PURSUING GOD ABOVE ALL ELSE

Choosing to pursue God may challenge us to give up things that are very important to us. Pursuing God means we prioritize God's ways more than anything else in our lives. Our dreams, desires, and ambitions must become secondary before God. Our families and those whom we love must become secondary before God. When the people and things we love compete with our pursuit of God, we will always struggle to put God first. Our Lord Jesus understands what we are going through in pursuing Him, and this is the reason he said these words to us, "If you want to be my disciple, you must, by comparison, hate everyone else—your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even your own life. Otherwise, you cannot be my disciple (Luke 14:26)." Jesus was not saying that we literally hate our parents, families, and ourselves. What Jesus was referring to in this verse is to put Him first above all else. He wanted us to put Him in the pinnacle of our hearts and that there is no one and nothing that can be compared to Him. 

Perhaps many of us who are reading this devotion have not experienced the difficult and painful consequences of pursuing God over families, careers, relationships, and other important things in our lives. We have brothers and sisters in the Lord all over the world who lost it all in pursuing God first. The purpose of this devotion is not to shame us, but to challenge us to really examine how much we want to pursue God. God is encouraging us today that if we want to pursue Him, we must pursue Him wholeheartedly and not half-heartedly. If we are struggling with this issue, we must ask God to continue to change our hearts and give us the courage to pursue Him above all else. We must be willing to surrender everything we love to God; after all, everything we have, including our families, is a gift from God. Every good thing that we have comes from God. Our lives, families, jobs, and everything that we are come from God. Naked when we were born, and so everything that we have has been granted by God to us.

If we believe that God loves us and that every good thing that we have comes from Him, would we want to have the best from God? The only way to have the best from God is to pursue Him above all else. 

Questions for application: (Think through these questions carefully, meditate on them while answering them, and let the Spirit of God speak to you.) Do I want the best from God? How do I get the best from God? Am I prioritizing my pursuit of God above all else?

Take a moment to write down all your worries today. Then, lift them up to God in prayer, surrendering them to His will and trusting in His guidance.

Prayer:

Dear Father in Heaven, thank you for giving me all the good things in my life since my birth. You have been loving and caring for me since I was a child. You know everything about me and what's best for me. Please help me to prioritize my pursuit of you above all else. Help me to love you more than anyone and anything in this world. Please help me to pursue you wholeheartedly. In your name, Jesus, I pray. Amen.