“Seek Ye First”
By Linda and Richard Eyre
The
core of what Christ taught and what he lived is this
admonition: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness” (Matthew 6:33). As He spoke
on the Mount, He turned the world upside down, elevating
the low, leveling the high, calling for treasure in
the heart (see Matthew 6:21), and telling those who
thought they owned the world that they owned nothing.
The
true in heart felt the light and knew that moth and
rust and time would take all their quantities
and leave them, in the eternities, with only their
qualities: qualities gained through the seeking,
first, of the kingdom of God.
Christ couldn’t have really taught that principle if
He had not lived it. But he did live it — so
totally that we know he knew whereof he spoke. He
sought nothing of the world: no mammon, no honors
or recognitions or titles, no praise, no physical
possession, no power, no
comfort or ease.
He consistently, consciously, continuously sought the kingdom of God and its righteousness not only for
himself but for all his younger brothers and sisters.
His goal — our eternal life and exaltation — was reflected
in all He said, and, more remarkably, in all he did.
Throughout the ages, saints and sages have proposed discipline
as the key to the highest realm of life. “Deny yourself.”
Deny your own needs for the sake of someone who need
you. Deny the momentary pleasure for the sake of the
longer term. Deny the easy and mediocre for the difficult
and excellent. Deny the physical for the spiritual.
Christ’s life is the maximum study of self-denial
— not self-harm or self-apathy, but the denial of
personal gratification, the denial of His life for
ours.
© 2005 Meridian
Magazine. All Rights Reserved.
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