29.03 | Priority Formation
1 Corinthians 16
'Now concerning the collection for the saints: as I directed the churches of Galatia, so you also are to do. On the first day of every week, each of you is to put something aside and store it up, as he may prosper, so that there will be no collecting when I come.’
1 Corinthians 16:1-2
Priorities.
It’s a word we all spend a lot of time with. We live in a world of compulsive excess, with busyness inscribed into our daily norms to such an extent that many of us are virtually blind to just how unhealthy the overwhelm is. In the heat of this rat race, analysis and decisiveness around our priorities is essential. We have priorities for our health, our mental health, our work, and our home life. To prioritise is to stack and reorder the competing claims on our limited resource, so that we can be intentional to give proper attention to the things of greater value.
Dig a little deeper, and we find that our actual priorities may be a little different to our named priorities. We might say that we have a priority of being in better shape, but when it’s time to go to the gym, we get sucked into nailing a few more emails. We might say that we have a priority of more time with our kids, and yet, when we’re with them, we get caught up in catching up on a few messages, giving them only half of our attention. There is a disconnect between our intended priorities and our actual priorities.
What do we do about this?
We need a way of reordering our inner world, so the named priorities can become our lived priorities.
We need a methodology for priority formation.
There’s a principle in the Scriptures that helps us. It revolves around what comes first.
In the Old Testament law, the firstborn of every animal and family was said to belong to God.1 So, if you owned a sheep, you would bring the firstborn of that sheep as a dedicated offering to God.
There was a similar law with the harvest. The firstfruits of the harvest would be brought as an offering to God.2
And then, reaching Paul’s words today, he tells the Corinthians to bring their financial offerings on the first day of the week.
What’s going on here?
It’s priority formation.
It is a lived practice of doing something regularly, that is intended to form the heart into keeping the main thing the main thing. The practice leads the heart.
Why bring the firstborn or the firstfruits? That feels vulnerable. What if the rest of the harvest fails? What if the sheep doesn’t have any more lambs? Firstfruits and firstborn were practices of priority formation, training a nation into the interplay of trust and love that were required to risk this priority. They needed to lean into the vulnerability of doing this first in order to reorder the priorities of their hearts. For life only flows when God remains our priority. An excellent, if clinical, description of worship is this: God gets priority.
Back to Corinth. Bring your money, Paul tells them, on the first day of the week.
What’s he doing?
Priority formation.
Because bringing your offering to God on Day 1 means that you might run out by Day 5.
But Paul is inviting them into an intentional reordering of their priorities. Not to give out of their leftovers but to give out of their first fruits. Not to only offer God what they have as excess, but to give first to Him in order that every single detail of their lives—from their prayers to their purses—align with the single priority of God first in all things.
Money is not an unspiritual issue. It is deeply spiritual. How we use it deeply trains the trajectory of our hearts. How we spend it on leads our direction. It forms our priorities. As one rabbi put it, ‘Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.’3
What is the first thing out of our bank accounts?
It matters. It is training your heart.
It is priority formation.
Reflect:
What goes out of my bank account first?
Remember that discipleship happens in small steps.
What is the next step that the Father may be inviting you into to reorder the priorities of your heart?
Pray:
Father,
To give first is to trust you.
My thoughts run to anxiety,
And my heart to ‘What if there is not enough?’
Father, today,
I step in.
Help me to recognise the greater cost to my soul,
Of being led by my fears rather than by faith,
And being led by the assumption of your absence
Rather than the simple trust in your faithfulness.
I offer you afresh what I have.
Here are my firstfruits,
Train me in the practice of generosity.
And thus, Father,
Reorder the priorities of my heart.
Because only the reordered heart
Is truly free.
In Jesus’ Name,
Amen
Old Testament:
For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:
Deuteronomy 28 | Proverbs 11:15-21
Exodus 13; Deuteronomy 15:19
Leviticus 23:9-14; Deuteronomy 26
Matthew 6:21