Thursday August 19: Dress Code in Effect
August 16, 2021
Make time to press ‘pause’
August 16, 2021

Friday August 20: The greatest commandment

hands of women who raise their hands to pray for God's blessings

Read today’s Gospel. Matthew 22: 34 – 40

Nothing must prevent us from putting God first in our lives.

Jesus, citing the greatest commandment, says we must love God with all our heart, all our soul and all our mind. The heart symbolises our emotions, the soul our interior or spirituality and the mind our will.

Together the heart, soul and mind speak of the whole self. The greatest commandment then is about Giving God our whole selves, holding nothing back. That means we cannot replace God with other gods, things, not even our personal desires and feelings. Nothing must prevent us from putting God first in our lives.

The second, which says we must love our neighbour as ourselves, resembles the golden rule. It translates into the good I want for myself, I also want for my neighbour. If this principle truly takes hold and sinister motives do not interfere, this can be a societal or even a world changer.

Blessings and graces can have a domino effect among us. Since God is the centre of our lives and He fills us, it makes the blessing I receive the blessing I share.