{"id":718,"date":"2025-02-14T07:46:54","date_gmt":"2025-02-14T07:46:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newcreationcity.org\/?p=718"},"modified":"2025-02-14T07:48:41","modified_gmt":"2025-02-14T07:48:41","slug":"busy-here-and-there","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newcreationcity.org\/?p=718","title":{"rendered":"Busy Here and There"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Discipleship Devotional, January 14th, 2025<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As the king passed by, the prophet called out to him, \u201cYour servant went into the thick of the battle, and someone came to me with a captive and said, \u2018Guard this man. If he is missing, it will be your life for his life, or you must pay a talent of silver.\u2019 While your servant was busy here and there, the man disappeared.\u201d \u201cThat is your sentence,\u201d the king of Israel said. \u201cYou have pronounced it yourself.\u201d<br>\u2014 1 Kings 20:39-40 (NIV)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In our anchor text, we see a man given a specific task: to guard a captive. But he lost the captive, offering an excuse that he was busy &#8220;here and there.&#8221; This reflects many believers today who focus on things that won\u2019t matter in eternity, neglecting the ultimate command God has given us. Just as the king did not accept the man\u2019s excuse, God won\u2019t accept any excuse for not obeying Him and fulfilling His ultimate command for our lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In case you don&#8217;t know what command I speak of, it is the mandate to preach the gospel. Christ commanded all believers to go in His name and make disciples of all nations, but some of us are busy here and there about earthly runs. While there are legitimate pursuits that may keep us occupied, they must never take chief priority in our lives. As important as our secular work is, it must not overshadow God\u2019s ultimate work. Some people\u2019s entire life revolves around earthly pursuits, resembling the man in our anchor text who was busy with everything but left his most important task undone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Today, the Lord is challenging us to let His purpose be our number one focus, no matter our earthly pursuits. Instead of being busy with temporary things and forgetting God\u2019s purpose, we ought to make God\u2019s purpose our main pursuit, with everything else revolving around it. God\u2019s purpose should influence all areas of our lives\u2014our job, whom we marry, where we choose to live, etc. I pray that we will be purpose-driven in Jesus\u2019 name. Amen!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Prayer<\/strong><br>Help me, Lord, not to be busy with things that don\u2019t matter. Keep me focused on Your\u00a0purpose.\u00a0Amen!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Discipleship Devotional, January 14th, 2025 As the king passed by, the prophet called out to him, \u201cYour servant went into the thick of the battle, and someone came to me with a captive and said, \u2018Guard this man. If he is missing, it will be your life for his life, or you must pay a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":650,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"saved_in_kubio":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-discipleship-devotional"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Busy Here and There - New Creation City<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/newcreationcity.org\/?p=718\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Busy Here and There - New Creation City\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Discipleship Devotional, January 14th, 2025 As the king passed by, the prophet called out to him, \u201cYour servant went into the thick of the battle, and someone came to me with a captive and said, \u2018Guard this man. 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