Only One Thing

“Always remember the essence of Christian holiness is simplicity and purity: one design,  one desire: entire devotion to Christ.”  John Wesley

A few months ago perhaps now I sensed the Holy Spirit leading me to put these three passages below on one of my prayer sheets for Christ’s church. We believers have a great tendency to involve ourselves in too many things, which over time whittles away at our pursuit of Christ and Him alone. This is especially a snare for those of us in ministry, as many of these things we are involved in are “for the Lord” or “for His kingdom” and thus surely are good and necessary things. But as Jesus said to Mary, “….only one thing is necessary.” So my prayer these days (among others) for Christ’s church is that we will increasingly be “one thingers” - - daily out of our love for Jesus and by the power of the Holy Spirit being willing to say no to the non necessary things so we can grasp and hang on to and experience the necessary thing. I hope you will join me in this prayer. I am confident the Father will answer it.

“One thing I have asked from the Lord, that I shall seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the Lord  And to meditate in His temple.” Psalm 27:4                                                                                                               King David was a very busy man, with a large kingdom to run and a large family to care for. He had many legitimate responsibilities. But he came to a place in his life where he realized only one thing is supremely important. And thus he learned to ask daily for the Father to grant him that one thing. To David that one thing is basically increasingly having the heart and the desire and the will to seek God for Himself – to know Him and enjoy Him and to oft be in His presence growing in his knowledge of and adoration for His God.

“but only one thing is necessary, for Mary has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away from her.”  Luke 10:42                                                                                            You know the story, Mary, Martha and Lazarus had the great privilege of having the Lord Jesus in their home (evidently on multiple occasions). But in this particular time, which might have been the first time, Mary – possibly just as aware as Martha was of the hospitality (e.g. food, drink, etc) that needed to be extended – Mary chose to ignore it for a time and just focus on communing and fellowshipping with Jesus – listening to His every word (see vs. 39). Martha – Luke tells us – “…was distracted with all her preparations…” and frustrated that Mary was being so irresponsible (vs. 40). One of the telltale signs that we are not being a one thinger is that we are frustrated and resentful of others that are. Luke tells us she was distracted. Jesus said to her, “…Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered about so many things;”. One has to wonder how much stress and worry and angst the body of Christ would be relieved of if we could by more like Mary….

“Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”  Philippians 3:13,14     The question we need to answer in this passage is what is that “upward call”?  Well Paul said to the church in Corinth, “God is faithful through whom you were called into fellowship with Jesus Christ His Son.” (I Corinthians 1:9)   Is there a greater calling in this earthly life? I think not.     Paul had just said several verses earlier, “But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, ….” 3:7,8  There is no greater prize than Christ Himself, but alas how easy it is to gain all kinds of other things in this distracted “Christian” life, but not Him.

May the Holy Spirit show us how to become “one thingers” and may we gladly die to whatever it is that is keeping us from obtaining the greatest prize of all. And may we all find others to pursue this greatest of prizes with.