(The following was originally published at CareyGreen.com.)
My daughter brought this to my attention the other day, my younger daughter has been using this book which I have used for years. My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers, she read something to me that I thought fit perfectly to entrepreneurs. It’s just a great reminder, this is on the if you want to get your own copy
Matthew 6:33
But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
“Immediately we look at these words of Jesus, we find them the most revolutionary statement human ears ever listened to. “Seek ye first the kingdom of God.” We argue in exactly the opposite way, even the most spiritually-minded of us – “But I must live; I must make so much money; I must be clothed; I must be fed.” The great concern of our lives is not the kingdom of God, but how we are to fit ourselves to live. Jesus reverses the order: Get rightly related to God first, maintain that as the great care of your life, and never put the concern of your care on the other things.
“Take no thought for your life. . . .” Our Lord points out the utter unreasonableness from His standpoint of being so anxious over the means of living. Jesus is not saying that the man who takes thought for nothing is blessed – that man is a fool. Jesus taught that a disciple has to make his relationship to God the dominating concentration of his life, and to be carefully careless about every thing else in comparison to that. Jesus is saying – “Don’t make the ruling factor of your life what you shall eat and what you shall drink, but be concentrated absolutely on God.” Some people are careless over what they eat and drink, and they suffer for it; they are careless about what they wear, and they look as they have no business to look; they are careless about their earthly affairs, and God holds them responsible. Jesus is saying that the great care of the life is to put the relationship to God first, and everything else second.
It is one of the severest disciplines of the Christian life to allow the Holy Spirit to bring us into harmony with the teaching of Jesus in these verses.”
Now think about that our first oder of business needs to be first seeking the kingdom of God. That’s a priority issue isn’t? We’re entrepreneurs we know what it’s like to carry a heavy load to wear multiple hats, to understand the responsibility of earning money, caring for employees, taking care of clients and building systems.
But if we don’t first get our relationship with God on track and focused those other things are going to consume us and God is going to fall by the way side. Not that he really will but in our minds he will, we won’t be focused on him. His purpose is for our business, that really is what we need first and for most, for God’s purposes to be fulfilled in our businesses. Grab a copy of My Utmost for His Highest and find the May 21st entry and pray over that over and over again.