Therefore, do not worry saying, “What shall we eat? What shall we drink? Or What shall I wear?” For all of these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need these things. Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you…”
“Seek first the Kingdom of God.”
These are the words of our Lord as he begins to conclude his famous Sermon on the Mount, where he taught us that we should not worry about the things of this life…all of these vain pursuits that will pass away when we go to eternal rest. Our focus needs to be towards eternity, towards building our confidence that God is in control, and towards the Kingdom which is to come.
There is a question that I pray we all walk out of here thinking about…and applying to our lives from today’s Gospel: “Is my day to day energy more spent on building up the Kingdom on Earth…or building within myself the Kingdom of God?”
As Christians, we know in our hearts what the answer should be to this question. We know deep down that if our trust was completely on God, and our focus completely on the Kingdom, then the amount of time we spend worrying about the world, dividing ourselves amongst one another, and having anxiety over the waves that life throws at us would completely disappear. But so often, we find ourselves answering that question the wrong way. We spend more time and energy focusing and worrying about our way of life, our wealth, our health…the very types of things that our Lord tells to put into the hands of God.
What must we do, to gain the sort of confidence to be able to walk through life, literally without a “care in the world”…knowing that God has everything in His control? We have been given a wonderful example to follow these past few weeks, as we have been in the midst of the Apostles Fast of the Church. This time of reflection was given to us by the Holy Fathers as a way to answer the very question, by reminding us how the Apostles…these leaders of the Saints…were able to not only Seek the Kingdom of God in their own lives, but also spread it to the rest of the world.
These chiefs of the Apostles, St. Peter and Paul, went through difficulties in this life that many of us could only imagine in our worst nightmares. In the epistles, St. Paul reflects on how He was beaten with rods, stoned, shipwrecked 3 times, robbed, yelled at by his own countrymen, and often left hungry, thirsty and naked. St. Peter had his own troubles in Rome and was ultimately tortured and crucified upside down…all while doing God’s work in the world! Yet despite all that happened to them, both of these men spent their lives in completetrust in God. They both had complete confidence that God was with them, and their focus was only on the Kingdom which is to come.
While we might not all reach the level of St. Peter and Paul, that does not mean that we can’t apply some of their examples to our own lives. There are two virtues that stand out among the rest that we can very easily apply to our lives today. The first one starts with St. Peter, who was the man who spent his time becoming the closest Disciple of our Lord. He was the first person to proclaim Jesus as God and was a true friend of Christ. But after our Lord was arrested, despite all of the Love that he had for Jesus, it was Peter who denied Him three times.
The very moment that he fell, Peter’s heart was pierced when he remembered the sweet but hurt eyes of God who he had turned his back on. Even though he was forgiven in the eternal kingdom, it is said for the rest of his life, Peter never forgot the pain of that betrayal. It is said in the reading of his life that he wept every day…so much so that there are some icons that depict large welts under his eyes where the tears of his repentance flowed. St. Peter reminded Himself each day of his unworthiness, of the look of pain that our Lord had given him, of the frailty he had as a human being. Peter used those images to spend his entire life in daily repentance, turning his focus away from the world and towards life with God.
St. Paul, our other example, lived a life in which he too denied Christ, but not with words. His denial came with every violent actions. This was a man who held the coats of the Pharisees while St. Stephen was beaten and martyred in the streets! But after St. Paul’s repentance, after his life changed, he was able to keep his eyes fixed on the Kingdom by living a life of humility.
St. Paul was a man who wrote most of the New Testament. He lived a God filled life! He started many Churches, healed the sick, and brought thousands of people to Christ! But despite all of this, he tells his disciple Timothy: “Jesus came into the world to save sinners…of whom I am “Protos” (first). Despite all of the miracles that our Lord worked to St. Paul, he still saw himself as the chief among sinners.
How can I begin to seek the Kingdom of God in my life? The answer is rooted in repentance (an about face or a change in our own lives)….and humility (the self emptying that allows us to keep moving towards Christ). This is not only a common denominator of the Apostles, but it is also a life that is shared by all of the Saints in the Church. We who are called to be saints must emulate these virtues daily, if we are to have any hope of Seeking the Kingdom in our own lives.