Everyday Encounter

Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Matt 6v33

Above all things, before all things, more important and crucial than anything else is that we seek the Kingdom of God and His righteousness.

Above and before our prefered style of worship and teaching, we seek His kingdom.
Above and before our own self image, we seek His kingdom
Above and before our own benefit, we seek His kingdom
Above and before our trials, circumstances and struggles, we seek His kingdom
First and foremost, Your Kingdom

Mike Pilavachi says it well when he says that if above all else we are people who love God everything else will fall into place – for it will find its correct place in the perspective of the big picture. We will only want to do things that bring praise to God and that please Him.

Make us a people who seek Your Kingdom and Your righteousness Father.

John 8:36 “if the Son sets you free you will be free indeed’

The question is do you feel free, or do you feel trapped?

Is what is apparently a mark of your ‘freedom’ actually trapping you? Caught in a cycle of screw ups, let downs, dissapointments and regrets? – Free? I’m not so sure.

Recently I’ve noticed and been thinking about how, often when I make a bad choice and go with my own desires rather than what will praise God, instead of feeling ‘free’ in my ability to do whatever I want, I actually feel more trapped. I don’t know if you know the feeling of attempting to put back on the chains that Jesus has already removed from us, but its anything but liberating.

Ask yourself today if you feel free or trapped.

Where there is unity, the Lord commands blessing. You find this theme in Psalm 133. And in Colossians 1:17 it says ‘He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.‘

Together – ‘in close proximity or companionship’

Where hearts, minds and passions unite in the purpose of the glory of God it is a beautiful thing. There is unity and a common goal, the means of how we get to it is irrelevant. Personal preferences are laid aside gladly as a (seemingly insignificant) sacrifice to the majesty, power, beauty and all-consuming, all-fulfilling, and all deserving glory of the Lord Almighty.

A people sold out for the renown of the God who saves. Nothing stands in the way of them bringing Him praise – not music, not distractions, not hard times or good times, not other peoples apparent lack of interest, not even self image. He is worth our everything, and deserves nothing less.

A unity of purpose and an unquenchable desire to praise the Name above all names that spills out to the streets, that breaks barriers between churches, communities and people, bringing unity wherever it touches.

“Unified voices make the loudest song”
Louie Giglio – The Air I Breathe/Wired

God is never late. God is never early. God is ALWAYS on time.

What strikes me about this is that God never gives us things before we are ready for them. And He also never misses the correct oppertunity for something. For me this has been something that I have found really challenging lately, especially in terms of Encounter and the worship and teaching that is going on there. There are weeks when it feels like everything is going great and people are connecting and being challenged by what they are hearing and singing. And then in other weeks God seems to be the furthest thing from some peoples minds as they step through the door, which leads to all sorts of ‘interesting behaviour’ during the talks and worship. I’m just coming to terms with the fact that God will move and challenge hearts on his time scale and not on ours, regardless of how amazing our talk or worship set preparation may be. Only God can provoke genuine, heartfelt and true responses to Himself.

We wait on you, Almighty God.