First and Greatest Commandment

Matthew 22:37-40

"Yeshua said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind." This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.  On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."

Also in Luke 10:25-37, Mark 12:28-34

These first two Greatest Commandments are not a new concept presented to the people by Yeshua; or as understood by the Lawyer who was questioned.  These are found in the Torah.  It is fundamental Mosaic / Hebraic teaching.  These two commandments emphasize that their principle is rooted in Love and encompass "All the Law and the Prophets."   In other words, all the commandments, statutes and precepts, prophecies, warnings, words of encouragement and such things like it, written by the Old Testament Prophets, were all about God reaching out his hands in love for His people (United Israel), instructing and even chastening them, in hopes they repent and return to Him, even when they continually rebelled and slid backwards and ultimately were scattered to the four corners of the earth.   

The Old Testament (Torah) is what the Apostles referred to as "scripture" and what they were teaching to the public in the New Testament and reading in the Synagogues.  These books are what Christ was hearing and talking about as a boy in Luke chapter 2.  The Old Testament is not some "OLD" and outdated series of books as the modern day Christian churches teach, but it is the first instruction to all knowledge of God and includes prophecies yet to be fulfilled, even in our time and beyond.  Anyone or any church who reject teaching and reading the Old Testament are deniers of the Faith and void of God's Truth.   

We find the first Greatest Commandment quoted in Deuteronomy Chapter 6:1-9:

"Now these are the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments, which the LORD your God commanded to teach you, that ye might do them in the land whither ye go to possess it:  That thou mightest fear the LORD thy God, to keep all his statutes and his Commandments, which I command thee, thou, and thy son, and thy son's son, all the days of thy life; and that thy days may be prolonged.  Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it; that it may be well with thee, and that ye may increase mightily, as the LORD God of thy fathers hath promised thee, in the land that floweth with milk and honey.  Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:  And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.   Deu 6:6  And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart:  And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.  And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes.  And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates." 

When you read through the first Four Commandments spoken by God's voice at Horeb (Holy Covenant - 10 Commandments) we notice a few things regarding this idea of "Loving God with all our heart and soul".  

FIRST OF THE 10 COMMANDMENTS

• Deuteronomy 5:7 (Exodus 20:3) "Thou shalt have no other gods before me"  
• Exodus 34:14 "For thou shalt worship no other god: for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God."
• Deuteronomy 4:24 "For the Lord thy God is a consuming fire, even a jealous God."
• Deuteronomy 6:15 "For the Lord thy God is a jealous God among you lest the anger of the Lord thy God be kindled against thee, and destroy thee from off the face of the earth."

Now an outsider to the faith might see these verses and ask the question "How can a loving God be jealous and be capable of destroying anyone from off the face of the earth"?  But you must understand things from God's point of view (for His ways are higher than our ways).  God created man for the purpose of loving Him first and having a perpetual relationship with Him, and stand as a friend or even family member, and he created a garden, the earth with all the elements and creatures therein for man's benefit.  However, mankind continually ignored God and even created false gods out of man's own imagination and turned their back on their very own creator!  It is simply not unreasonable for God to have this point of view.  Furthermore, God also had a group of heavenly angels rebel against him, who were cast down to earth, and who taught man all sorts of wickedness and corruption, even the very building blocks of God's design became polluted.  God had no other choice but to destroy the corruption from the earth with extreme measure to preserve what was good so the earth and mankind could grow and thrive the way He intended.    

1 John 5: 1-3

"Whosoever believeth that Yeshua is the Christ is born of God: and every one that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him.  By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep His (10) commandments.  For this is the love of God, that we keep His (10) commandments: and His commandments are not grievous."

SECOND OF THE 10 COMMANDMENTS 

•  Deuteronomy 5:8-10 (Exodus 20:4-5)  "Thou shalt not make thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters beneath the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me, And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments." 
• Micah 5:13 "Thy graven images also will I cut off, and thy standing images out of the midst of thee; and thou shalt no more worship the work of thine hands."

•  Psalms 115:5-8 "Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands. They have mouths, but they speak not: eyes have they, but they see not: They have ears, but they hear not: noses have they, but they smell not: They have hands, but they handle not: feet have they, but they walk not: neither speak they through their throat. They that make them are like unto them; so is every one that trusteth in them."
• Deuteronomy 29:17 "Deuteronomy 29:17 And ye have seen their abominations, and their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which were among them"
• Psalms 96:5 "For all the gods of the nations are idols: but the LORD made the heavens."
• Isaiah 57:5 "Enflaming yourselves with idols under every green tree, slaying the children in the valleys under the clifts of the rocks?"
• Ezekiel 6:9 "And they that escape of you shall remember me among the nations whither they shall be carried captives, because I am broken with their whorish heart, which hath departed from me, and with their eyes, which go a whoring after their idols: and they shall lothe themselves for the evils which they have committed in all their abominations."

•  Jeremiah 10:2-5  "Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them.   For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe.  They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.  They are upright as the palm tree, but speak not: they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. Be not afraid of them; for they cannot do evil, neither also is it in them to do good."

GOD IS SORELY GRIEVED FOR A PEOPLE WHO TURN FROM HIM AND SEEK AFTER IDOLS!

Jer 10:19-21  "Woe is me for my hurt! My wound is grievous: but I said, Truly this is a grief, and I must bear it.  My tabernacle is spoiled, and all my cords are broken: my children are gone forth of me, and they are not: there is none to stretch forth my tent any more, and to set up my curtains.  For the pastors are become brutish, and have not sought the LORD: therefore they shall not prosper, and all their flocks shall be scattered."

THIRD OF THE 10 COMMANDMENTS 

•  Deuteronomy 5:11 (Exodus 20:7)  "Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain: for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain." 
• Numbers 13:16  ..."Oshea the son of Nun Jehoshua." (Long Version of the Name of the Messiah in Hebrew, a type and shadow of the Messiah)
• Isaiah 53 (In 20 letter skip sequence in Hebrew) "Yeshua Schmi"  "Yeshua is my name"
• Joh 5:43  "I am come in my Father's name (Jehovah), and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name (Jesus), him ye will receive."
• Act 4:11-12  "This is the stone which was set at naught of you builders, which is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved." 
• Jer 23:26-27 "How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets that prophesy lies? Yea, they are prophets of the deceit of their own heart; which think to cause my people to forget my name by their dreams which they tell every man to his neighbor, as their fathers have forgotten my name for Baal." 

See "Father and Son"

FOURTH OF THE 10 COMMANDMENTS 

•  Deuteronomy 5:12-15  "Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee. Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work:  But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou.  And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the LORD thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the LORD thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day. "
• Isa 58:13-14  "If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the LORD, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: Then shalt thou delight thyself in the LORD; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it." 

LOVE GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART AND SOUL

John 15:10 "If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love."

John 14:15-17 "If ye love me, keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;  even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you."

See DAY DAWNING

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