This is the working introduction to one of my next books, The Perfect 10: How & Why God’s Commandments Still Apply in the 21st Century.

When Jesus is asked, “Which is the greatest commandment?” He replies with two:

“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.^‘ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Jesus pulls these from Deuteronomy and Leviticus, two books I’m sure feel a bit antiquated to our modern Western sensibilities, but have survived the test of time.

If only we took them seriously.

These commandments are the embodiment of the ten that God gave Moses on Mount Horeb, an entire list of what most might think of as “shoulds and should nots,” but ultimately comprise the very recipe that purifies a human heart.

But here’s the thing: following these commandments isn’t our end goal. Following Jesus is, and it’s in following Jesus that these commandments not only make sense but sing to our souls.

They’re no longer dusty ol’ mandates but the scaffolding of a perfect Eden that we will one day inhabit again.

They’re the lifeblood of what Earth is to be like as in Heaven, and the beautiful thing?

We can live them now.