“So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” –Jesus, Matthew 6:31-33

“God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells.
God is within her, she will not fall; God will help her at break of day.
Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall; he lifts his voice, the earth melts.

The Lord Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.

Come and see what the Lord has done, the desolations he has brought on the earth.
He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear; he burns the shields with fire.
He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
    I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.”

The Lord Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.” Psalm 46

Seek God first—Be still and know that He is God.  As we come to God in an attitude of grateful praise with a humbled heart seeking to know God, we realize His Presence as been there all the time waiting for us to talk with Him.  He delights in our seeking and in our wanting to let go of everything else occupying our minds to know Him more.

We discover that the more we know about God, we more often fixed our gaze on Him.  We also learn that we know little and must learn more.  Once there was a young adult, the youngest in the family, who was given the work of a shepherd boy. (Much like telling the youngest in our families to take out the trash today!)  It was a stinky job but had to be done.  But God had other plans for this young man, a gifted song writer who was deemed “a man after God’s own heart” because of David’s life-long pursuit to know God.  David loved to worship Him with his psalms but he also learned hard lessons when his eyes were fixed on something or someone else other than God.  David suffered the consequences of his sins against God. 

All the songs David wrote to God were filled honor and praise for God with a repentant, humbled heart, seeking forgiveness from God.  Because he knew God well, studied his word, and listened to God’s Spirit, David also knew when he had failed. Sometimes David needed a mentor, as in Nathan the prophet, to confront him of his sins unrepented and guide him back to God. David always returned to God who loved him. David experienced God’s mercy and grace to him.

That same God, who never changes in His love for his created humans, forgives and loves us still.  He helps those who believe in Him for God is for us, not against us.  He provides for our needs.  He protects us and leads us through the “dark valleys” of our days on earth.  He restores our broken hearts and gives us new life in Christ Jesus who died to remove our sins from our being—God’s Plan to save us forever!  God also has a plan and purpose for each life lived on earth.

Paul, God’s mentor to Timothy, another young man who loves God, continues to remind Timothy of how God wants us to live—in simple faith as we learn His plan and follow Truth.  But, “the first thing I want you to do is pray,” says Paul. 

How will we know what God wants to do in and through us if we do not ask God first?

1 Timothy 2, The Message

Simple Faith and Plain Truth

^1-3 The first thing I want you to do is pray. Pray every way you know how, for everyone you know. Pray especially for rulers and their governments to rule well so we can be quietly about our business of living simply, in humble contemplation. This is the way our Savior God wants us to live.

^4-7 He wants not only us but everyone saved, you know, everyone to get to know the truth we’ve learned: that there’s one God and only one, and one Priest-Mediator between God and us—Jesus, who offered himself in exchange for everyone held captive by sin, to set them all free. Eventually the news is going to get out. This and this only has been my appointed work: getting this news to those who have never heard of God, and explaining how it works by simple faith and plain truth.

^8-10 Since prayer is at the bottom of all this, what I want mostly is for men to pray—not shaking angry fists at enemies but raising holy hands to God. And I want women to get in there with the men in humility before God, not primping before a mirror or chasing the latest fashions but doing something beautiful for God and becoming beautiful doing it.

^11-15 I don’t let women take over and tell the men what to do. They should study to be quiet and obedient along with everyone else. Adam was made first, then Eve; woman was deceived first—our pioneer in sin!—with Adam right on her heels. On the other hand, her childbearing brought about salvation, reversing Eve. But this salvation only comes to those who continue in faith, love, and holiness, gathering it all into maturity. You can depend on this.

WHAT DO WE LEARN—HOW DO WE RESPOND?

Jesus got alone often to a quiet place to pray to God.  Jesus did this before doing anything of significance because it was God who sent Him and He knew God who would provide direction.  Jesus did what the Father told Him to say and do.  Jesus, His Son, knew God, the Father well.  Jesus knew as Son of Man, to be still and know God so He could fulfill the mission God sent him to be and do.

So, who are we to think we can be and then do what God wants in and through us without asking Him?  I shudder and tremble at the thought.

PAUSE TO PRAY

Paul reminds all of us to refrain from reacting to the unfair, rude, cruel world around us with fists of anger and instead respond with raising “holy hands to God in prayer.  Read that again, I did.  There is a distinct difference in reacting in haste and respond to the God who created all, knows all and is over all. 

Seek first God and His righteousness—the “right” response to be and do.

Lord,

Help me to avoid the natural temptation to react to injustice with anger by pausing to respond instead with seeking you first asking what you want from me.  Help us all to be in pursuit of you all day long, looking for you, listening to you, hiding your Word in our hearts—all for the purpose of being still, letting go of what we think, to know what you think as we know you more.  May your glory and beauty be seen in me.

In Jesus Name, Amen