Matthew 22:34-46; Psalm 119:65-72

Matthew 22:34-46
Jesus is still being questioned by the Jewish leaders. He has already answered the question about our relationship with the government and one about heaven. Today we will see two more questions--one about our relationship to God and others and finally, one about our personal relationship with Jesus. If we really stop to think about it, if we get the last one right, the others should follow. And to put it another way, we can't adequately understand and obey the first three unless we have the last one settled.

v. 36 records the third question of this chapter, "Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?" Jesus answered with a quotation from the Old Testament (Deut. 6:4), "You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind."  Then He went on to say, "A second is equally important: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'" In reality, without a true relationship with Jesus Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit who lives within us, we cannot in any way keep these commandments! We must trust God for the grace to be obedient to these most important commandments.

And this brings us to the last and most comprehensive of the questions in this chapter. It is actually a question Jesus asks them! "What do you think about the Messiah? Whose son is he?" They were trained in the Old Testament, and so they answered, "He is the son of David." This is true in the human sense as Jesus did indeed come to us through the line of David. But He is much more than that. David himself recognized that the Messiah would be God Himself in the flesh, and he (David) called Him Lord and recognized that He would sit in the place of honor at the Father's right hand!

Like these Jewish questioners of Jesus' day, we too must decide what we believe about Jesus. We can examine the facts that He came to earth as God in the flesh, and He gave Himself at the ultimate sacrifice for our sins then rose again from the dead and returned to heaven. We can recognize that we are sinners who need a savior, and we can believe this message and apply it personally to ourselves and be saved!

Psalm 119:65-72
It's a Bible truth that God is good! This is not just a Christian cliche! Sometimes it doesn't SEEM as if God is good. At least that's how it seems to me. These verses give us a clue as to what God MAY be doing when life is hard.

• He may be disciplining us for wandering off. v. 67  Remember that God is our loving parent who wants to save us from making big mistakes.
• He may be trying to get our attention. v. 71  I'm afraid our spiritual attention span is pretty short, and God needs to bring it back to Him!

Then I have to say that it's so interesting how God works! In Matthew 22, we read about the greatest commandment to love God and our neighbor, and we know how hard that is. Now in v. 72 we see the psalmist tell about how he views God's Word. "Your instructions are more valuable to me than millions in gold and silver." Wow! Who can honestly say that? We know that we SHOULD love and treasure God's Word, but I have to say that reading and studying and meditating on it is hard--a struggle. But what a challenge this is for all of us!