”One
of the automobile companies is now advertising its car by suggesting
that we get inside the car for then the car will get inside us.
We all know someone who seems always to have a car inside them for
that is all they seem to think and talk about.
We know that out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh,
and the person who is filled with the car is going to talk about
it. It isn’t cars however, that should fill us up, but rather, the
Truth. We talk about being in the Truth, but the thing we really
want is to have the Truth in us.
John tells us, ”He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments,
is a liar, and the truth is not in him.” This means that if the
Truth is really in us, then we will keep God’s commands. It doesn’t
matter how long we have been ”in the truth,” if we are not keeping
God’s commands then the Truth is not in us. Later John tells us
”This is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his
commandments are not grievous.”
Love is the key to keeping God’s commandments, for if we have enough
love, keeping His commands will come automatically. This is why
James calls love the ”Royal law” and Jesus explains that on the
first two commandments regarding love for God and love for our neighbor
hang all the law and the prophets. John’s point regarding keeping
God’s commands is that if we love enough they will not be grievous.
It is only when we lack love that keeping them seems hard. The children
of Israel referred to God’s commands as the ”burden of the Lord.”
God replied to them, ”What burden?... Because ye say this word,
the burden of the LORD, and I have sent unto you, saying, Ye shall
not say, The burden of the LORD; Therefore, behold I, even I, will
utterly forget you, and I will forsake you.”
We
have all experienced the difference love makes in doing what might
otherwise b: a burdensome task. A young man may complain bitterly
about doing his mother’s dishes but finds it a joy to do if asked
by the girl he loves. Even the love of money can change a dreary
job to one that gives pleasure and satisfaction Give a young person
a distasteful job to do with no promise of a reward, then tell him
that when he has finished he can have ten dollars and the job suddenly
becomes easier and gets done much faster.
It
is love that makes all the difference. The keeping of God’s commands
becomes easier in direct proportion to our love for Him. This is
why we want not only to be in the Truth but to have the Truth in
us to the degree that keeping His commands is actually what we want
to do.
This was true of Jesus. He so loved His Father that he said ”My
meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work.”
So great was his love that it strengthened and sustained him even
as natural meat does the natural man. Certainly when we eat meat,
we take it inside us. When our love for God increases to the point
that it is also our meat to do His will, it will not be a burden,
it will not be grievous, but a joy and a pleasure. David exclaimed
”0 how love I thy law! It is my meditation all the day.”
When this happens, then truly the truth will be in us and it will
be noticeable to everyone who knows us. The love of God will transform
us and Paul tells us this is done by the renewing of our minds.
If we fill our minds with things like cars then it will b a car
that is inside us just like the commercial suggests, but if we fill
our minds with the things of God, then He will be in us. Jesus tells
us, ”At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in
me, and I in you. He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them,
he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of
my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him."
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