In How Must We Prepare for the Heaven Beyond Earth?, we discovered that God Incarnate taught that our preparation for heaven must include our internalization of the Word of God. That leaves us with the question, “Why?”. Haven’t we learned enough about God’s Word through the Lord’s Prayer and The Greatest Commandment? Can’t we just read between the lines for whatever else God has to say?
Well, let’s re-examine the Lord’s Prayer. What do we need to internalize about the first two words, “Our Father”? Does that not mean He loves us and wills that we not predecease Him, as earthly fathers do? To not predecease Him, must that not mean He intends that we have eternal life? Like earthly fathers, must He not want all His children to love all their siblings and Him as He loves them and as well as they are able? Must God’s intent not be the purpose of our lives – that we love our creator and all its created as selflessly and unconditionally as we are able? Can we internalize all these things from just two words in the Lord’s Prayer?
But there’s more. “Thy will be done” Are we not the only ones who can do it? Does the teaching that we pray for it not mean we can’t accomplish His will on our own without praying for God’s help to accomplish His will? What about “… as it is in Heaven”? Note that Jesus did not add, “by some of the people some of the time”. Does that not mean that, to belong in heaven, we must become capable, with God’s help, of loving selflessly and unconditionally as He does? All this in the Lord’s Prayer?
What do we need to internalize about The Greatest Commandment? We began our internalization in All the Alls in The Greatest Commandment and in The Neighbour in The Greatest Commandment. There, did we not discover that Jesus’ criteria for how we must love God and all our neighbours far exceed whatever criteria we may have chosen to live by?
What do we need to internalize about all His other teachings? Jesus was quoted over 400 times in the Gospels where those teachings reside. If the Lord’s Prayer and The Greatest Commandment were all we needed to internalize, why would He have supplemented them? Must they not also be an important part of all we have to internalize of the Word of God? But how can we get our heads around hundreds of teachings scattered across the four Gospels? The Gospels are each a compelling story about Jesus’ life but not an organized
presentation of all His teachings by topic.
Fortunately, there is a topic-organized presentation of His teachings available. It is presented in the Appendix of Discovering Life’s Purpose. The Appendix is a book entitled The Sayings of Jesus. It presents Jesus’ teachings on each of 55 topics separately and determines the relative importance of each topic. Book Five of Discovering Life’s Purpose describes how this presentation was developed and illustrates how it can enable the
internalization of His message on 14 of the 15 most important topics.
Seeing all Jesus taught on each topic he addressed in one place, enables the reader to internalize each teaching of the Word of God as successfully as does having the Lord’s Prayer and The Greatest Commandment in one place. The more you pray for God’s help in your internalization, the more you master. Is it now clear why Jesus insisted that internalization of the Word of God, as well as we are able, is our necessary preparation for our attainment of heaven beyond earth?
Del H. Smith conducts research into life’s meaning and is the award-winning author of the AMAZON Best Seller, Discovering Life’s Purpose.