Mark 12:30 English Standard Version (ESV) And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.

We spoke to the heart yesterday. Let us address the soul now.

Genesis 2:7 English Standard Version (ESV) then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.

Genesis 2:7 King James Version (KJV) And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

Every creature that breathes has a soul. We look at the animal kingdom and know this to be true. Mankind is not unique when it comes to the issue of having a soul.

Mark broke down what we consider to be part of the human soul into its component parts, mind, will, and emotions. Strength is a component of will.

Psalm 150:6 English Standard Version (ESV) Let everything that has breath praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord!

Jesus Christ came from God as a man. His offer of salvation is restricted to mankind. We need not worry about the salvation of everything that has breath. We were made in His image, animals were not.

Then there is the component part of the mind. Animals think, some have minds that are exceedingly more complicated than ours. Some use echolocation in the dark or underwater. Primates use tools, they have reasoning skills. Our minds have one thing that none of our fellow breathing souls do not. God sent His Word into the world to communicate to us His identity, purpose and plans.

That leaves us with strength. Strength indicates effort, a force of will, to follow through with the choices we make because we love God more than self. Putting aside selfish interests takes strength to overcome the desires of the flesh.

Many who read this know this. Some who read this have not considered it. Some are reading this for the first time and might become curious about these issues for the first time. To those who fall in the 3rd category I encourage them to seek someone who knows God’s Word.

Jeremiah 12:3a English Standard Version (ESV) But you, O Lord, know me; you see me, and test my heart toward you.

It is not our mind being tested but our hearts.

When we first come to Christ our minds made a choice to place our faith in Christ. How we came to know about Christ was an intellectual pursuit. We heard the expression “I gave my heart to Christ” and we probably believed that to be true without understanding that at the time our hearts were not making the decisions.

The heart wants what the heart wants is a secular saying that indicates desire is not controlled by the rational mind. Now we must reconcile following our hearts in righteousness when all we knew about our hearts was desires of the flesh.

If we have come to understand that God is a God of order then let us look at this order.

Mark 12:30 English Standard Version (ESV) And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.

The focal point is love and the order is heart, soul, mind and then strength. Matthew’s quote leaves out strength, but I shall quote Mark for this purpose, to indicate ability.

Isaiah 57:15 English Standard Version (ESV) For thus says the One who is high and lifted up,     who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.”

This is a promise of God. He broke our hearts in order to dwell with us.

Colossians 3:15 English Standard Version (ESV) And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful.

Christ’s intention is to rule in our hearts without taking away free will. Love has to be a choice. If we are going to love God with all our heart we will need to choose His will over ours.

When we lose the peace of Christ, we have not chosen His will, perhaps because we did not know it, or because we are not willing to obey by faith.

I pray it is because we did not know His will.