One Thing
There’s One Thing. Words can’t really capture it. No one can completely define it. It doesn’t fit nicely into organized steps. It’s hard to measure. And yet, it’s what everybody’s heart truly longs for whether they realize it or not. You can know it intellectually and yet not have grasped it or taken hold of it. That was my story.
As a child growing up in a church-going family, I knew that Jesus is the Savior and that our lives are supposed to be lived following His example. The Christian life to me was a little more like a fire-insurance policy than a passion. That probably explains the aversion I had to Paul’s words in Philippians 3:7-10
“But everything that was a gain to me, I have considered to be a loss because of Christ. More than that, I also consider everything to be a loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. Because of Him I have suffered the loss of all things and consider them filth, so that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own from the law, but one that is through faith in Christ—the righteousness from God based on faith. My goal is to know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death”
I was only 4 years old when I asked Jesus to forgive me for my sins and to make me His child. It would be 26 years later before I would begin to ponder whether I really knew this Jesus and if there was a whole lot more to this Christian journey than what I had been living. It took another 15+ years after that before I was willing to see Jesus the way Paul described in Philippians. I can say that after a couple of years of walking out the Christian Life with this mindset, there’s no going back. There is nothing else. He is my everything, always: happy days, hard days, every day.
Having discovered something this good, this freeing, this life-giving, I can’t help but desire to assure others how much they need it. It frustrates me that I have no idea how to convince them that life’s greatest joy is found in knowing Jesus. I’m painfully aware that it took the crumbling of my world for me to lay down every other dream and pursuit and determine to set knowing Jesus as my One Thing. I only wish that I could motivate people to believe it without the pain of losing everything first.
The scripture is full of this exhortation to know Jesus as your chief pursuit. My favorite one is in Luke 10:38-42. Jesus had come to visit Mary and Martha. It says “Martha was distracted with all her preparations” and Mary was sitting at the Lord’s feet listening. When Martha complained to the Lord that Mary was not helping her, He answered her saying “Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered about so many things; but only one thing is necessary, for Mary has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away from her.” Honestly, Mary is a bit anti-American here. Where’s her hard work, drive, and motivation? She’s sitting on her bum listening to Jesus when there are tasks to be accomplished. Sit when you could serve? It might even be opposite of how your church leadership exhorts you to spend your time. Jesus applauded the prioritization of truly knowing Him because it’s the place from which all abundant living flows.
If I could accomplish anything with this post, it would be to motivate people to consider what things in their life are a greater priority than knowing Jesus and to ponder how life and ministry might be different if they were to intentionally re-prioritize. How about you? What is a greater priority for you than knowing Jesus? What keeps you from re-prioritizing?
This is my testimony. The things I once held dearer than knowing Him, I’m now able to enjoy them more fully and without fear because they are no longer necessary to my joy. I invite you to this same freedom. There’s One Thing; Know Him.
