Deeper Reflection
IT IS INTERESTING TO NOTE THAT THE GREATEST commandment is mentioned in all three of the synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark³⁴ and Luke³⁵), but is absent from John’s account of the Gospel. One wonders why the Apostle John chose not to include it in his account. Yet the theme of loving God totally is surely not missing from John’s account. As a matter of fact, John ends his Gospel with the restoration of the Lord’s call upon the Apostle Peter’s life in chapter 21. It reveals Jesus’ gracious love that does not depend on how well we “perform”. More importantly, we see that Jesus’ primary focus was not whether Peter could do anything for Him (hence, Jesus does not start by asking Peter to do something for Him). Rather Jesus’ first concern – and therefore repeated question to Peter – was simply this one thing: “Do you love Me?” (Jn 21:15-17). In other words, amid our failures, God’s primary concern is not what we might be doing for Him in the future (important as that may be), but at the heart of it all, do we really love Him?We are on Day Two of trying to “perceive” what the Lord may have been revealing to us in the course of the past two pandemic years. Certainly, we believe that He has spoken in different ways to different ones. Yet today we see that His primary concern was: How has the pandemic revealed the quality of your love for Him?

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³⁴ Mark 12:28-30. ³⁵ Luke 10:25-27.