God should NOT be number #1 on your list

Is God number #1 in your life? Does God get first priority? Do you seek to worship God, serve God and love God before you get on with the rest of your life?

These can be challenging questions. In fact, it was questions like these that got me thinking about God twenty years ago. I had always believed that God existed, but I realised that God had always been a small part of my life. I treated him like a calculator. I always had my calculator handy. I didn’t want to live life without a calculator. But when did I reach in my pocket and take engage with my calculator? Well, only when I had a problem to solve. I treated God in the same way. I had no issue believing God existed, but I didn’t really engage with God unless I was thinking about the meaning of life, or if I would ever get a girlfriend, or if I would be caught for doing something naughty. God was convenient, but no a big part of my life.

I came to see that if my life was a movie, I was the star and God was just an extra. The good thing was, as soon as I came to see that, I knew instinctively that that was wrong. If I believed in God at all (which I did) then he couldn’t simply be a bit part. He was too big for that. He was God! When it came to the meaning of life, God either didn’t exist at all or else he had to have everything to do with it!

So began a spiritual journey for me that would lead me to hear the gospel about Jesus and what he had done on the cross to reconcile me to God. At aged 16, I gave up my crown and let God take his rightful place as #1 in my life. That is, in very simplistic terms, what it means to repent and become a Christian. We say sorry for trying to rule our own life, we thank Jesus for dying for our sins so we can be forgiven, and we treat God as he deserves and we commit to following Jesus as “Christ” – God’s appointed king.

When I first became a Christian, this meant that on my list of priorities, God moved right up the top of the list. First came God, then came my family and friends, then everything else. This way of thinking, still challenges me and I hope it challenges you as well. As you get older and your life is filled with many more responsibilities, you have to keep considering your priorities. It is very difficult to assess whether God is #1 in your life. I work 40 hours a week, and only do around 6-8 hours of God-focussed stuff a week. Does that mean my job is more important to me than God? I only give away about a quarter of my wage to charities and gospel ministries. Does that mean I serve money more than God? I watch more YouTube than pray, I eat more often than I read the bible and I sleep for longer than I serve others. I only go to church one day a week and that for only a couple of hours! Does that mean that I worship myself for the other 166 hours a week? Well, of course not. In fact, I have never really thought like that. Fortunately, back when I was still a teenager and a baby Christian, I went to a youth event where I heard a speaker challenge that whole idea.

God should NOT be #1 in your life. God should not be at the top of the list of your priorities.

God is not #1 on the list…

God IS the list.

In Mark 12:28-34, when Jesus was asked by an Old Testament scholar about which was the most important commandment of all, the question was about what was #1 in the long list of rules that God had given in the law. Jesus blew that way of thinking out of the water with his answer. He pointed the man to the Old Testament law book Deuteronomy and quotes chapter 6, verse 4 and 5. These verses weren’t one of the laws. They were the premise behind all of the laws. This is what Jesus said to the man’s question:

“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”

Jesus says the most important thing we must do is love Yahweh (the “Lord”) with everything you have – your heart, soul, mind and strength. Everything! God shouldn’t just be our #1 priority. If we are to follow Jesus’ words then God must be the one thing that ALL of our priorities are shaped by. We must love God with every part of our life. That means that every dollar I spend is God’s money, every hour I work I am doing ministry. Worship is not just something I do on a Sunday. Every category on my list is a form of worship. God is not #1 on my list, he is the paper that the list is written on. He is the pen that writes what goes on the list and what stays off it. God IS the list.

The danger with talking about God as your #1 priority, is that you can fool yourself into believing that he has nothing to do with your #2 priority or #3 priority. That sort of Christian can go to church, give money to charity, even read his bible and pray or be involved in ministry, and yet cheat on his wife on the side. Or maybe it’s not so dramatic. Maybe he just likes to play computer games and resents his wife and children for invading that little bit of space that is just his own.

For a Christian, there is not time that is “just our own”. There is not one cent in our bank account, not one second of our day, not one breath in our lungs that is not God’s. We are completely his. As Paul says, “You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)

We must not compartmentalise our Christian lives. God is not simply the most important one of our various priorities. He is not simply the one we attend to first, before going off to engage in our other pursuits. We should love God with everything we have. He is not just #1. He is #1 to infinity.

Or, as God himself puts it in the very last chapter in the bible: “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”

He IS the list.

So reflect on this… Where is God in your life? Is he on the list at all? Or do you treat him like a calculator or an extra in the movie where you are the star?

Maybe you need to flip the whole thing around. That what the word “repent” actually means. Stop ignoring God and stop feeling guilty that God should have a bigger role in your life. Don’t just “prioritise” God. Give him him everything. Give him the crown. Give him your heart, soul, mind and strength. Give him the pen and the paper and let him be more than just #1 in your life. Let him be your life.

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