God Greatest Commandment

By Andrew Oghena

About the Book
God Greatest Commandment: A Guide discusses in detail the two greatest commandments given by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ that will enable all humans to live a godly life during their earthly pilgrimages. The book’s objective is to provide steps on how to love God with all your heart, soul and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself, as well as to outline rewards that you will receive by loving God and neighbor. Readers of this book will be reminded that we are all one, that we all came from one God, just like the billions of rays of sunlight all come from one source, the sun. Since all humanity is from God the Father, we should endeavor to love our Creator and also love all created people. If we all love each other, then our communities, our countries, and our world will be better places to live, without war, but with peace and harmony.

About the Author
Andrew Oghena is a happily married family man with two kids. He loves family time and sharing stories together, whether it’s during meals, road trips, or long walks. He was born and brought up as a Christian in the Roman Catholic faith and is a member of both the Blue Army, a Catholic society that promotes the message of Our Lady of Fatima, and the Knights of Columbus, a society that promotes family and defends the Christian faith. He has a PhD degree in petroleum engineering and has traveled to multiple countries on international assignments and worked on several teams with colleagues of multiple nationalities. In his profession, he sees himself as a citizen of the world, and sees the world as a global village. After viewing himself and the world this way for twenty-five years, he has come to realize the Gospel Truth that Our Lord Jesus Christ said in the Bible 2000 years ago. Andrew Oghena knows that all humanity needs to hear this priceless message, and most importantly apply it to their daily lives, to make the world a better place for all.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Company
• Release date: Sep 5, 2023
• ISBN: 9798889255567

Book preview

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The contents of this work, including, but not limited to, the accuracy of events, people, and places depicted; opinions expressed; permission to use previously published materials included; and any advice given or actions advocated are solely the responsibility of the author, who assumes all liability for said work and indemnifies the publisher against any claims stemming from publication of the work.

All Rights Reserved

Copyright © 2023 by Andrew Oghena, PhD

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted, downloaded, distributed, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, including photocopying and recording, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented without permission in writing from the publisher.

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ISBN: 979-8-88925-056-2

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Introduction

Seven Steps to Loving God and Your Neighbor

In the beginning, God created man and woman. God placed the first man and woman in a beautiful paradise where our Creator fellowshipped with our first parents daily and gave them everything they wanted, needed, and dreamed off. Adam and Eve, our first parents, had everything life could offer and lived in peace, joy, and happiness. However, God gave them one commandment and instructed our first parents to obey this command in order to continue fellowship with Him and enjoy the beautiful paradise. Our first parents disobeyed this command. As a result of their disobedience, man lost fellowship with God, and He banished them from paradise. Consequently, sin, pain, and suffering entered the world, and man must die at the end of his journey on Earth.

As Earth’s population increased, God chose the Israelite nation and gave them commandments to obey. The Ten Commandments are written in Exodus 20:3-17, which are:

You shall have no other gods before Me.

You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 

Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you.

You shall not murder.

You shall not commit adultery.

You shall not steal.

You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.

If God’s people obey and live their lives by keeping the commandments, it will separate them from the rest of humanity, and they will enjoy God’s mercy while on Earth and in Heaven at the end of their earthly pilgrimage.

When Jesus Christ, the Only begotten Son of God, came to Earth, He reaffirmed the Ten Commandments as the sure way to regaining our fellowship with God. He also told us which is the greatest commandment out of all the commandments, and to put emphasis on the greatest commandment, Jesus gave us a new commandment, which further confirmed the greatest commandment. Jesus said that the greatest commandment is to love God and your neighbor.

This book’s objective is to provide guidance on how to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind and to love your neighbor as yourself. Who is better to provide the perfect guidance other than the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of Jesus? The Virgin Mary told the marriage servers in Canaan to do whatever Jesus told them to do. These are Mary’s recorded last words in the Bible. Similarly, Mary is telling you to do whatever our Lord Jesus Christ told you to do. You see, Jesus Christ shared things with us, including His Mother, Mary. So, this is your Spiritual Mother’s advice to you. Your Spiritual Mother’s advice should be close to your heart, and you should strive to obey it. As we read in the Holy Scriptures, at the wedding in Canaan, the marriage attendants obeyed your Spiritual Mother’s advice and filled 12 jars with water. As reported in the Sacred Scripture, the water in the jars was converted into wine by Jesus. This changed the wedding disaster of running out of wine into joy with sweet and abundant wine for the all wedding guests, all because the servers obeyed your Spiritual Mother’s words. Now it is your turn to obey Mother Mary’s words, and her words are simple: Obey Jesus’ commands.

