heart, soul, and strength

love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength

ah, deuteronomy 6:5...love it :)

youversion is great because it includes little reflection questions to go along with the readings for the day. one of today's questions really got me thinking. it asked why i thought those three things were singled out...why heart, soul, and strength?

heart--if i sat back and thought about all the time and energy i put into crushing on my crushes throughout high school and college...and i suppose even post-college...i would be pretty ashamed to see how much of my heart was wasted on nothing. my heart is the wellspring of life. everything i am and have comes from the very depths of my heart...so shouldn't God be at the center of that?

soul--the soul. what exactly is a soul anyway? here are some definitions i found:
the immaterial part of a person; the actuating cause of an individual life; deep feeling or emotion; human embodiment of something; the eternal part of a living being, commonly held to be separable from the physical body

i'm going to go with my soul is the eternal part of my being, the part that will forever exist in God's presence regardless of whether my physical body is alive or not. i have always had a tough time thinking about eternity because it frankly makes my head spin just trying to comprehend FOREVER. but since my soul will live on eternally, the love that i have for God must be present there as well. my heart will eventually stop beating, but my soul will continue to breathe in God's presence long after my physical body wastes away.

strength--i think this is probably both the most abstract and possibly the most important one of the three. as much as i hate to admit it, i already know that i have a tendency to walk away from God for periods of time. i may not totally turn my back. i may not even realize my passion is dwindling. but it happens. i think this is because i live in a world that wants me to give in to my own musings, my own desires. and because i am human, it is so easy to fall into the temptations and pleasures around me. if i use my strength to hold on to someone i know i need to let go of or if i use my strength to find a way to fulfill my flesh, i am cheating God out of what is rightfully his. my strength is not infinite. it is in my best interest to use what little strength i have to fully love my Lord and Savior.

if i truly learned to love God with my whole heart, soul, and strength every minute of every day, think about what a different person i would be. my actions would completely change. i would see people the way God sees them. i wouldn't have fear or doubt or worry. i would be completely and utterly His. my world would change. and i would be a world changer. it's time to start digging in and loving my God.