Pastor Aaron Long: Two Simple Rules

Christianity isn’t complicated, people make it so, but it isn’t.  There are just two simple rules and if you get them right you got the rest of this.  Jesus says everything comes down to loving the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your strength and to love your neighbor as yourself.

Remember that these two rules aren’t something that Jesus just came up with on the spot.  He was quoting Deuteronomy for the first and Leviticus for the second.  God established these two rules all the way back in the beginning.  God even set up the ten commandments based off of these two simple rules as you see the first table of the commandments based off loving God and the second table based off the second rule.

Now, you may ask me if it is this simple why is it we have thousands of denominations and why is it Christians fight each other so much?  That’s also pretty simple, people are sinners and selfish.  We all want to make ourselves the center of our own world, to get our own way, to make our own rules instead of simply following God’s.  This goes all the way back to Adam and Eve in the garden questioning why God would give them a rule to start with and comes down to us even today.

Now, you may ask, “Preacher, how is it we can make these two simple rules apply to every situation in a complicated world that we live in?”  Well, I got a big mouth, and I am not afraid to share so let me get started.

To Love God with all your heart, and mind, and soul, and strength means that God has to come first in all areas of our life.  That we should give glory and thanksgiving to God in all we do and for all we have.  Those who honestly follow this first commandment will be in the visible church because the visible church is the body and bride of Christ.  They will give their offerings not because they must but because they want to, they will be baptized into the body, they will participate at the Lord’s Table in Holy Communion because they are sitting down to eat with their family.  They will pray and read the bible daily because the Bible is how God talks to us and prayer is how we talk to God.  They will share their faith because they love God and want to tell others about Him.

To love one’s neighbor means you want to build people up not tear them down.  You will want to help, not hurt and by hurt, I mean we will say the hard things when people are living in such a way that hurts them even if they don’t want to hear it.  It means we will respect our relationships, especially those in our biological and church families.  We will respect each other’s property and only say what is kind and helpful to others, not lying and gossiping and defaming others.  It means we will be content with what God has given us rather than constantly being greedy and self-obsessed.  We will support missions out into our community to help those less fortunate than ourselves rather than hoarding up our time, talents, and money for our own selfish desires.

This Christian faith is really simple, its not complicated.  Just love God, love your neighbor and put your whole life in Jesus hands trusting Him.  Live in the visible church, read your bible, pray, and get out there and do what Jesus is calling you to do by serving others.  If you aren’t doing all of this, you got to ask yourself the question if you are really a Christian in the first place. 

It isn’t hard.  Love God, love neighbor, and stop making everything so complicated.