"You shall have no other gods before me."
(Exodus 20:3 NRSV)

At age sixteen Margie Denny gave her life to Jesus Christ. Life wasn't easy for Margie, but she felt Christ's presence in her hurts and sorrows. Her commitment to Christ held even in high school when her friends began to "get interested in drugs and parties." Studying the Bible and being around Christians convinced her that her non-Christian friends' life-style "was not pleasing to the Lord." She had to make a lot of difficult choices, she recalls, "But commitment to him was more important than any friendship."

Today Margie is a thirty-year-old woman from a community of townhouses in a working class neighborhood just outside Chicago. She is back in college, after a hiatus of several years, hoping to gain her teacher's certification, while her husband serves as an associate pastor at a nearby church.

A long-time acquaintance had this to say, "Margie believes in making the world a better place. She and her husband both have college degrees and could have chosen lucrative careers. But she's planning on being a school teacher and her husband is a pastor, as they serve God's people."

What are you doing to serve God's people? What are the priorities of your life? Is Jesus the center of your life, or have you allowed your life to become cluttered with the things and activities of this world and there is no longer any room for Jesus? If so, take a few moments to re-evaluate your life and what is most important. Put Jesus back on the throne of your life and in control.

When we allow Christ to be Lord of our lives we reorder our priorities.

God of grace and mercy, may my priorities be yours. Amen.