God Loves Us So He Gives Us Commandments

“If ye love me, keep my commandments.” How does keeping the commandments show that we love the Lord? First of all, God is not some authoritarian tyrant inventing cruel ways to make our lives more difficult than it has to be. God gives us commandments because He loves us and He wants us to enjoy the best possible life we can, and He has given us a set of commandments that will ensure that our lives are as rich and rewarding as possible.We show our love to God when we keep the commandments because God first showed His love to us when He gave us the commandments. It can be difficult sometimes with our limited mortal perspective to perceive how certain commandments come from a place of love and are actually designed to make us happier instead of more miserable. But just as parents impose bedtimes or restrictions on ice cream intake on small children because they love their children and know that if they stay up until two in the morning eating ice cream everyone is going to be more miserable the next day, in the same way God gives us commandments that from our perspective seem to limit our freedom or stop us from having as much of something as we think we want, but He gives us these commandments because He loves us and He knows that if we just do whatever the natural man wants then we will end up more miserable and He will end up more miserable because He cares what happens to us. So, if we can change our perspective and look at God’s commandments as acts of love, then it will be easier to obey them as acts of love, even if we still don’t understand them.