Introduction

Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. - Matthew 22:37-39

Each of us will come to the point where our mortal journey has ended. At some point after death, each and every one of us will come to a time known as the judgment. Then, all who ever lived will recognize with awe and reverence beyond description that Jesus is the Christ. “Yea, every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess...that he is God.”¹

In that day you will have a perfect comprehension of what the Savior has done for you. This is not all. You will also have a remembrance of life—all of the as well as perfect your good all of the bad.² What knee would not bow under the strain of comprehending the limitless love of God, while knowing with perfect clarity how undeserving we are? In that day, who is there among us that will not feel with all the feeling in their soul that in this life they should have loved the Savior more than they did? If you were to feel that feeling today, what changes would you make in your life?

What keeps us from seeing with an eternal perspective? What is it within us that causes us to attach more value to the now than the later, the here than the hereafter, to ourselves instead of to others? I believe that the answer is simple. We do not love God as much as we ought.

Unconditional love for God is the key to consecration and self-reliance. It is the to in our spiritual key living valiantly testimony of Christ. It is the key to overing a sacrifice in righteousness, or acting out of our hearts and not for external reasons. Thus, love of God is the key to true obedience to God. President Dieter F. Uchtdorf has said, “His pure love directs and encourages us to become more pure and holy. It inspires us to walk in righteousness—not out of fear or obligation but out of an earnest desire to become even more like Him because we love Him.”³ The love of God makes us one with God because his purposes become our own.

The love of God is so important to our accomplishment of the of creation that God made it the and purposes first great commandment. “Because love is the great commandment, it ought to be at the center of all and everything we do in our own family, in our Church callings, and in our livelihood.”⁴ Love is the impetus to true kingdom building. It is dedication to improving the lives of any and all.

Kingdom building is so often thought of as discrete tasks—things we can check on a list. True kingdom building, however, is a lifetime evort. It is not about discrete tasks. It is not about building up a church. It is about building people—either yourself, or others. It means to bring yourself and others unto Christ. Kingdom building is a pervasive attitude which ought to be consummate and constant. With that sort of attitude, actions flow out of the heart in every condition and place. But actions are not as important as the motive behind them. Motive is everything. Ask a Pharisee. The Lord condemned many Pharisees in the New Testament for doing the works without the Spirit. He instructed them as well as us to act “not with eyeservice, as menpleasers; but as the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart.”⁵ When seek to build you the kingdom, you not only do what the Savior would do, but do it for the same reasons he would. What is the Savior’s you motivation? “He doeth not anything save it be for the benefit of the world.”⁶ You should do everything for the benefit of the world, just as the Savior does. Conversely, you should do nothing which does not benefit the world. This is a principle which will av ect everything in your life.

Though this thought may be intimidating, you must realize that love of God will cast out all fear of Him.¹⁷ pure obeying The Savior lived a consecrated life because he loved us. If you love God, you will do the same.

Because he loves us, you should love others. You should use your time, talent, and everything you have to increase the happiness of others, just as God uses his limitless power and resources to increase your happiness. To do anything else would be to that are indebted to deny you “eternally your heavenly Father, to render to him all that you have and are.”⁷

Charity is impossible without consecration. Consecration allows us to be charitable. The two are intertwined.

John said that we love God because God first loved us⁸, yet there are plenty in and out of the Church who do not love God because they have never known his love for us or because their love for God has waxed cold. For those who have never recognized the love of God in their lives and for those who have once felt it but have let it grow cold, the remedy is the same. The key to increasing love for God lies in obedience. The reason for this is that the love of God comes from a comprehension of his goodness to us; whether that be through a greater understanding of the blessings he has given us, a comprehension of the grossness of our sins which he has forgiven, or a greater knowledge of his and wisdom. All of these come a goodness things through greater measure of the Holy Ghost. And the Holy Ghost comes in to our own To be more proportion personal righteousness. consecrated, you must love God more. To love God more, you must be more spiritual. To be more spiritual, you must be more obedient.

Obedience is a necessary quality for those who desire to increase in their love for God. “We increase our love for our Heavenly Father and demonstrate that love by aligning our thoughts and actions with God’s word.”⁹ You are obedient as you implement all of the principles that you have been taught. First, reconcile yourself to the principles that you already know. Second, seek further light and knowledge by feasting on the words of Christ.¹⁰ Through your obedience you will become more like the Father, and feel more of the love for Him that he feels for you.

Although obedience to all the commandments is necessary to avoid hindering the Spirit, there are two commandments of vect action whose degree of fulfillment will have a tremendous e on the measure of the Holy Ghost that you feel. Besides obeying the commandments of avoidance, such as the word of Wisdom, the law of chastity, etc., one should increase the intensity of scripture study and prayer.

The scriptures help us “remember, and always retain in remembrance, the greatness of God, and your own nothingness, and his goodness and long-suvering towards you, unworthy creatures.”¹¹ When you study the scriptures, you see what God has done for others and for and the love have for God you, you increases.

When you study the scriptures, how do you feel? Do you remember that these are real people who had real experiences? They felt pain and sorrow, happiness and joy. They made real sacrifices and received real blessings.

