(Untitled)

[lovedablues]

Comments

[becke1084]

Why do you say that God is jealous?

The Greatest Commandment

[senschuh]

Matthew 22:36-40: "Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?" He said to him, " 'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."

[becke1084]

I think that one of the central and most important parts of Christianity is stated in the first commandment given to Moses: "I am the Lord God, and thou shalt not have any gods before me." I think that people put way too many other things before God (including myself). I would say "today," but I think this has probably always been a struggle for people; it's way too easy to become absorbed with earthly things and lose sight of what is heavenly. I do think that our hectic, materialistic lives complicate this problem; we have so many distractions, and our society places so much emphasis on wealth and beauty and material goods (buy a Dell! buy a Lexus! etc. etc.). Of course, farmers on the prairie in the 1800's could have turned to sex, or alcohol, or food, or gambling, or even work, as distractions from God, as false gods, but you have to admit that there were far fewer distractions overall, and society at that time placed a much higher value on Godliness and hard work and Christian values. Now, we have to struggle against so

[simsinnippon]

I thought that the points that you mentioned were all very good ones, but I'd like to offer a slight addition to balance #3. Faith without works might be be useless (much like the example of the barren fig tree that Jesus cursed) but works without faith are just meaningless acts. Works are the fruit of faith, but faith is still the root. Without that root, the works can't support themselves.

[lovedablues]

i did mean that, too. i think it is something that the catholic church often fails to draw the connection between. they preach more about the works, and not so much about the faith. this at least was my experience in the church. the opposite for protestants. there needs to be a median.