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I love Hobby Lobby – it is June and they are bringing out their Christmas décor! Some would argue that June is too late:  I think June is right on time. The owner of Hobby Lobby has bankrolled many great Christian ministries and outreaches. The company honors the Lord’s Day by closing on Sundays.

Walking in the store makes you happy. Everything is upbeat, joyous, and positive. They have made a trademark habit of selling signs (pictures?) with terse sayings which are supposed to be both encouraging and artistic. Why wouldn’t we hang these throughout our house? What if we find ourselves mired in a day where we forgot to either live-love-(or) laugh? They have a sign to help you remember all three!

However, I saw one of their signs that proved what I preached two weeks ago. The small sign says this: “LOVE GOD LOVE OTHERS it is that simple.” Let me clear - neither direction, (loving God and others) is wrong. The error lies in reducing the commandment to these four words – then insisting that any other words in the commandment just don’t matter.

Here is what Jesus actually said in Mark 12:

Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 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 second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31 ESV)

Jesus was quoting the books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy. Here is what the Old Testament passages say:

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. (Deuteronomy 6:4-5)

You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord. (Leviticus 19:18)

The important points that the Hobby Lobby picture miss are this:

(1) God is supreme.

As such, God is alone in his supremacy over all. This, along with the “oneness” of God, is the message of Deuteronomy 6:4. Jesus did not quote the greatest commandment (the love of God) without prefacing it with the supreme aloneness of God. It is God, alone, that deserves our love because there is no other beside him. (Mark 12:32)

(2) Because God is unique, our love for him is to be unique.

Jesus says that we love God with everything we are. Deuteronomy 6:5 describes this whole-person love as a dedication that involves the “heart, soul, and might.” Jesus adds the word “mind” to this list in order to remind his audience that the mind is part of the whole-person that is to be wholly devoted to God.

(3) Because we love God supremely, we love our neighbors, albeit in a different manner.

This second commandment is not part of the Shamah in Deuteronomy. Jesus ensured that this commandment is subordinate to the love of God. He also emphasized the difference between the love of God and the love of neighbor. A neighbor gets the kind of love that we give to ourselves. This is different, and subordinate to, the unique whole-person love that we are commanded to give to God alone.

Do not love God like you love yourself. Do not love your neighbor as the supremely alone creator of the universe. The artwork at Hobby Lobby negligently conflates these two in order to make it seem splashingly simple.

You can listen to my entire message on this topic by clicking --> here <--

This trip to Hobby Lobby reminds us all that we should not get our theology from the home décor section of a hobby store. We should go to God’s Word, and honor it as it is revealed to us – without summarizing it in a way that reduces its meaning!

Even if that summary looks good on our kitchen backsplash.