SEEK YE FIRST

“But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” (Matthew 6:33 KJV)

People have needs that they bring to the Lord, expecting them to be filled, and are not. They then begin to question God’s Word, or they will believe that God has said, “NO!”, or ,”LATER”, or, “MAYBE”. Why is this problem so prevalent? It is because these are not truly seeking God’s Kingdom, nor His righteousness, and they are misusing the Word. Man always looks beyond himself to find fault, not seeing that the fault is he, himself.

Let’s look first at the underlined portion of the text, above. There is no hint that there would be a negative response to the promise, nor does it even require a request for the food, care, and shelter promised. This means that the failure falls in the seeking God’s Kingdom, or seeking His righteousness. Also, this promise is often misused by people asking for things beyond that promised by God in this portion of His Word. God is not a part-time Grandpa who dotes over the whims of his charges, nor a Mamma who appeases her children to keep them quiet. God is God!

So, now let’s look at the seeking the Kingdom requirement. Remember the parables of our Lord concerning the Kingdom, and what it is like? The pearl of great price and the treasure in the field? (Mt. 13:44-50) Remember also what the Lord told Nicodemus about the Kingdom? “Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” (John 3:3 KJV) Just to see the kingdom requires rebirth of spirit, which is the dying of the old man of sin, being crucified with Christ, and the putting on of the new man in Christ. But to enter the Kingdom requires an enduring walk with the Lord: “And when they had preached the gospel to that city, and had taught many, they returned again to Lystra, and to Iconium, and Antioch, Confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.” (Acts 14:21-22 AV) Seeking the Kingdom then, requires the rebirth, the death of self, and living in Christ, and He in the seeker.

What about seeking the righteousness of God? Actually, the ‘born-again’ experience is the first step in receiving the righteousness of God, in that Christ is our righteousness and the old man having been unrighteous is now dead. So now the seeker can rest in assurance that his basic needs of life will be attended to by our loving God without his having to ask.

Now there are other specific needs that are not essential to life, but needed for the ministries of the Saints. These should be requested in prayer with supplication. These are the requests that God will grant or not according to His will with respect to the prevailing circumstances. ’We have not because we ask not’ is relevant here. (See Mt. 7:7-11)

We need to be sure that we fulfill the requirements God puts on us before we expect Him to keep His promises to us. There is always a covenant relationship that needs to be in place as we serve God, otherwise we will be serving ourselves to our own destruction.

Source: http://www.wtlministry.org 2/25/02