LOVING JESUS WITH ALL OUR HEARTS
To love Jesus with all our hearts is not a sentimental phrase stitched onto Christian speech; it is the great commandment that gathers up the whole of life and lays it at His feet. When our Lord said, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind” (Matthew 22:37), He was not asking for a portion, a mood, or a moment—He was calling for the center. The heart, in Scripture, is the seat of desire, direction, and devotion; it is where loyalties are decided long before actions are seen.
Such love is not measured by volume or visibility, but by surrender. We may sing loudly and still withhold the heart; we may serve faithfully and yet keep a locked room within.
Loving Jesus with all our hearts means there are no rival thrones—no affection cherished above Him, no ambition protected from His lordship. “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21). Our hearts inevitably follow what we prize most, and Christ calls us to treasure Him above all else.
This love is sustained not by our strength, but by His prior love toward us. “We love Him because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19). The cross stands as the eternal proof that Jesus did not love us halfway. He gave Himself fully, holding nothing back, even unto death (Philippians 2:8). When that truth settles into the heart, obedience ceases to feel like burden and begins to look like gratitude; devotion becomes response rather than effort.
Yet loving Jesus with all our hearts is a daily yielding. The heart must be kept, guarded, and returned—sometimes again and again. “Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life” (Proverbs 4:23).
There will be days when the heart wanders, when affection cools, when lesser loves whisper for attention. In those moments, the call is not despair but return—to fix our eyes again upon Christ, “the author and finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2), and to love Him anew with an undivided heart.
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Lord Jesus, You have loved me completely and without reserve. Take my heart—every corner, every affection, every desire—and make it wholly Yours. Teach me to love You above all else, today and always. Amen.
BDD
