6:4-5, “Listen, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength.” 

Some translations read “the Lord is one.” Some of this probably sounds familiar to you. Verse four, is known as the Shema. It is the centerpiece of the Jewish faith. In fact, if you’re walking the streets of Jerusalem, Nazareth, or Bethlehem today, you may see Jews greet each other this way, “The Lord is our God." Then one would respond with "The Lord is One.” 

However, I want to focus on the second part of this passage, “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength.” Jesus uses this in the Gospels, where He adds mind to this. In Matthew 22, the Pharisees are trying to trap Him. They’re playing the political game, trying to get him to pick one law over the rest so they can discount Him by saying, “He only cares about this one law. He doesn’t care about the rest!” Jesus, knowing what they were trying to do, outsmarted them and used it against them. 

He said, “Love the Lord your God, with all your heart, your mind, your soul and your strength.”  I started thinking, what could we possibly do as followers of Jesus that is not covered by one of those four things? Think about it….your heart, is the center of who you are.  It includes all of your passions and all of your emotions. If He is at the center of your emotions, the center of your passions, then He is going to be a driving force in your life. Your soul is your eternal well being. That’s your relationship with Jesus. You honor Jesus by living out your faith and fleshing out your relationship with Him. Your mind is anything that you think about, anything that demands your focus. Finally, strength is everything that you can physically do. You are physically serving God, usually by serving those He loves. 

We were in the Middle East last week, and I had a chance to speak several times about the topic of identity, and what should be its root. We were talking about the importance of living a noble life. In these talks, we can’t use scripture or Jesus’ name in public conversations, but we can use Bible verses as principles to live by. In those conversations I had last week, I kept coming back to what Jesus said in the last part of Luke 6:45. “For out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks.” Then as an application I added out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks, the body does, and the mind thinks. 

So, if all of your strength, all your mind, all your heart, and all your soul, and everything that you say and do flows from what is going on in your heart, what better way is there to serve the Lord Jesus?

Love you guys.

John