Seek First The Kingdom of God and His Righteousness

  1 Cor 3:6-8 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase. Now he who plants and he who waters are one, and each one will receive his own reward according to his own labor. There’s a whole lot of work done to prepare the field for planting and then there’s more work that happens after planting before you see the first sprouts and then there’s more work to bring the plants to harvest time. Sometimes our focus is so much on the end result/harvest time because honestly no harvest and all the rest of the effort was for nothing. YET without all the effort before hand there is no harvest so the whole process is important. If it is important then each part of the process needs to not only be taken seriously it needs to be celebrated. So keep the end result in mind but be focused on the tasks at hand and celebrate each task as you progress

  Reconciliation Borrowed from my friend Isaac Ball . 2 Cor 5:15-21 15 And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again. 16 So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:fn The old has gone, the new is here! 18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21 God made him who had no sin to be sinfn for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. This is one of my favorite passages,...

  How much do you know? How much do you understand? Do you know what is going to happen a minute from now, exactly, let alone a month or a year from now? Why would you ever put your faith/trust into yourself or another person more than you would God? We are limited He is not. None of us no for sure what the future holds but He already does. You see we are linear and bound by time. God is not. For Him our future has already happened, evey choice and every possibility He knows. He is I Am, not I was nor I will be. So why would you willingly choose to rely upon limited human knowledge and understanding instead of the Eternal unlimited creator God? Provebs 3:5-7 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding; In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths. Do not be wise in your own eyes; Fear the LORD and depart from evil. It will be health to your flesh, And strength to your bones. Isaiah 55:8-9 For My thoughts are not your thoughts, N...

  Ephesians 5:1 Therefore be imitators of God as dear children. IM'ITATOR, noun One that follows in manners or deportment. 1. One that copies, or attempts to make the resemblance of any thing.

  James 1:19 So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath; We could save ourselves sooo much trouble and stress if we followed this instead of being swift to speak and wrath and slow to hear.

  A friend of mine brought up the subject of availability in our lives. By asking the following How do we make ourselves available? With… -God -Family -Friends Relationship with Jesus? Praying for others? He then went on to say that balance could run parallel with this. Making ourselves available, but also balancing the different pieces. Finding that balance of availability is having to say no to something and have an even out the sea saw. This got me to thinking and this is what the Lord showed: Availability comes from priority. Our priorities are actually what we wind up balancing out and being available for. What ever is the higher priority is what we will make ourselves available for and what is less of a priority we will be less available for. We need to make sure that we first set our priorities properly, then our availability will follow which is the only way the sea saw can be balanced. Wrong order of priorities equals uneven sea saw which causes conflict and stress. I have...

  Reaching ahead Philippians 3:13 Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, Hebrews 12:2 looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. We decide to either look back or look ahead. I learned that when plowing especially, the first furrow, to make a straight furrow you have to stay focused straight ahead. If you look back or off to the side your furrow will be crooked. In an engineering class I learned that to draw straight lines with out a straight edge you have to focus on the end point. When things get off kilter examine where your eyes:focus has been. Looking back really doesn’t help us because it is static and dead. Life and power are ahead of us. Change is only found in front of us.