"But seek first the kingdom of God..."(Matthew 6:33). What does that look like? What does it mean to seek first God's kingdom? I've been pondering that this week. Last weekend, I attended a conference at Lake Yale where the speaker, Mark Vance, preached from the Sermon on the Mount. That passage of Scripture is so familiar that it is tempting to write it off as "Been there done that." I thought I knew the Sermon on the Mount, but the sermons revealed I did not. At the heart of this scripture is the centrality of Jesus. It all comes back to "Who do I value? What is my treasure? Am I willing to follow Jesus no matter the cost?" Because when we value Jesus' approval over man's, when we live out obedient lives because of our Father's love, when we treasure God's kingdom over everything else, and count Jesus as worth every cost, our lives are flipped upside down. We become counter-cultural. We will not look the same. We become anomalies.
Imagine if we all lived like that. What would our campus look like if we were whole-heartedly committed and passionate about the glory of Jesus? How radical would we look in the eyes of the world? We would be salt and light, a city on a hill that cannot be hidden and does not try to hide. That's convicting to me. How do I seek first the kingdom of God? What does it look like for me to live this out? I've found myself praying about reaching my campus more than I have before. I long to see my campus and my community know Jesus. The thing is, my calling is right in front of my face, but when God says "Go," I've said "No." I've had my heart and mind focused on other things and not the glory of God. Who do I value? Am I more concerned about what others think about me or what God thinks about me? Why do I serve? Is my heart motivated by the unearned love of my Father? Am I treasuring Jesus or stuff? Have I counted Christ as worthy of every cost?
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I've been listening to a song that declares, "Jesus, You, You're worth it all. Every nation and every soul." The question is, do we believe it? If the answer is yes, then why live in apathy, why settle for the world's status quo? God has more for us. Will you follow Him on your Monday mornings on the way to class? On your Wednesday afternoons at work? On your Saturday runs at the gym? Think about this from Mark Vance: "What if we were more scared of living a life that did not matter than we were of the dark?" I for one want to live a life that matters. And nothing else matters but Jesus.
