Anna, Lover of God – The Great Commandment

Anna, Lover of God

Matthew 22:37, 38

And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.”

Luke 2:36, 37

And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin, and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day.

We love God in the secret places.

Perhaps one of the greatest tests of our love for God is whether we love Him in solitude. Anna was a lone, living in temple quarters from which she never departed. Yet she was not moping around, feeling sorry for herself or bitter about her plight. Anna loved God, and she devoted her solitude to showing her love for Him in the only ways she could, by fasting and praying night and day. People today don’t like to be alone. We have to have something to do, someone to be with, lest we become fidgety. But solitude with God – to meditate on His beauty, draw on His strength, fast for a clearer focus on Him, and just to wait on Him in silence – is an important discipline for the lovers of God. So much did God revel in Anna’s solitude with Him, that He granted her the privilege of a first look at His Son, honoring her love for Him with a special act of love for her. In the solitude, where there’s no one to see us and no one to impress, we have an opportunity to show the purity and intensity of our love for God, and to find Him there, in the solitude, waiting to bestow upon us some special gift of His glory and grace.

How do you practice the discipline of solitude? Can you find some brief moments for solitude during the course of your day?

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“In the Gates” is a devotional series on the Law of God by Rev. T.M. Moore

T. M. Moore is editor of the Worldview Church. He serves as dean of the Centurions Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He is the author or editor of twenty books, and has contributed chapters to four others. His essays, reviews, articles, papers, and poetry have appeared in dozens of national and international journals, and on a wide range of websites. His most recent books are The Ailbe Psalter and The Ground for Christian Ethics (Waxed Tablet).

Scripture quotations in this article are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, (c) copyright 2001,2007 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Editor’s note: The use of a translation other than the Authorised Version in an article does not constitute an endorsement in whole or in part by The Christian Observer.