However much some Christians, for various reasons, seek to separate the Old Testament from the New, it can’t be done, at least not without all but denuding the New Testament of its true meaning. The New Testament, in its revelation of Jesus and its theological explanations of His life, death, resurrection, and High Priestly ministry, points to the fulfillment of many of the Old Testament prophecies and types. In many ways, the Old Testament forms the background, the context, the basis for the New. Both testaments reveal the goodness and love of God.

This is one reason why, over and over, the New Testament, including Jesus, quotes the Old.

Read Mark 12:28-30. What was the question asked about the “first commandment of all”? What does Jesus respond and from where does He get His answer?

Image © Kevin Carden at Goodsalt.com

It’s interesting that a scribe, someone who had dedicated his life to understanding the law and how it should be applied, would have asked this question. However, many laws they might have believed that they needed to obey (later Jewish tradition said that there were 613 laws), it’s not surprising that they would want it all distilled into one question.

And what does Jesus do?

He goes right to Deuteronomy 6, starting out with the “Hear, O Israel: the LORD our God, the LORD is one!” (Deuteronomy 6:4), and then quotes the next verse as well, about loving God with all your heart, soul, and strength. He pointed to the key affirmation of the Lord as their God, their only God, and based on that great truth, they are called to love Him supremely.

What could be more “present truth” than this command? In the very last days, when final events unfold and everyone will be called to choose one side or the other in a very dramatic way, the commandments of God (Revelation 14:12) will play a crucial role.

Ultimately, the side we choose, even in the face of persecution, will be based on whether or not we truly love God. That’s the deciding issue, and we can come to love God with all our heart and soul and might only as we come to know Him for ourselves and experience for ourselves His goodness, love, and grace. If need be, that’s something to die for.

<–Wednesday Friday–>

Amen!(0)

The post Thursday: The First Commandment appeared first on Sabbath School Net.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SabbathSchoolNet/~3/HCYY9mg1QYA/

This video is produced by the South Pacific Division Discipleship team.

Week 4_To Love the Lord Your God_ study this lesson for Oct 23 from SPD Discipleship on Vimeo.

Amen!(0)

The post 4: To Love the Lord Your God – SPD Discipleship Video appeared first on Sabbath School Net.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SabbathSchoolNet/~3/1F4KSrrnJAE/

Israel — the nation as a whole — was called to love God. But this was something that could happen only individually. As a single human being given free will, each Israelite had to make the choice to love God — and they were to show that love through obedience.

What do the following texts have in common? That is, what is the common theme among them?

Deuteronomy 5:10

Deuteronomy 7:9

Deuteronomy 10.12-13

Deuteronomy 11:1

Deuteronomy 19:9

Image © Steve Creitz from GoodSalt.com

How much clearer could the Word of God be? Just as God doesn’t merely say He loves us but has revealed that love for us by what He has done and still does, God’s people, too, are to show their love to God by their actions. And in these texts we see that love to God is inseparably linked to obedience to Him.

This is why, when John says things like, “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments” (1 John 5:3), or when Jesus says, “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15), these verses are merely expressing this basic teaching. Love to God must always be expressed by obedience to God. That has always been the case, and it always will be. And this obedience to God means obedience to His law, the Ten Commandments, which includes the fourth commandment as well, the Sabbath. Keeping the fourth commandment is no more legalism than is keeping any of the other nine.

Though obedience to any of the commandments can be legalism, that kind of obedience isn’t really done out of love for God. When we truly love God, especially because of what He has done for us in Christ Jesus, we want to obey Him, because that’s what He asks us to do.

When Moses over and over told Israel to love and obey God, he did it after they had been redeemed from Egypt. That is, their love and obedience was a response to the redemption that God had given them. They had been redeemed by the Lord. Now they would respond by faithfully obeying His commandments. Is it any different today?

<–Tuesday Thursday–>

Amen!(0)

The post Wednesday: If You Love Me, Keep My Commandments appeared first on Sabbath School Net.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SabbathSchoolNet/~3/LO1nVKb8Klk/

You can view an in-depth discussion of To Love the Lord Your God in the Hope Sabbath School class led by Pastor Derek Morris. Click on the image to view:

With thanks to Hope Channel – Television that will change your life.

Amen!(0)

The post 4: To Love the Lord Your God – HopeSS Video Discussion appeared first on Sabbath School Net.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SabbathSchoolNet/~3/uC_LFkwzRIA/

Even amid rules and regulations in Deuteronomy and all the admonitions warning the Jewish nation that the people must obey “His commandments, His judgments, and His statutes,” they were first and foremost to love God with all their heart and soul and might. Of course, they had good reasons to do just that.

Read Deuteronomy 4:37;  Deuteronomy 7.7-8, Deuteronomy 7:13; Deuteronomy 10:15; Deuteronomy 23:5; and Deuteronomy 33:3. What do these verses teach about God’s love for His people?

Image © Kevin Carden at Goodsalt.com

Over and over in Deuteronomy, Moses told the people about God’s love for their fathers and for them. But more than just words, the Lord revealed this love by His actions. That is, even despite their shortcomings, their failures, their sins, God’s love for them remained steadfast — a love that was powerfully manifested in His dealing with them.

“We love Him because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19). How does this text help us understand why we should love God?

God’s love for us predated our existence, in that the plan of salvation was in place way before “the foundation of the world” (Ephesians 1:4).

As Ellen G. White said it: “The plan for our redemption was not an afterthought, a plan formulated after the fall of Adam. It was a revelation of ‘the mystery which hath been kept in silence through times eternal.’ Romans 16:25, R.V. It was an unfolding of the principles that from eternal ages have been the foundation of God’s throne.” — The Desire of Ages, p. 22.

How fortunate we all are that God is, indeed, a God of love, a love so great that He went to the cross for us, a self-sacrificing love in which “He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross” (Philippians 2:8). Thus, we today have a revelation of God’s love for us that the children of Israel probably couldn’t even have imagined.

<–Monday Wednesday–>

Amen!(0)

The post Tuesday: He First Loved Us appeared first on Sabbath School Net.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SabbathSchoolNet/~3/_p3GGXQL_Fs/