What do we love most?

      Is Your Passion Passionate About You?      

    A man named Halford Lucock (in a Progress magazine article, 12/1992) related the following – “I was impressed several years ago when I read that Eugene Normandy dislocated a shoulder while directing the Philadelphia Orchestra. I do not know what they were playing, but he was giving all of himself to it! And I have asked myself sadly, ‘Did I ever dislocate anything, even a necktie?’” That’s passion, isn’t it? 

The word “passion” in modern American culture can refer to sensual things like sexual desire and lust, or to any powerful or compelling emotion or feeling, as love or hate (dictionary.reference.com). Long before these meanings became attached, however, the word referred to Jesus’ sufferings, especially the last few days leading up to and including the cross. But the focus of this article is the kind of passion Eugene Normandy has for orchestra music – a strong and even extravagant fondness, enthusiasm and desire.

What are you passionate about? In Matthew 22:36 Jesus was asked by a Jewish religious leader, “What is the great commandment in the law?” The Lord’s response in verses 38-40 points to a two-pronged passion that ought to be at the center of every person’s life – “Jesus said to him, 'You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets." The Lord’s answer is astonishing!


Jewish experts in the Law of Moses claimed to find 613 commands in the law. That lawyer was asking Jesus, “Which of those hundreds of God-given regulations is the most important, the main one, the one at the top of the list, the command we must not leave undone if we want God’s approval and favor?” And the Lord didn’t blink or stutter. He answered by pointing to Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18 in that order. And He went on to teach that every other command in the Law is related to, or hangs, on those two passions!

The main business of life for every human being, the main thing we ought to be concerned about and compelled by, is our relationship with God and our neighbor. Would it change the world if each of us were passionate about God and as passionate about others as we are ourselves?! Would it change our marriages? Would it change the church? Our main passions in life ought to be God and other people. Not hating and hurting or using them, but loving and serving them. It’s okay to love music – but not as much as you love God. It’s okay to have a passion for cars or the stars or candy bars, but not as much passion, and not the same kind, that you have for God.

It’s okay to love clothes, career, houses and hunting, fishing and football, soccer and biking and hiking and your cell phone or I-pad – but not if you love any of that stuff with so much of your heart and soul and mind that it becomes more important to you than God and people! None of those things can love us back or last forever. Only two things will matter at the end of our lives – the God who created us and the people He placed around us. We can be passionate about them and they can be passionate about us. Now, is the thing you are most passionate about capable of being passionate about you? What is your greatest love in life? Does it love you back? We all really ought to think about that.

by Dan Gulley, Smithville, TN