Kingdom Living
Matthew 6: 33 Amplified Version
But first and most importantly seek (aim at, strive after) His kingdom and His righteousness [His way of doing and being right—the attitude and character of God], and all these things will be given to you also.
One of the fundamental principles of faith is to seek God. Seeking God’s face and His presence is never the wrong thing to do but, in this passage, Jesus gave us a more precise instruction. He said to seek the Kingdom of God and God’s righteousness, the two being closely related.
Jesus wants us to look at the Kingdom of God and learn how it operates and what spiritual laws control it because once we understand the Kingdom’s operation rules, nothing will be impossible to us. God’s righteousness is similar. It is God’s “right” way of doing and being. It is not about holiness. That is different though how can you do things God’s way and not be holy? Still, this is about “right-ness” and I think this is a much better way for you to think about righteousness. In fact, you will help yourself if every time you see righteousness, you translate it in your mind to rightness. Godly rightness is doing things the way God would do them or how He would have you do them, which can be very different from the rules the world operates by. Understand this, again we are not talking about morality here. Not doing it God’s way does not make it immoral or sinful it just isn’t “right” Kingdom thinking. It’s world thinking which is what most of us were trained in.
Here is a simple example. What is the proper economic response in the time of famine, or in modern language, economic downturn? What if your salary has been reduced or your company is struggling? The world would say this is a time to save for a rainy day. It’s time to stock up and hoard provision for a later time. Kingdom dynamics operate differently. The Kingdom principle is, give in time of famine, sow seed like Isaac did. Now here is an interesting rub. Non-Christians will tap into these Kingdom principles and they will work for them even though they aren’t saved as we understand that term. Kingdom principles are like rain which falls on believers and non-believers. It will water everyone’s seed. The only real question is who has sown seed? So, sometimes non-believers benefit more from Christian principles than we do.
Here is another example. Kingdom principles teach to put other people’s needs and concerns ahead of your own. The world says, this is a dog eat dog world and you need to do unto others before they do unto you. There is a little perversion in that language, huh? I remember hearing a pastor talking about a contract he negotiated. He made sure the other guy got a good deal too. He wasn’t out to just get the best deal he could regardless of who might get hurt. That’s enlightening because a Christian take advantage of someone all the while thinking, “God is blessing me.” That kind of thinking bites back because it isn’t Kingdom dynamics at work. It is worldly thinking. Just get what you can for yourself regardless of the impact upon others.
Jesus wants us to learn to think like he and Yahweh do. They both want us to look at them and do as they do. Jesus said he only did what he saw the Father do. In other words, he totally modeled God and we can do the same by emulating him. We can learn to operate in the Kingdom and have Kingdom blessing working for us. Seek first God’s way of doing and being and in the end, He will give you everything.
