Sunday, 18 May 2008

• MUFHH 5.18.08

  Living Simply, Yet Focused
  
  Today's My Utmost for His Highest, which is based on Matt 6:26,28 seems very appropriate as my first devotional entry on this blog.  The verses are from the "Do Not Worry" passage in the Bible and they are as follows:
  

  26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life^[a]?

   28"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin.

  Oswald Chambers writes that the point of this passage is to remind us that Jesus wants us as we are.  He had a design for us and sometimes we try a little too hard on our own to be useful and purposeful in serving the Lord.  What God really desires is for us to focus on him so he can reveal his purpose for us.

  I liked this sentence in particular,

  We cannot discover the source of our natural life through common sense and reasoning, and Jesus is teaching here that growth in our spiritual life comes not from focusing directly on it, but from concentrating on our Father in heaven.

  So, it seems fitting that as I attempt to spend more time with God through his word and my prayers, he is encouraging me and saying that this is exactly what I should be doing.  I don't need to worry about if I'm serving enough or being diligent enough or useful enough.  I just have to focus on him by praying, worshipping, reading his word, and learning more about who HE is.  In knowing God better, I will know myself better too.
  
  The birds and lilies do not worry, but they serve their purpose exactly as God intended.  I should like to do the same.
  
  

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