Our number one goal in life is to obey God’s commandments, especially the great commandment. According to the Sacred Scripture, Jesus Christ taught us God’s great commandment. So, what is Jesus’ commandment, or in other words, what is God’s commandment that Jesus said is the greatest? When Jesus was asked, What is the great commandment? He gave two commandments as the greatest. Jesus said that the first of the two great commandments is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind. And the second is to love your neighbor as yourself. The second great commandment is equally important as the first great commandment. The first and most important commandment is based on vertical union with God, our Creator. And the second most important commandment is the horizontal relationship among human beings. I used the words union and relationship because the foundation of a good union/relationship is love. The parties involved in a union share love; a love that involves giving, receiving, and giving back. In the case of vertical union, God has given us love. He loved us before we were born. Even if we don’t know it, God still loves us. As Scripture says, God loves us so much that He sent His only begotten Son to die for our sins. He has shown His love to us whether we know it or believe it. God has already given us His love. He loves us unconditionally, whether we are poor or rich, young, or old, with an everlasting love. His agape love for each one of us is unfathomable. We, in turn, need to open our hearts to receive God’s love and give back to Him the love we have received and share the love with our neighbor.

Jesus gave us the two most important commandments, which are closely related. When you truly love God—the first great commandment—you will for sure love your neighbor, which is the second great commandment. Furthermore, Jesus Christ said that these two great commandments are the foundation for the entire commandments and laws, as it is written in Matthew 22:37-40. Let’s look at these two commandments using the concept of construction. When building a house, you want the foundation to be strong so that it can carry all the other parts of the house. Similarly, Jesus has told us which of the commandments is the foundation for all of God’s commandments. Therefore, if you want to follow all God’s commandments, then you will need to be strong in the foundational commandment. Jesus has told us the foundational commandment and the most important commandment is to love God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself. As children of God, adopted brothers of Christ, and adopted children of Mary, we need to listen to our Mother Mary by obeying the commandment Christ said is the greatest, which is to love the Lord your God with all our heart, all our soul, and all our mind and your neighbor.

The psalmist said blessed is the man who delights in the law of God and meditates day and night on the law of God. Meditate day and night on the great commandment, so it will be always on your mind to renew your mind and make you delight in knowing this command. According to Scripture, when Jesus was asked which is the great commandment, Jesus started His answer by saying, Hear O Israel (Mark 12:29). Let’s investigate the hear. We hear with one of our five senses: the ears. Jesus was saying: open your ears, and listen to God’s great commandment so that it can be part of your mind and written in your heart. What you hear through your ears goes into your mind and becomes part of your memory. The words that you hear, and reside in your memory, will be used to make decisions. So when you hear this commandment and it enters your memory, you will need it to make life decisions. One of the greatest life decisions that every human being will have to make is to decide to love God with all his or her heart. This is a personal decision that no other person can make on your behalf. You must decide to give yourself to God by loving Him with all your heart.

The command says to love the Lord your God. Your God in the statement indicates that you must first acknowledge that God is your God. The acknowledgment that the Lord is your God is to know that you are a human, and you have a God, and that God is the Almighty God, and you are subject to God. In Exodus 20:2, the Ten Commandments that God gave to the people of Israel through Moses started with I AM the Lord your God. Similarly, Jesus Christ said the great commandment is to love the Lord your God. This indicates that we must first acknowledge God as our God.

Let’s ask ourselves why the people asked Jesus which commandment is the greatest. I think the answer to this question can be found from a similar question the disciples of Jesus asked Him on how to pray to God. You see, Jesus’ mission on Earth was to save humankind and show us the way to God. So, this question was addressed to Jesus since the people knew that Jesus would show them, and us now, the true way to God. And the true way to God, as stated by Jesus, is to obey God’s commands.

In the first place, why was this great commandment given by God? The answer to this question can be seen by going back to the beginning. In the beginning, God created Adam and Eve in the image and likeness of Himself. He placed both the man (Adam) and woman (Eve) in a beautiful garden called Eden. God came down from Heaven to commune with the man and woman. This shows God’s special love for His created man and woman. He loved His creation so much that He, Almighty God, spent time with His created man and woman every evening as a father spends time with his beloved children. God told our first parent in the garden of Eden to take care of it and that he should not the fruit in the center of the garden commonly called the forbidden fruit. Our first parents disobeyed God’s command not to eat the forbidden fruit by eating the forbidden fruit and committed the first sin, generally called the original sin. To make a long story short, when sin entered the world through the original sin, God sent Adam and Eve out of the garden of Eden, and God stopped the regular relationship that He had established with them. This original sin impacted God’s love for His creation till the story of Abraham and Abraham’s descendant Jacob (Israel).

