8th May 2025

Have you ever run across a scripture you memorised years ago and have it slap you in the face with the fact that you haven’t fully updated your interpretation of it recently? That happened to me with the header scripture. Many of us already have the melody in mind — we often sang it. It was quoted in articles or messages exhorting us towards the goal of the kingdom.

And then it hit me: I had always filed this text in the ‘things to accomplish, character to work on, another of the should-do, have-to-do’ texts in my mental ‘Christian checklist file.’

But it doesn’t say that, does it? Jesus invites us to seek the kingdom he is offering. (As possible definitions for ‘seek’, Strong’s Dictionary lists: enquire into, crave, aim at, meditate on.) It’s a journey of discovery, learning to lean into him because he wants to share his righteousness with us. He knows we can’t come up with righteousness — after all, he said he could not do anything as a human being on his own, so he’s not going to ask us to. The secret is not in what we need to do, but what we need to let go of in order to receive.

Jesus is the way and the truth, and the life. The more fully that is understood, the more useless it is to retain a ‘Christian checklist file.’ Instead, we respond to Jesus who lives the way and the truth and the life out in us, as we let go of our need to do things on our own. And as we all know, that isn’t a one-time, done-and-dusted decision — it is a frame of mind to be consciously adopted on a daily basis.

First published on 10 April 2024 in GCI Update Devotionals https://update.gci.org 

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