In an account from the Book of Mormon we have a record of the reunion of several groups of people. To catch each other on their recent read the records the up history, they detailing experiences of each. After reading the experiences that were had, the people are described as having many deep, sincere emotions because of their consideration of those people about whom they had read.

When were last “struck with wonder and amazement” you while reading the scriptures? When were you last “filled with exceedingly great joy”? When were you last “filled with sorrow”? When did you last “shed many tears of sorrow” for the sins of others while reading the scriptures? Does reading the scriptures cause to thanks to God” or with and you “give fill you “pain anguish for the welfare” of your brethren? These are the feelings that the people in this Book of Mormon story are recorded to have had by reading the scriptures, and they are feelings that you, too, are able to have if you study the scriptures properly.

The key to all of this feeling is that they had to actually think about what were Four times in these six verses they reading! above quoted the record mentions that they were thinking about what had been written.¹² If you will make an evort to invest your mind and heart into your scripture study, you will reap a greater love of God and man.

Prayer is a tool that can be used to express gratitude toward Heavenly Father, and thereby helps us recognize blessings which he has given to us. Have you ever prayed without asking for any Do to an entire blessings? you recognize enough blessings fill prayer with gratitude for them? Have you ever prayed until you could not think of one more thing to thank God for? It seems that there is some sort of cloud that us from prevents feeling prayer, one that only goes away with sincerity and evort, which often translates into time. When was the last time you stayed on your knees until you thought he was listening?

Obedience will strengthen our prayers. When you are true followers of Christ through your obedience, you can pray to the Father with all the energy of your heart and he will help you to love Him and others as he loves us.¹³ Your confidence in God—your faith that he hears you and that your desires are one with his desires—will increase as you are obedient towards God in both your actions and in your desires as expressed in prayer.¹⁴

It is not possible for those who make an evort to remember the Lord in their lives to not recognize the love that God has for them. For those who need a reminder of how much the Lord has loved them, there are journals to read, thoughts to ponder, v Each of these tools act prayers to o er, and scriptures to study. as a barrier to an eroding testimony of God’s love for you. How can one who has recognized the hand of the Lord daily through journal writing, meditation, prayer, and scripture study deny that God loves him?

One of the central purposes of the Book of Mormon is to help you increase in love for God by helping you to “remember how merciful the Lord hath been unto the children of men, from the creation of Adam”¹⁵ as you read and ponder its words. The Book of Mormon, other scriptures, and the words of living prophets will invite the Spirit of the Lord into the heart of the reader, helping him to remember how much the Lord has done for him. Meditation and prayers of gratitude will supplement a rigorous study of the scriptures for those who desire to remember the Lord.

When you have a grasp of even a small degree of the love that God has for you, you will love Him in return. This is a juvenile but essential first step in the path towards consecration. The next step is to graduate this reciprocal love into an unconditional love. You love God because he loved you first. You may think you have completed your journey once you have reciprocal love for God. After all, because his love for you is unconditional, he will never stop loving you, and so, you reason, you will never cease to love him. When the sun is up, it may appear that a solar panel will always provide energy. Yet, the sun sets. Though God never stops loving us, this mortal probation includes times when the love of God is not readily apparent to our limited sight. For example, it may be tough to feel the love of God when a loved one dies, or when you feel you are the victim of misfortune, or when you have done everything right only to see everything go wrong, or when you are just plain having a bad day. Because faith is a necessary part of this mortal probation, blessings aren’t always apparent immediately after righteous acts, nor do punishments immediately follow unrighteous acts. There will be times that the Father hides his presence from imperfect you, as he did from perfect Jesus,¹⁶ that you may have a more complete trial of your faith. So you see that if your love for God is conditioned on his loving you, you are not yet prepared for what you will face in this life, and therefore not prepared for eternal life.

If you only love God because he loves you, you will cease to love God his love for is not Those still anytime you apparent. in the reciprocal stage of love for God will quickly turn away from the faith when they see righteousness seemingly rewarded with aIiction, or wickedness seemingly rewarded with blessings. are obedient because of what can out of They only they get it. Those who move on to unconditional love have a diweren't attitude. They are obedient no matter what happens. They love God so much that will in the face of they obey great adversity and aIiction. Their obedience is not limited to their current understanding of the gospel. They stand ready to repent and improve over their current practices upon receipt of further light and knowledge. Their love for and obedience to God join together to produce a deep trust in God and a confidence that endures aIiction “this must be for any by saying, necessary my happiness and progression.” This is the love that Abraham, Joseph Smith, Paul, and Jesus Christ had for God. This is the love of God which caused Job to say, “though he slay me, yet will I trust in him.”¹⁷

You should strive to develop unconditional love for God. Only when your love for Him is unconditional can you be blessed with all the experiences he desires you to have to make you more like he is. Without this love, you are like a piece of chicken that hasn’t been cooked all the way through because it is taken out of the oven too quickly thus wasting the whole experience. The whole meat is spoiled because the core was not prepared.

Love of God is an absolute necessity for those who desire to live a consecrated life. Without it, no part of consecration makes sense. Without it, there is no motive to live consecrated or strength to overcome the pull of the world.