PRIORITIZE

Luke 10:38-42

³⁸ As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. ³⁹ She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. ⁴⁰ But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”
   ⁴¹ “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, ⁴² but few things are needed—or indeed only one.^[a] Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”


My question to you today is ... Do you put Jesus first, above all things? How much time do we really dedicate to our Lord? The following post will be kind of harsh to most, but for a Christian it is necessary to be heard.

I have had such a hard time with this lately. I have come to the conclusion that I as a Christian do not dedicate myself enough to my God. He has given us life. He has given us everything we want; and I am not talking in the aspect of riches or gold. I am talking about good health and the time to praise him.
I know that most of the time we feel there are just not enough hours in the day to get done the things we need or want to get done.  But out of all of those hours in our busy lives, how much time do we take to really sit down and contemplate the love of our Jesus and the life that he has given us.  How much time do we take to read the bible; even if only one verse. I can tell you that just one verse or one word from the Bible can change a life or feelings. The Word of God to our soul is like food for our being. We need that food to survive in this world, just as the Holy Spirit that God has sent to us needs the Word of God daily to keep strong in us... so that we are strong in our faith. 

It isn't easy to find the time to sit and read the Bible, but God doesn’t want us to sit and memorize the Bible front to back if we do it just to say we have. It is better to study each word - each and every word and sentence in the Bible has a meaning. We just have to ask for it in prayer. Okay so I got off track there for a second. Back to the matter at hand. As my Pastor explained, Martha and Maria were servants of God.  But when Jesus came to visit them Martha wanted everything to be perfect for him so that he would come back. And that is good that Martha wanted to serve Jesus in the best way she could, but if it wasn't for Maria Jesus would have been sitting all alone while Martha worried about everything else besides Him. The same as if we were entertaining guests in our own home. I am so guilty of being "Martha".  When someone goes to visit you they go to visit and spend time with you, not your television (while waiting for you). Another good example that my Pastor gave was- when we are in church we indulge in the presence of God and try to fill ourselves with the Holy Spirit first, then we eat ( listen to the word of God).  God wants us to put him FIRST, and then he takes care of all the things that come after ( our busy lives ... shopping, eating, errands, etc...) If we could just put him first above our children, above work, above the stress of everyday life situations, he will make sure that our children are taken care of; he will make sure that those errands get done; he will provide our tables with an abundance of food.

I remember when my husband and I got married. We had gotten a 2 bedroom apartment and when we moved in we had absolutely nothing but or Flat screen T.V.  (LOL)  That was when we were still in our first months of accepting Christ as our Savior. And we were so scared in the beginning because my husband was the only one working and was only bringing home max $600 every two weeks. Now keep in mind we still had to pay our electric, water, gas, and rent not including groceries. (And we had our 2 kids at that time) So you could imagine that our bills were definitely adding up to be more than what we were actually bringing in. But we keep going to church, letting God have what was his and trusting that God would take care of us for putting him first in our lives without asking for anything in return. And I can tell you that it was only by his Grace and his love for us that somehow the bills were always paid on time, including our rent, each day our apartment filled up with new things. I really can't even begin to explain all the blessings that God wants to give us every day.  But he wants to give us these things without asking for anything in return. Jesus died on a cross to save our selfish hatred filled lives without asking for anything in return.  God gave to us his only Son without asking for anything in return. The least we could do is dedicate at least 10 minutes to him a day. He is worth so much more than ANYTHING THIS WORLD HAS TO OFFER!!!