Seek FIRST His Kingdom

Matthew 6:33

But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

What do you do – first thing in the morning – at home? Most of us have some routine in the morning. Some items might be brushing our teeth – taking our vitamins – taking a shower/bath – dressing for the day – combing our hair – putting on our face (for the women) – eating our first meal of the day.

What do you do – first thing in the morning – at work? Most of us have some routine when we get to work. Checking overnight communications – email – text – calls/messages – preparing for meetings – preparing for customers – getting the stock in order – cleaning the workplace from any mess left by the previous shift. In my part-time job – I set up the coffee station (even though I am not a coffee drinker) – setting and printing the tee-sheet for the day – printing scorecards for games that day – printing the tee-sheet with bag storage – counting the cash drawer – checking the bathrooms (men’s and women’s) – prepare some pop corn for the members – and if time allows – helping to set up carts for the morning (I work in the pro-shop at The Golf Club at South River.

For The Time Will Come…

2 Timothy 4:3

For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine.

Have you ever been warned about something that was pending – something that was going to happen in the future? I had a teacher who would often say – mark my word – and then tell us something that was going to happen – like – mark my word – this will be on the next test.

Maybe as a parent you have said something like this – or your parents did – mark my word – if you do that again – you will get punished. Maybe it was like this – if you don’t stop fighting – if you make me get out of my chair – if you don’t get up now – if you don’t eat all your food – than “whatever” was going to happen – mark my word.

Paul gives us warning in today’s passage – 2 Timothy 4:3 – For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. He could have added – mark my word.

God Sees It All

Matthew 6:6

But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

In our world of social media – everyone posts everything – it seems. People post what they eat. People post what they do. People post how they feel. People post their anger – their joy – and their mixed feelings. They not only post words – they post pictures – selfies – videos – and more.

Programs like Twitter – Facebook – Snap Chat – YouTube – Instagram – and more make connecting on a surface level pretty easy. We have thousands of friends and even post things that tests our friendships – if you read this and are truly my friend – post one word on how we met and repost this on your site – or I will remove you from my friend’s list.

Some do not want an Internet footprint or want to reduce their footprint (good luck). In the Christian world we do all of the above and at times I have seen prayer requests online. My hope is that when folks type praying – they truly take the time to pray.