Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray With Me”.

John said,
  This how we love God:
      by keeping his commands.
      And his commands are not burdensome.
            (1 Jn 5:3)

God’s commands not burdensome? Really? The Ten Commandments are a light load? Even after Jesus elaborated them? 

For example, one commandment says, “Don’t commit adultery”. Jesus added, And that includes even fantasizing about sex (Mat 5:27-28).   

Jesus said, Hating your brother, is like murder! (Mat 5:21-22).

He also said, “If your hand offends you, cut it off. If your eye offends you, gouge it out” (Mat 5:29-30).

If I apply Jesus’ standard of amputating body parts to my mind, because of the things I think about, I’d need a frontal lobotomy. Which would solve some of my problems, but create others. 

Bible interpreters say, “Jesus didn’t want a bunch of amputees. He used hyperbole to make a point.” 

Perhaps. But the hyperbole doesn’t make the commands lighter. It adds weight to already weighty commands. So what to do with John’s opinion that Jesus’ commands aren’t burdensome?

Listen to the rest of John’s statement:
    His commands are not burdensome,
    because everyone born of God overcomes the world.
        This is the victory that overcomes the world,
                even our faith (1 Jn 5:3-4).

Strangely enough, my faltering attempts to keep the commands make me believe that yes, there is light at the end of the tunnel. Somewhere beyond me, and growing within me, is a gift of God that disciplines my mind, reforms my desires, and shifts my values.

The spiritual life isn’t measured by whether God meets my expectations, like the store survey that asks, “Did we exceed your expectations?” Rather, God is like a life coach who asks, “Do you know what you really want?” 

The psalmist said,
  Delight yourself in the Lord
      and he will give you the desires of your heart (Ps 37:4).

I know the desires of my flesh: food and sex and entertainment and comfort. But the desires of the heart are deeper.

In CS Lewis’ novel Queen Orual says, “you will be forced at last to utter the speech which has lain at the center of your soul for years . . . Till that word can be dug out of us, why should [the gods] hear the babble we think we mean?”  (Till We Have Faces, ch. 4). 

Do you know the speech that lies at the center of your soul? What is your heart’s desire? 

Let’s pray. 

Our father, I still find your commands burdensome. I like my comfortable, middle-class life in a rich country. I am not sure how to leave it all and follow you. But your call rings in my ears and tugs at my heart. It changes my mind and directs my journey. 

I hear people speak of finding their passion. But passion is too shallow a word for the desire of my heart. You are my heart’s desire. I want to please you. To imitate you by loving others. Even to lose my life, if that will help me find life in you.

May your spirit challenge my shallow desires, and draw me to find the riches of my heart’s desire.  

Amen. 

I’m Daniel, on the channel “Pray with Me”.  

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