JESUS' reply to the lawyer who, in an effort to confound him, propounded the searching question, "Master, which is the great commandment in the law?" typifies the very essence, the spirit and the letter of Christianity. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind," is, indeed, the first and greatest commandment, for in effect it proclaims the obligation of mankind to gain the Mind of Christ, to seek eternal life, to purify completely human consciousness,—to attain to that state of spiritual-mindedness which constitutes the kingdom of heaven. And, withal, so emphatic are its admonitions that there remains no doubt as to the degree of obedience whereby this state of spiritual blessedness is to be gained. Yet, is it not obvious that for one to love God so whole-heartedly, God must be known to be possessed of the qualities that engender the purest love in its fullest expression? To love the unlovely is, manifestly, an impossibility; yet the Master's injunction admits of no qualification. "With all thy heart" leaves no slightest room for any degree of mental reservation.
The student of the Old Testament finds much there representative of mankind's unfolding concept of the Lord God, Jehovah, which is far from lovely. As avenger, as wager of war, as promoter of hate, as relentless pursuer of the disobedient, as the inspirer of consuming fear, the Lord God, Jehovah, is far from the one "altogether lovely," whom the Nazarene in gentlest phrase depicted as compassionate, as expressing mercy and loving-kindness in a degree quite beyond the possibility of a mortal's comprehension. Under these compelling precepts, what from a human point of view seems an impossibility becomes a divine necessity; for, is it not as impossible to refrain from loving that which is "altogether lovely" as it is to love that which is altogether unlovely? Christ Jesus made very plain the necessity for the commandment to be fulfilled. In the light of the revelation of the New Testament and of Christian Science regarding the attributes and qualities of God, it is seen that mankind's concept of God has unfolded through the centuries until His true nature is revealed. But God is changeless; He is the same forever; His qualities are eternal.
John, the beloved disciple, supplied a very necessary step in the fulfillment of this most important of all commandments. He not only set forth the need for men to love God and one another, but gave expression to the great central truth that "God is love." Of the significance of this, Mrs. Eddy says in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 2): "God is Love. Can we ask Him to be more?" And she further states on page 6, "More than this we cannot ask, higher we cannot look, farther we cannot go." God, then, as Love is the supreme, all-inclusive goodness, beyond which there is nothing lovable, permanent, desirable, or attainable, the state of perfection which constitutes the kingdom of heaven, complete beneficence. But one may ask, Granted all this, how am I to obey in detail this commandment, upon the obedience to which Jesus placed so much stress? Again Christian Science supplies the means whereby one may abide in the full consciousness of the possibility of fulfilling the Master's behest.
