A young coachee asked me to watch a short video with RC Sproul (I believe based on video comments) saying that the way to know if you're saved is if you can answer this question with "yes": "Do you love Christ even a little bit?" (Don't worry about loving Him perfectly or as He ought to be loved.) But it made me think about a tv show or movie in which one character, talking about love relationships, asks another, "Do you know what makes her heart sing?"
So my questions as I pray and read are "Lord, what makes Your heart sing? And does what I'm doing make it sing?" Because if I truly love someone, I would want to make their heart sing. And I want to make Christ's heart sing.
Dallas Willard in his book, The Divine Conspiracy, bemoans the fact that we believers overlook Christ as Teacher. We rely on Him as Savior. We follow Him perhaps as Liberator. But Willard exhorts us to know Him through His teachings, and by knowing Him we'll be intimately familiar with how He thinks and feels. Isn't that the goal?
Christ says it's not just deeds that create the relationship: "Depart from Me. I did not know you." (Mt. 7.21) Though deeds warm His heart: "As you did it for the least of these, you did it for Me" (Mt. 25). And likewise, He admonishes people: "Why do you call Me, Lord Lord, and do not do what I say?" (Lk 6.46).
But it's not keeping the 600+ laws from the Hebrew Scriptures. Christ doesn't teach that. Not even the Hebrew prophets taught that. Isaiah immediately in his speaking/writings condemns the ritual obedience of sacrifices and festivals and prayers without a heart willing to remove evil, do justice, rebuke the ruthless, defend the orphan and plead for the widow. An ox knows what makes the master happy. A donkey knows the same. Why, God asks, don't My people know what makes Me happy?
"Know Me," Christ seems to say, "and allow Me into your life so that I might know you. I want to make your heart sing."
Shouldn't we return the favor?
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