Names of God: Through Thanksgiving & Christmas

Names of God: Through Thanksgiving & Christmas

Day 4 of 30 Jesus warns believers in this passage against self-centered works, materialism, anxiety, and worry. He explains that material needs will be taken care of, but spiritual needs are most important and should be the priority in our lives.  Believers can fall into a pattern of self-protection, where we actively seek things that make us feel secure, things that protect us from pain, and things that keep us in our comfort zone. Instead of relying on God completely, we attempt to incorporate God into our own desires for comfort and convenience. When we worry, we take our eyes off of God and His unlimited resources and put them on ourselves and our limits.  What are you seeking first in life? Does your life demonstrate one lived in absolute faith in the Lord? Or is your life filled with anxiety, worry, and fear of the future? Has the accumulation of material possessions, wealth, status, or position become your goal, crowding out your desire for spiritual growth? What changes would you see in your life if you wholeheartedly sought first the kingdom of God?  Father God, You are the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, the author and finisher of our faith. We were created to worship You. Though sometimes, Lord, my heart strays and I struggle to seek You first. So many other things and so many people have my heart, steal Your worship, and distract me from Your love. Lord, empty me of the preoccupation with materialism, worry, and anxiety. Remove any idols in my life that seek to take Your place in my heart. Lord, forgive my selfishness, my self-centeredness, and my self-seeking ways. When I struggle to trust You with my needs, remind me that You are bigger than my desires, my worries and fears, and my small plans and ambitions. Lord, remind me that Your desire and plan for me is much bigger than my own and I can trust You implicitly. In Jesus' name. Amen.  Matthew 6:25-34 Matthew 6:25-34 NKJV 25 “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?  26Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?  27 Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? 28 “So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin;  29 and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.  30 Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’  32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.  33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.  34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.