Friday mornings have a particular feel. The week is almost spent. Whatever energy you started with on Monday has been handed out in pieces to meetings, errands, worries, and people, and what’s left can feel like leftovers. It’s tempting to coast toward the weekend and give God whatever scraps remain.
Mark tells us about a man who came to Jesus near the end of a long, tense week, too.
It was the last days before the cross. Jesus was teaching in the temple courts, and one group after another had come at Him with trick questions: about taxes, about the resurrection, about His authority. The air was thick with people trying to catch Him out.
Then one of the scribes stepped forward. Mark says he had been listening, and “perceiving that he had answered them well,” he asked a question of his own:
“Which is the first commandment of all? And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:28–31, KJV)
Notice what Jesus didn’t do. He didn’t treat the man as another enemy. He didn’t answer with suspicion just because the question came from the “wrong” crowd. He answered plainly, warmly, with the very words the scribe had likely prayed every morning of his life: Hear, O Israel.
And then He added something the man hadn’t asked for. A second commandment, “like” the first. Love God with everything, and love the person next to you the way you’d want to be loved. Jesus wouldn’t let the two come apart. You can’t love God with all your heart and keep your neighbour out of it.
All, not leftovers
The word that keeps returning is all. All thy heart. All thy soul. All thy mind. All thy strength.
That can sound like pressure on a tired Friday. But I don’t think Jesus meant “try harder.” I think He meant “come whole.” Bring the tired heart, the scattered mind, the strength that’s running low. Love isn’t measured by how much you have left in the tank; it’s measured by whether you’re holding anything back from Him.
A tired person who turns all of themselves toward God, even the worn-out parts, is loving Him with all their strength. That’s what all means: not perfection, but nothing hidden.
“Thou art not far”
The scribe’s reply is beautiful. “Well, Master, thou hast said the truth,” he says, and then he goes further: to love God like this, and your neighbour as yourself, “is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices” (Mark 12:33, KJV). He saw that all the busy religious activity of the temple around him pointed to something simpler and deeper.
And then:
“And when Jesus saw that he answered discreetly, he said unto him, Thou art not far from the kingdom of God.” (Mark 12:34, KJV)
Jesus saw him. In a crowd of people trying to trap Him, He noticed one honest heart leaning toward the truth, and He told him so. Not “you’ve arrived.” Not “you’re out.” Just: you’re close. Keep coming.
Some of us need to hear exactly that this morning. You may not feel like you’ve got it all figured out. Your faith may feel more like a question than an answer. But if you are turning toward Jesus, listening, wanting to love what He loves, He sees it. And He says you are not far.
The good news is that the distance is never closed by our effort alone. “We love him, because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19, KJV). The One who spoke those words to the scribe would, within days, walk to a cross to bring the kingdom all the way to people like him, and like us.
For today
Before the Friday rush, try this: say the old words slowly. Hear, O Israel; the Lord our God is one Lord. Then offer Him all of you, tired parts included. And then ask Him to show you one neighbour today who needs to be loved the way you’d want to be loved.
That’s not leftovers. That’s the whole of it.
And He is closer than you think.