If there’s one thing I can tell you, it’s to put Jesus first in your life.
Matthew 6:33, Jesus said, “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these other things will be added to you as well.”
Seek God—get good stuff. That’s the magic formula for getting what I want, right?
I don’t think that’s exactly what it means. I’m going to tell you the hardest thing, the thing that is most opposed to your humanity, and I’m going to say it like it’s easy. Seek God, and do your best to remove any benefits you might receive from him from your motivation. Become as nothing before God.
Seeking God’s Kingdom first isn’t a barter or a transaction, we don’t do it to get something. Instead, when we do it wholly, we will find that our lives overflow with the abundance of God.
“These things” that Jesus spoke of aren’t a reward for a job well done. Instead, “these things” are a symptom—a symptom of a life wholly surrendered to God.
It takes time to get to that place. Probably more than a whole lifetime.
Psalm 34:1 starts in an interesting way. David said, “I will bless the Lord at all times.” That’s interesting to me because most of the time we think about God blessing us.
What if you could live your life from that place? Not of trying to get anything, or even trying to do the right thing, but of just being a blessing to God.
You know how sometimes a parent will say something like, “This child is such a blessing to me.” What if we could be that for God?
That would be cool. What would it look like for your life to be a blessing to God?
That Matthew 6:33 verse comes at the end of Jesus talking about worrying. The symptoms of a life that are devoted to God include having our needs met and not being anxious.
But it’s even better than that. That phrase is also toward the end of the sermon on the mount. I don’t think it’s only about the worry stuff. I think when Jesus says “all things” he’s talking about all of the stuff he’s been teaching about in this sermon. In the same speech, which starts in Matthew 5, he’s talking about money and marriage and lust and kindness and prayer.
When we really seek God first, not for what he’ll do for us but just for who he is, all that other stuff falls in line. When we’re really sold out for Jesus, everything gets a whole lot easier, maybe mostly because those other things fall into their proper importance in our lives.
Jesus is more important than our talents, more important even than our personality. He’s more important than our future.
If we’re just tagging Jesus onto our writing in order to make it “OK” or so that God will bless it, we’re doing it wrong.
Make God first, and then watch those symptoms of his goodness take hold in your life.
Watch those symptoms take hold in your writing.
In Psalm 37:4, David said, “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.”
So I delight myself in the Lord, and then all my wishes come true, right?
Well, let’s think for just a moment. If you delight yourself in the Lord, what will be the desire of your heart?
THE LORD.
It’s the same message. Delighting in the Lord isn’t a shortcut to fame and riches, delighting in the Lord is the whole game!
When we do that, which is the only thing God ever wanted of us, then we become supremely useful to His Kingdom.
Delight yourself in the Lord. Seek first God’s Kingdom and His righteousness. Just for him.
We’ll probably never get it exactly right. But when we make Jesus our goal, all of the other pieces will fall into place.
Take heart. Have grace for yourself. Find ways to live your life as a blessing to the Lord. Trust Jesus for the rest.
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