Priorities, Priorities

"Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength." - Deuteronomy 6:4-5

We wake up in the morning, brush our teeth, take a shower, eat breakfast, go to work/ school, eat lunch, come home, eat dinner, watch tv, talk on the phone, surf the internet, go to bed. Does this sound like your typical day? What else do you fill it up with? If you have a boyfriend/ girlfriend, I'm sure you spend a lot of the day thinking about them, or talking to them. If you have a child, a lot of your time is spent tending to them, and if you go to school or are a workaholic, most of your time is spent working. You spend most of your time doing these things because they are your priorities - you have made a conscious decision to organize your time in this way according to the things you care the most about. Now, if your day has 24 hours and you filled it up with these things, how much did you give to God today?

Many of us want God to give, give, give to us, and answer our prayers immediately but a lot of times, what you get back from God is in direct proportion to what space He occupies in your life. Honestly, think about where you have God in your life right now, would you want Him to give you the same amount of importance you currently give Him? He does give you so many things because He is merciful, but this verse in Deuteronomy tells you EXACTLY how it needs to be - you need to love God with ALL your heart, with ALL your soul, and with ALL of your strength. Anything less is not good enough at all! This means that He, and only He, must occupy the first place in your life. Not your own life, not your significant other, not your family, not your job, because He is the one that gave you all these things and He can take them away. Remember that Jesus had said to only fix your eyes upon God and all else will be taken care of for you. If you decide to make Him first in your life, then as soon as you open your eyes in the morning, your first thought should be to give Him thanks for the new day. In all you do, wherever you go, you have Him in mind, constantly shooting up mini prayers throughout the day.

Make God first in your life and He will help you with all your other priorities.

Today's Prayer:
Lord, help me to love You with all my heart, with all my soul and with all my strength. You made me and deserve the most and the best of me each day. In Your Name we pray, Amen.