Rend your heart, and not your garments

Do you know why God loves us as no one can love us? Because God has always gone behind His people looking for them to convert to Him. God has an interest in us and that is incredible. All the old testament is about God looking for His people to repent and keep His ways, in the same way it happens from grace, and it is God looking for man, is this not unreasonable? God loves us and that is why He wants us to live for Him.

A great proof of that love that God has for us is to see how in the second chapter of Joel’s book, God begins by warning the children of Israel, but then He stops and tells them:

13 And rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your God: for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil.

14 Who knoweth if he will return and repent, and leave a blessing behind him; even a meat offering and a drink offering unto the Lord your God?

Joel 2:13-14

Jesus said that the most important commandment is to love our God with all our heart, and this is what is presented in the book of Joel, God demanded of them that they convert with all their hearts, and God demands that fom us today, that we become to Him with all our hearts and that also means that we deny everything that does not please God.

Samuel said: “Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams”. The people of Israel made many sacrifices, but God required more of them, and that was their heart. Remember that God also told them: “You honor me with your lips but your hearts are far from me”.

Let us seek God with all our heart, and remember that our God is slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy, and we thank Him for that love with which He has loved us and for the patient that He is for us.

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