Seek Ye First

RRev. Andrew Brashier / September 29, 2025

This entry is part 49 of 49 in the series A Walk in the Ancient Western Lectionary

The Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity

Seek Ye first the kingdom of God

And His righteousness

And all these things shall be added unto you. Allelu, Alleluia.

We are distracted beings. Along the Way of salvation are detours deviously trapping us like the tourist pausing to gander at the roadside attraction. At best, we lost a few hours of our lives: a delay, a minor inconvenience. At worst, we stay at the distraction or wander further from the path laid out by the Master, to our own peril.

Like lost sheep, we need tending and keeping. Cry aloud to your Good Shepherd, and ask Him to, “Keep, we beseech thee, O Lord, thy church with thy perpetual mercy.” (Collect of the Day). Why do we need keeping? Because even our overseers are human, are sinners, and are failures. Hence we pray not only individually but collectively as the Church for the Lord’s mercy, “because the frailty of man without thee cannot but fall,” therefore again we echo in this week’s collect the theme of “keeping” by asking the Lord to “keep us ever by thy help from all things hurtful, and lead us to all things profitable to our salvation, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.” (Collect of the Day).

Man shall not live by bread alone

But by every word

That proceeds from the mouth of God. Allelu, Alleluia.

We Christians are easily distracted by errors of our own making. We, the Church, love nothing more than making anything and everything outside the Gospel preached and Gospel sacraments administered the main thing, and that inevitably leads to our wandering in the wilderness of our own making. Making a mountain out of a molehill is a sinner’s speciality. Choosing to die on an anthill of self-righteousness and ignoring God’s command to overtake hell’s gates frequently appears and reappears in the Church’s history and in our own lives. Do you hear the voice of the Lord as you stumble among the thorns and thistles off His beaten path? He calls out to you, O Church, “I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.” (Revelation 2:4, KJV).

Do not forget your first love, the One who loved you before you were knitted in your mother’s womb. Return and “Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works,” and do so immediately, “or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent.” (Revelation 2:5 KJV).

Ask and it shall be given unto you

Seek and ye shall find

Knock and the door shall be opened unto you. Allelu, Alleluia.

We sinners, both individually and corporately as the Church, far too often “desire to make a fair shew in the flesh,” rather than recall our first love, whom we meet at the Cross. (Epistle lesson, Galatians 6:12, KJV). Our pride dies hard. We may not be comparing circumcision with uncircumcision as in the Church of Galatia, but instead we argue, dispute, and quibble over what lifts up our flesh instead of lifting up our hearts, our minds, our bodies, and our souls as a sacrifice of praise unto the Lord. We think if we have power then we have control, when in reality the power controls us. We deceive ourselves by whispering in our heart that if only we had more money, then we would be secure, when only our insecurities will become more manifest. We justify the need for planning, plotting, and preparing for tomorrow, thinking we are merely being prudent when, in all actuality, we are missing Providence meeting our immediate needs and our greater need to meet the needs of our neighbor Lazarus, who sits outside the door wishing for our bread crumbs.

This moment and all this week, we need to “Consider the lilies of the field” and touch grass, as the kids say. My favorite pastime is working in my backyard and looking up when I hear the small buzzing of a hummingbird, hovering like a small helicopter as it drinks from the deep well of our flowers. They have no worries. They have no desire to one-up a fellow hummingbird. They simply exist in perfect trust of their Creator in the midst of this fallen and corrupt world that is no fault of their own.

Let us no more glory in ourselves, “for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” (Genesis 3:19). We are miserable sinners at best, as we are reminded and need reminding through praying the Litany. Let our only boast be in how great a failure we are, and how great a Savior is the One who provides exactly what we need, and not what we think we need (thank God). Therefore, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.” (Galatians 6:14).

Do you wish for more? Leave it at the Cross. Do you desire tomorrow? Settle for today. Are you seeking a word or a vision from God? Be satisfied with the living Scriptures in your hands and hardened knees in prayer. We sinners cannot help but seek to enthrone ourselves, but let us be reminded that the throne of Christ is Jesus hanging upon the Cross. Therefore, lay aside the treasures, the power, the money, and the pleasures of this world, for we are not called to lord over anyone like the Gentiles do. We are called to serve. (Mark 10:42-43). You were crucified to the world in Jesus; therefore, pay no heed to sin’s passions, the world’s siren calls, nor Satan’s temptations, for “in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.” (Romans 8:37).

If the Son shall set you free

Ye shall be free indeed.

Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free. Allelu, Alleluia.

Set aside your slavery to your old master, and think not that you can serve two, for “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.” (Gospel lesson, Matthew 6:24, KJV). You cannot serve your selfish ambitions, passions, desires, and wants. What you wish to consume shall consume you on the last day unless you lay it at the Cross. Serve the trust Master, the One who freed you from your chains and “seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness.” (Matthew 6:33). “O ye of little faith,” cease, desist, and no more dwell upon the questions the world revels in: what to eat, how to dress, who to impress, how to advance, and how to self-promote while self-justifying all along the way to death and the road to destruction. (Matthew 6:30). “For after all these things do the Gentiles seek.” (Matthew 6:32).

Keep the Gospel, the Gospel. It is not merely the “main” thing; it is the only thing. Anything else is a distraction. “Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” (Matthew 6:34). Is your enemy striking you – turn the other cheek. Has the thief stolen your goods, give them what he leftover. The Way of Jesus Christ is the Way of Life; choose it over the way of death. Dispossess death by denying the dark power’s possession over you and your soul.

Let your light so shine before men

That they may see your good works

And glorify your father in heaven. Allelu, Alleluia.

Dear Christian, what you need is neither promotion nor possessions lest you become possessed by power and ultimately devoured by your desires in the end. What you truly need in this life is in the wounded hands of Christ, “for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.” (Mathew 6:32). He is a good Father and He knows what you truly need, hence He gives us not only the material items for living, but also He gives us the Good Shepherd to keep us close to Him. Close your heart to the cold cash of this world and open your arms to the One wounded for you. Bear His wounds as you carry your own cross, seeking only the Kingdom and desiring only the promised heavenly Jerusalem which is given to us at the end of the age. Desire the Spirit and not the flesh, “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature.” (Galatians 6:15). Bear your sin no more, and “From henceforth let no man trouble me,” but instead be so united to Christ Jesus that the only thing you bear in your body are “the marks of the Lord Jesus.” (Galatians 6:17).

The day is short, and tomorrow has more evil. Let us rest for the night and return in repentance along the Way of Jesus. We resume our journey this week, following after Christ in humility as He was humiliated for our redemption. Tomorrow we pick up our steps and walk again, yet not alone, but with our Master, our Lord, our Savior. “And as many as walk according to this rule, peace be on them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God.” (Galatians 6:16). Let us walk together under the Cross, and may we humble ourselves, repent where we have wronged, and forgive where there is error. “Brethren, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen.” (Galatians 6:18).

Trust in the Lord with all thy heart

He shall direct thy path

Heal all thy ways, acknowledge Him. Allelu, Alleluia.