Invitation to Love
Mark 12:28-34
“How do you want to be remembered?” This question was my writing prompt several weeks ago in my journaling practice. The question is a bit challenging because it asks us to think longer term, to reflect across the span of our lives, and to acknowledge our lives have a time frame. Even as uncomfortable as it may make us, the question is important.
I remembered two quotes as I started to think about my written response. The first was the “Greatest Commandment” that Jesus offers in response to inquirers who come to challenge him in Mark, as well as in Matthew and Luke. Mark, though, places Jesus’ encounter with a challenger in the story of Jesus in Jerusalem, just before he is crucified. This placement heightens the importance of the teaching. Mark also begins Jesus’ response to his challenger with the words “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one” (v. 29). Quoting Deuteronomy 6:4, this opening connects Jesus’ teaching with the teaching in the Hebrew Bible. Mark ends this encounter with the statement, “After that no one dared to ask him any question” (v. 38). Jesus brings all of the threads together reaching across the experiences of God’s people and connects them with the teaching to love above all else and at the same time silences anyone who question him further.
Jesus’ teaching ties together loving God and loving neighbor. We might wonder how we do one or the other commands in this teaching. But, Jesus point is that they are forever tied together. When we share love with our neighbors, we are loving God. When we are loving God, we are sharing love with our neighbors.
Here is where I remembered the second quote, "We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” Winston Churchill made this statement. These words remind us of Jesus’ teaching to give our love to our neighbor. When we give of our financial resources, it is an act of love, of loving our neighbors and loving God because it empowers the ministry of the church to reach out to the hungry and the thirsty, the naked and the searching, the imprisoned and those bound to their beds in illness. Life is richer when we are giving and helping, when we are acting for the wellbeing of others. Life is richer when we are giving and helping because then we are loving God with all of our hearts, souls, mind and strength and loving others well.
Reflection Questions:
Have you ever had an impulse to act in a certain way and done differently when you remember these two commandments?
Can you imagine trying for one day to keep these commandments at the forefront of your mind? What would that be like for you?
How do you want to be remembered?