God First - Devotional by Ashlea Massie

“The word of the Lord came to me: ‘Son of man, behold, I am about to take the delight of your eyes away from you at a stroke; yet you shall not mourn or weep, nor shall your tears run down.’ …. at evening my wife died. And on the next morning I did as I was commanded.” Ezekiel 24:16,18

Imagine being told that the one thing you cherished the most on this earth would be taken from you, and not only that, but you would not be allowed to even mourn and heal over the loss of this particular person.

Ezekiel had done nothing wrong to elicit the death of his wife. There was also nothing wrong with mourning the death of a loved one. But, God needed Ezekiel to be an example to the Israelites by showing them that what they loved most would be taken away from them. It would happen so quickly they wouldn’t have time to mourn.

Because Ezekiel obeyed God, his decision to follow through with such an extremely hard task revealed his dedication to God. It proved that God was the number one priority in his life.

Would we be able to act like Ezekiel though? Or would we despair if our most loved human on this earth was taken away from us? God set Ezekiel as an example not only for the Israelites but for future believers to be reminded that we must cherish God first above all else in life. God wants us to make him our first priority because only his love is eternal. All else will fade.

We must prepare for the hard times to come and be willing to let God take back what he generously lent to us. Our only way of putting God first is through prayer, and God will grant us the ability to love him more than anything else in this life, making the tough times bearable.