Aiming for the Kingdom – EP75 (Matt 6:33)
Matthew 6:33
"But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well."
Hello and welcome back to the One Thing podcast. Today the Lord had placed a verse on my heart, and it's a very familiar verse probably to many of you listening. And what I love about it is its simplicity. And I'm praying today that, even as we share this verse, that God would shed a new light in each one of our hearts to give us a new understanding, and to really further His Kingdom in our lives.
"‘Beyond everything, make your aim - make your focus - My Kingdom, and everything else will fall into place - everything else will be okay.’"And so it’s Matthew chapter 6, verse 33. It says, “But seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness…” The rest of the verse speaks about everything else being added unto us - which is all important. But the one part that I wanted to focus on is to seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness. And when we look at this, what is it that God is trying to speak? He’s saying, ‘Beyond everything, make your aim - make your focus - My Kingdom, and everything else will fall into place - everything else will be okay.’
So what does it mean to seek? Now think about this: In life, some of us have played a sport - maybe soccer, maybe basketball. And what do you do when you want to get really good as a team player, or even as an individual player? You - as a basketball player - you aim for that hoop. You aim to be the best that you can at shooting a three-pointer. Even if you're not so good at it you practice and you practice and your aim - what you're striving for - is to make that goal, to make that ball get into the net. No matter what you need to do - spend hours training spend hours working and sweating - and all the things that it takes to get better, you're willing to do it because it's your aim. It's what you're focused on. It could be soccer it could be, like I said, any type of sport. Or even within the job, or in the school, there's something that we can aim and strive for. You may be a student. And not only do you want to just pass but you want to excel. You want to excel your peers, excel those that are all around you and you want to be the best that you can in that classroom. So you aim. You strive you put forward every effort. You exert yourself to study harder to go beyond just the books but to, you know, read extra books or to look for an experience in any level of job opportunity that can help you to become the better worker or the better student, whatever it may be.
Seek first the Kingdom
"When you seek God in such a way...He's willing to help us and to give us everything that we need...we're set simply on the Kingdom."It's no different for the Kingdom, but what's powerful is that when you seek first the Kingdom - in other words you aim. You strive. You make it your aim. You look at it as any sport or any other goal that you have - but the greatest goal that you can have. And you say, ‘You know what Father? I'm out for Your Kingdom. I'm gonna aim for whatever it takes whether it be me praying whether it be me seeking You. Whether it be me putting a few other things aside, Your Kingdom is what I aim for - what I strive for.’ And the beautiful thing is this: When you seek God in such a way you're not on your own. See the Holy Spirit is able to empower us to lead us in the right direction. He's willing to help us and to give us everything that we need. Why? Because we're not set on ourselves, we're not set on the world we're not set on making more money or this and that, but we're set simply on the Kingdom.
"...He calls us to turn from the world and to seek His Kingdom..."So I encourage you today to come back to the roots of Christianity - the Kingdom of God. Jesus said, “Repent for the Kingdom is near!” And He spoke so much about the Kingdom and He calls us to come back He calls us to turn from the world and to seek His Kingdom - “Seek first the kingdom of God.”
I'm praying today that this would open up our eyes - that this would be a light to our heart - to give us a new focus a fresh focus on what God is calling us to do in this season. Bless you all, and I'm praying that the Kingdom of God would be our aim. That today we would come into a new place going after it with all of our hearts, and seeking the Lord. Amen.