“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” Luke 10:27 NLT
Joy in the Journey
Happy New Year! As this new year starts out, I am super pumped about reaching my goals. I’m excited about seeing my family reach their goals as well. I have extra vigor in my step as I imagine what life will be like when we succeed. But as I get all geared up for success, I hear a still small voice. I love it when God speaks to me. But He doesn’t always say what I want to hear. This time I hear Him whisper, “Find joy in the journey.”
So I begin a chorus of, “But Lord, I want to find joy in reaching my goal weight and being healthy. I want to find joy in being super organized and planning my meals ahead of time. I want to find joy in having a potty trained toddler.” Perhaps it wasn’t really God that I heard speaking at all. There is joy in all these things. But then I hear His voice AGAIN! Does God speak to you like that? When He really wants to get my attention, He keeps telling me the same thing over and over. I kept hearing the same message. “Find joy in the journey.”
All Your Heart
Luke 10:27 isn’t about achieving a particular goal. The journey isn’t ever over. We can’t ever say, “I have arrived! I love God with all my heart!” We WANT to say we love God with all of our heart. That’s when we get redirected back to the other things that have a hold on us, the things that hold us back from loving Christ even more. Our hearts keep changing, evolving, and growing. Our love for God can always grow.
All Your Soul
The word “soul” is interchangeable with the word “spirit.” It’s what makes you who you are. God created each of us uniquely in His image. But isn’t it interesting how there is always something new that we can learn about ourselves? Similarly, we can continually grow in our journey to learn how to love God with all of our soul.
All Your Strength
We can’t be strong without our bodies. We never reach a point in our journey for strength that we are so strong and healthy we can just stop and eat whatever we want for the rest of our lives. We don’t get to quit resting and getting exercise. God wants our bodies to be His temple, a place that His spirit dwells our entire lives.
Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, 20 for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body.” 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 NLT
God took great care making preparations for His temple in the Old Testament. Being a living temple of God is no small task. Not only does He want us to be His temple, but He wants us to honor him. I don’t know about you, but honoring God is the last thing I am thinking about when I am ripping through my pantry in search of a piece of chocolate.
I’m not strong when I am too tired to get up off the couch and take care of my family. I’m not strong when I continue to give in to temptations that are making me less than the best that God created me to be. Finding strength to fully serve God is a continual journey. If you are excited about the health aspect of this challenge, check out the 2016 Book Brigade and go ahead and get your copy of Trim Healthy Mama Plan: The Easy-Does-It Approach to Vibrant Health and a Slim Waistline
All Your Mind
For the Lord grants wisdom!
From his mouth come knowledge and understanding.” Proverbs 2:6 NLT
God gave us minds and he wants us to use them. He freely gives us wisdom through His word. Our minds never quit growing. There are always new things to learn.
Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord.” Isaiah 1:18 ESV
Find Joy in the Journey: Take the Luke 10:27 Challenge!
Resolutions may fail. Committing to find joy in the journey to fully love God is something that we can do every single day, even after we mess up. In fact, God already knows we will mess up! The Luke 10:27 Challenge is a challenge to continually work on your heart, soul, strength, and mind so that you can enjoy the journey, not just an end product. Through the month of January, we take a closer look at how you can love God with your heart, soul, body, and mind. Better yet, it’s something you can do with your entire family. Each week of January, we will focus on one area. Next week, we will begin with our hearts. We will explore how the things we love and thoughts we think in our hearts shape and influence our ability to worship God and connect with Him. I pray that you will join us!
Which area do you struggle with the most? What kind of changes would you like to see in your life so that you can better live out Luke 10:27?
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Tara -We’ve nominated you for the Liebster Award, a distinction given by bloggers to other bloggers. You share the love of Jesus abundantly! Here’s a link to the details about the Liebster: http://www.classesbybeth.com/blog/who-knew-liebster-award/
We hope you have a great 2016 and look forward to your posts!
Thank you so much! I am honored!
Yes, I love this! “Committing to find joy in the journey” of this life is such a precious gift from our Heavenly Father. He knows we will have trials that can bring us to the point of death but carrying that joy that no one else can touch or take away is precious. He truly knows how to give good gifts and to grow in our understanding of how to love him with our whole self will be the greatest gift of all.
Oh may, I struggle right now with focus. Actually, that is my word for the year. Lately, I’ve felt like a butterfly fluttering from flower to flower. There are a lot of great things to do in the name of our Savior but I’m finding which ones are the ones he wants me to say yes to!
May 2016 be a year of focus for you! My word is “balance,” much for the same reasons. I need to balance all the things I have on my plate and not leave anything undone that God has for me!
It is so hard to live in such an open-ended way, there is only one finish line, and at that point I hope to hear, “Well done, my good and faithful servant,” but until then we do have to learn to love the journey! Great perspective!
Jennifer DeFrates recently posted…My Best New Years Resolution
It is hard to live knowing that we have to be open to change, but it is exciting too. God always has great surprises in store.
I am taking this challenge with you this year! I have been yearning for a closer relationship with Him–this is just perfect and exactly what I need to work on this year. Thank you so much, can’t wait to follow along. And thank you for linking up to Fitness Fridays on Drops of Learning. I hope you will continue to link up posts for this challenge there. Happy 2016!!!
Miranda recently posted…Fitness Friday — Happy New Year!
I will definitely link up with you! Thank you so much for the invite. I’m glad you plan on joining us! May you find the close relationship you are looking for!
I completely love this. I will be taking this challenge and applying it to myself every day for the rest of my life, not just this year. Thank you.
That’s wonderful! I’m so glad you find it inspiring. I hope it helps you find joy in your personal journey!
This sounds like a great challenge! Something do with my wife for sure. Happy new year and best wishes in 2016! Keep up the great content!
Jonathan Key recently posted…Giveaway $50 Amazon Gift Card and 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership
Hello Tara,
I’m a mini-van mama too! I loved your post because it reminded me that I don’t have to be discouraged when I’m trying to meet a goal but haven’t yet. When I focus on loving the Lord with all my heart, soul and mind…then I can enjoy the journey and the process to get there. I chose this as my host favorite at #100HappyDays! You can come grab a button if you like on Thursday.
Greetings. I am doing a personal study on Luke 10:27 and I went to Google to see what info was available in helping me dig deeper into the study of this verse. That’s how I came to your webpage. What intrigued me about this verse was the challenge to “love with your WHOLE HEART, WHOLE SOUL, WHOLE STRENGTH and WHOLE MIND. I know only the mighty Holy Spirit can elicit change in a person’s life, and i have prayerfully asked Him for His assistance. But, i don’t know if i want to know more or, if i just want to make the changes myself. You know, “by works.” As you can see I’m a bit confused. I see that the last messaging was done in 2016. So, I’ll just put this out there and see what happens. Thank you. p.s. I’ve joined the minivan express.
Thank you for messaging and joining! I pray that you are finding some clarity as you are studying Luke 10:27. Doing things in our own strength is very hard and sometimes impossible. I will continue to pray for you. Please feel free to contact me at tara@minivanministries.com if you want to discuss this in a more personal manner. God bless!