With the story of Abraham, God wanted to re-establish His relationship with human beings after the fall of Adam and Eve. God wanted to commune with humans as a lovely father. God wanted every human person to know Him and love Him as He, God, loved us. God wanted a people who are devoted to Him. Special people among the peoples who would be His own. Due to the desire of God to re-establish relationship with His creature, God called Abraham to leave his home and country and that God will make Abraham become a father of a great nation. As the story of Abraham is written in the books of Genesis and Exodus, God kept His promise to Abraham and his descendant Israel. The Abraham descendant, called the Israel nation, was small when the people of Israel moved into the Egyptian nation, but they left Egypt as a great nation with a large number.

When the children of Israel were living in Egypt under bondage, God called Moses, a descendant of Israel who was living in the desert outside of Egypt for fear of the Egyptian ruler. God appeared to Moses in the burning bush and gave him a mission to go and deliver the Israelites from Egyptian slavery.  Moses and the children of Israelites left Egypt as a great nation of large people and great wealth (Exodus 12:37). They travelled through the Red Sea and the desert on their way to the land of Canaan, called the promised land, that God promised to give to Abraham and his descendants (Genesis 15:18–21). God gave the Law, the Ten Commandments, to Moses on Mount Sinai, in the desert, to give to the descendants of Israel with the following instructions as written in Exodus 19:5: If you obey my voice and keep my covenant you shall be my treasured possession out of all the peoples. And in verse 6, God says, You shall be for me a priestly kingdom and a holy nation. You see, the Ten Commandments were given to God’s people. God chose Abraham and his children to be His chosen people out of the peoples on the face of the earth as written in the Old Testament of the Bible. Out of God’s love for His chosen people, the Israelites, God gave the commandments that whoever obeys them will be God’s special people.

Fast-forward to nowadays, we are the peoples of the New Testament of the Bible. The New Testament tells how God sent His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, to save the entire human race and that whoever believes and obeys Jesus’ teachings, which include the Ten Commandments, will be God adopted children through Jesus Christ. You see, God’s commandments were meant for us to obey so that we can be counted among God’s treasured people; so that we can have a special relationship with God; so that we can be free from the original sin that separated us from God. As you can see, the commandments of God have blessings attached to them. As recounted in the Scripture, Elizabeth called the Virgin Mary blessed because she believed and obeyed the message from God. The blessing is given to you if you decide to obey the commandments. You see, God gave every one of us free will to decide to obey His commandment. God loves us so much that He does not force us. You have the free will to decide to repay His love by loving Him back.

In the beginning, God gave our first parents Adam and Eve free will and dominion over every living thing and the environment, but with a command not to eat the forbidden fruit. By dominion, God gave Adam and Eve, our first parents, control over every living thing and the environment as long as they abided within God’s rules. Our first parents failed. For you and me to succeed, we need to do like the new Eve, our Spiritual Mother Mary, advised us to (i.e., do whatever God tells us to). If we love God with all our heart, all our soul, and all our mind, we will surely have dominion over every living thing, including our bodily desires, worries, emotions, etc.

To truly love God with all our heart, all our soul, and all our mind consists of living in Heaven while we are still living in the body on Earth, essentially living a spiritual life while here on earth. To live a spiritual life involves allowing God’s Holy Spirit to control and stir your spirit each moment. According to Exodus in the Bible, God gave the commandments so that His people will live a separate life from other nations (group of people) that are living among them. Living a separate life includes living a godly life with God’s Holy Spirit in control of your life, and you subject your life totally to God. Living a separate life, which is righteous living, is living a spiritual life in every present moment when we are still in this earthly body. Similarly, to live a Christlike life while we are still living in these earthly bodies is to have Jesus’ heart and mind. If we have Christ’s heart and mind, then we can live in Christ right here on Earth. Then we can do the things God what us to do. We can love God, Our Father in Heaven, with Christlike hearts and minds. With a Christlike heart and mind, we are adopted children of God, and we can call God Abba Father. If we have Jesus’ heart and mind, then in all situations, we can act or speak how Jesus will act or speak in that given situation. I personally constantly ask myself in most situations what Jesus would do. This questioning of my heart tends to bring me peace of heart and helps me to make Christlike decisions in any given situation.

Let’s ask ourselves, how do we have Jesus’ heart and mind? Where