Exodus 20:1-21
Ten Commandments
1 And God spoke all these words:
2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 “You shall have no other gods before me.
4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.
7 “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
8 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. 11 For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
12 “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.
13 “You shall not murder.
14 “You shall not commit adultery.
15 “You shall not steal.
16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
18 When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance 19 and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.”
20 Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning.”
21 The people remained at a distance, while Moses approached the thick darkness where God was.
1 Corinthians 13:1-13
Love
1 If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. 12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
Matthew 22:36-40
The Greatest Commandment
36 "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" 37 Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.
Can Love have rules?...If you think about the one you love, you know there are rules...You or your partner cannot just do anything they want...
Can we have free choice and free will and still have Love?...I think we can, and God shows us how these things are done...When I was a young believer, I wondered why God, who LOVES us, just doesn't let us do our own thing...Following a rule requires some discipline...More questions came and come up about free will and free choice...Why did God need to discipline me, when I wanted to choose and do what I wanted to do?...Why does He need rules or laws for us?...
The first five books of the Bible are were written by Moses...These first five books are often called the Law of Moses or Mosaic Law...And the Law of Moses are written and especially outlined in the second through fifth books of the Bible...The Ten Commandments are the first of the Mosaic Laws...These first ten laws tell us what we can and cannot do, or shall and shall not do...They are the first rules of Love from God to mankind...When Moses completed writing the Mosaic Law, God's people had laws for a nation...The nation of Israel now had a set of laws they needed to follow...Now that made some sense to me (on why we need laws), when looking it from a nation's point of view...
St. Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians gives us another outline of rules...There are like a short story to us and how St. Paul feels about love and the importance of love in one's life...He tell us love is one of the greatest of all the things on earth...St. Paul does not go into great detail, but when we think about love, we often do not think of love as as this set of rules...For instance we know, if we have no respect for our spouse or partner, something is broken or wrong...If we have a private conversation with our spouse or partner and that needs to remain private -and we take it to our friends and others we have broken something...If we never forgive our spouse or partner for something they have done, then we have broken something...One might say the we have broken a rule of love, when we harm our loving relationship with the one and ones we love or love...If you never remember your spouse's birthday or anniversary -a rule may be broken...There seems to be these things we need to do out of love, and things we should not do...I will call them rules of love for lack of a better set of words...And there are some severe rules that when one is broken, it gets very difficult to mend...And that type of breaking of these love rules -sometimes leads to a love separating and departing...
To further show that love can have rules, are the rules we place on our young children...We often have rules for teenagers and our children about hours, curfews, things they can do and not do...We teach them the rules of how to enter a busy street...These rules too -are rules made out of love...We require them to work for an allowance to show them the importance of work and how money is earned...Things and rules of this nature are done out of love...
I have no problem believing, when God inspired Moses to write the Mosaic Laws that they were out of Love - and God's Love for His new nation and us...For us to love God and to have faith in God, now I better understand -man needs rules...And God felt His rules needed to be written down in the Bible...I personally believe, Love and faith require rules, discipline (to follow the rules), and a desire to follow the One and ones we love...
When God sent Jesus to us to reveal Himself to us...Jesus spoke Mighty Words that were written down and still followed two thousand years later...His Mighty Words, all revolved around His Father and the Bible, of the Mosaic Law, the Wisdom Books, and the Prophets...His Son completed followed all the rules of God...
Jesus says that the entire Mosaic Law and the Scripture of the Prophets can be summed up in two rules...The first rule is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind...The second rule is to love your neighbor as yourself...Two rules and in just two sentences that sum up some of the greatest literature ever written...And these two rules are all about Love...