Ever, Only All For Thee
Over the last 2–3 years, I’ve referenced the Shema prayer in Deuteronomy 6:4–5 and its New Testament counterpart in Mark 12:29–30 quite a bit—because I see them as definitions of worship.
Deuteronomy 6:4–5
4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.
5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.”
Mark 12:29–30
29 Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.
30 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.’”
A pretty simple question arises from these passages:
What do you love, and how much of yourself are you giving to that love?
The Bible Project says that the word might in Deuteronomy 6:5 means everything we have. It means “devoting every capacity and opportunity to honoring God.”1
That is what worship is. it’s not just a song sung it’s a life lived.
Our closing hymn this week is one we’ve written about before2 —a hymn that’s quickly becoming one of my favorites to sing as a prayer. It expresses the desire I have for my life to honor God and be used for His glory.
There are six verses in the song, and taken together, I feel they present a full picture of what it means to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.”
- Verse 1: Take my life and let it be consecrated, Lord, to Thee.
- Verse 2: Take my hands and let them move at the impulse of Thy love.
- Verse 3: Take my voice and let me sing, always, only for my King.
- Verse 4: Take my silver and my gold; not a mite would I withhold.
- Verse 5: Take my will and make it Thine; it shall be no longer mine.
- Verse 6: Take my love—my Lord, I pour at Thy feet its treasure store.
What would it look like for us to truly give our all to God—for us to use “every opportunity and capacity to honor God”, to truly worship Him?
- To live your life for His glory.
- To use your hands to serve Him.
- To use your voice to praise Him and tell others about Him.
- To be intentional about how you spend your money.
- To submit your will to His.
- To love Him with all that you are.
At First Baptist Church, we’ve adapted (intentionally or maybe organically) the way Lifeway presents the gospel in their VBS material:3
- A – Admit to God that you’re a sinner
- B – Believe that Jesus is the Son of God
- C – Confess your faith in Jesus as Lord
(I can hear previous versions of the VBS songs singing this as I write.)
Almost every time Pastor Chuck presents the gospel, when he gets to “Confess,” he defines it like this:
“Confess means taking whatever is on the throne of your life off and placing God there.”
In other words, living for Him and His glory, and letting Him call the shots.
So again, the question:
What do you love, and how much of yourself are you giving to that love?
What is on the throne of your life. It’s not wrong to love family or hobbies—but what is the driving force in your life?
I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to get to the end of my life and think, “I could have given God more.” To put it in a sports metaphor: I want to leave it all on the field. I don’t want to hold anything back.
But the reality is my life often shows that I am holding back from giving God everything.
As we go through our week and as we sing on Sunday may continue to ask God to reveal to us areas of our lives where we are not giving God our best and may He give us the strength to change.
I want to close with the closing words of the Hymn
“Take myself and I will be every, only, all for thee”
Adam