What Is Your Top Priority?

As they were going along the road, someone said to Him, “I will follow You wherever You go.” And Jesus said to him, “The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” And He said to another, “Follow Me.” But he said, “Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father.” But He said to him, “Allow the dead to bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim everywhere the kingdom of God.” Another also said, “I will follow You, Lord; but first permit me to say good-bye to those at home.” But Jesus said to him, “No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.” Luke 9:57-62 NASB

There is nothing more important than following Jesus. If you want to live at peace and be completely satisfied, your relationship with Jesus must be your first priority. In today’s passage we see three people who had the opportunity to follow Him but for reasons which we all can relate to, ended up going another direction.

The first appears to have had some desire to know God and even expressed a commitment to do so, but is assumed to have changed his mind when he heard Jesus’ response, “The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” One of the things we value in life is a dependable roof over our heads. We all want to pursue the American dream of finding a good job, buying a nice house, saving for retirement, etc. Those things become a priority in our lives because they bring us a sense of security. Herein lies the first problem. Our security must always come from Christ. If our mind is set in the right place, the only real contentment we will find stems from a right relationship with God. While there’s certainly nothing wrong with having our financial ducks in a row, when that becomes the focus of our time, we find ourselves following the dream, rather than following Jesus. The majority of our time is spent working and maintaining our homes, and we only focus on God in the time left over. Let’s be honest, that’s not following Jesus.

The second man in the passage was personally invited by Jesus Himself to come and follow Him. Yet he didn’t jump at the opportunity. He had some desire to know God but wasn’t ready to make it a priority just yet. Down the road, maybe after his father passed away he would take time to follow God. The third has a similar response. He wanted to focus on family matters, put his house in order and handle those responsibilities first, then he thought he would have the time to focus on spiritual matters. I encounter so many people who fall into this same thought pattern. They express some level of realization that spiritual matters are important, but they aren’t ready to make God their number one priority.  If you are so caught up in “life,” that you don’t have time for God, you are missing it!

“No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.”  We only have one first priority, either it’s following Jesus or it’s not. Jesus welcomes each one of us to follow Him, to enjoy a life changing relationship with our Creator, one that brings unmatched peace, contentment and joy, in fact, He suffered greatly on our behalf to give us the opportunity to stand before God forgiven of sin and acceptable to Him. But if we are going to follow Him, He must be our first priority. We must pursue Him with all our heart. Our commitment to Him must be firm in our hearts, unwavering.

It’s far too easy to get caught up in our jobs, our homes, raising our kids and pursuing all the things we think we need to be happy when really all we need is to focus our attention of God and follow hard after Him. When He is our goal, everything else falls into place!

But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. Matthew 6:33 KJV