My message this Sunday is entitled, "Seekers" . . . and is based upon that pericope in Luke which contains the Lord's Prayer and the Lord's admonition that we should ask, seek, and knock if we are to discover the will and leading of God.
I'm pondering this message deeply this week because I know many congregations that have been built around the idea of offering "seeker" worship services--the idea being that there is a group of people who are seeking and another group of people who have "found" what they are seeking (and are then by definition no longer seekers but true Christians).
I don't see this distinction in the gospel, however. Jesus told his disciples to "seek first the kingdom of God"...but the Greek verb form here would better be translated, "continue to seek the kingdom" or "never stop seeking the kingdom."
Now here is the spin. The essence of faith is seeking! It is not finding.
Jesus made it clear that when we pray the Lord's Prayer, we are seeking God, the one who is higher and greater than we are . . . seeking the kingdom on earth as it exists in heaven. When we pray, we are asking. We are seeking God through our continued knocking, our continuing persistence and attention toward the things of God . . . even that, and especially that, which we do not understand.
We are always seekers. If we are found, it is God who has found us . . . not us who have found God.
We are always seekers.
Kind of like that line in the U-2 song: "I still haven't found what I'm looking for."
Are you still seeking first the kingdom? If so, Jesus said all the rest will follow after, not the other way around.
~Pastor Todd
I'm pondering this message deeply this week because I know many congregations that have been built around the idea of offering "seeker" worship services--the idea being that there is a group of people who are seeking and another group of people who have "found" what they are seeking (and are then by definition no longer seekers but true Christians).
I don't see this distinction in the gospel, however. Jesus told his disciples to "seek first the kingdom of God"...but the Greek verb form here would better be translated, "continue to seek the kingdom" or "never stop seeking the kingdom."
Now here is the spin. The essence of faith is seeking! It is not finding.
Jesus made it clear that when we pray the Lord's Prayer, we are seeking God, the one who is higher and greater than we are . . . seeking the kingdom on earth as it exists in heaven. When we pray, we are asking. We are seeking God through our continued knocking, our continuing persistence and attention toward the things of God . . . even that, and especially that, which we do not understand.
We are always seekers. If we are found, it is God who has found us . . . not us who have found God.
We are always seekers.
Kind of like that line in the U-2 song: "I still haven't found what I'm looking for."
Are you still seeking first the kingdom? If so, Jesus said all the rest will follow after, not the other way around.
~Pastor Todd
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