I had been looking at Matthew 6:33 for a couple of weeks on my whiteboard. Specifically, I had written the King James version of the verse. It goes: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” Today, I wanted to move from there to another verse. I kept coming to seek God and his word and his wisdom. I ended up doing a Google search for “seek first the kingdom of god” and Google suggested “seek first the kingdom of god luke”. I decided to follow the suggestion and that took me to Luke 12:31.
“… your Father knows you need them. But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.”
Luke 12:30-31 (NIV)
In this verse in Luke, Jesus is saying to seek God’s kingdom and “these things” will be given to you. What are “these things”? Specifically, in the NIV, we are told those things are food and drink. Pausing here, I wondered if this verse speaks literally to those two general items, or if we can stretch it further to include all things needed by humans. I tend to think that is reasonable to make the stretch, because earlier in 27 we were talking about wild flowers and in 28 we were talking about grass of the field. These two particular items were brought up as examples of organisms that have needs. These needs are wholly filled by God. The point was that we are vastly more important, therefore we can lay down our worry and let God handle the obvious.
This is good news. If we seek hard after God’s kingdom, we will be provided what we need. These things that tend to make us anxious can be an afterthought, so that we can continue seeking God’s kingdom.
If you go to Luke 12:34 you see this.
“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Luke 12:34 (NIV)
Your treasure should not be in the kitchen, or at a restaurant, or at a bar, or any number of other places. Your treasure should be God. Seek after God and treasure the experience and the opportunity.