Hunter Christner

Do you feel like life is chasing after you? Do you feel like it’s doing everything it can to combat your priorities and crush your dreams and aspirations? You may think to yourself, “Priorities are a good idea and maybe someday I will be able to have them.” The reality is that you do have them, they just aren’t what you want them to be right now. Mahatma Gandhi once said, “Action determines priorities.”

The best way to determine your priorities is not to sit down at the kitchen table and make a list of the ideas that you think are most helpful for your life. Rather, you should sit down and make a chart for every hour of the next seven days. Then fill it with whatever you did with that time. A week from now you will have a much better grasp on what your real priorities are because you can see what you’ve actually filled your time with. Ideas are listed, priorities are lived.

It never ceases to amaze me that a few 30-pound border collies can push a whole herd of cows, each of which weighing 1,000 pounds or more. What if, when we stop running and turn around to face this difficult life, we begin chasing it, herding it where we want it to go. A rule that I have adopted in my life to help me keep my priorities straight came from Jordan Pearson, a guy in my life during my junior high years. He says, “What you take in is what you think about. What you think about is what you care about. And what you care about is what you chase after.” 

You have to think critically about what sort of content you take in. Is that what you want to be influencing what you spend your time thinking about? What you are thinking about will naturally form what (and who) you care about. By default, what you care about determines what you chase after in life. Your priorities reveal what you think is best for you and important to you.

Living your best life isn’t about doing what makes you happy, it’s about doing what is best for you. God argues that his plan for your life is what is best for you. “The Lord says, ‘I will guide you along the best pathway for your life. I will advise you and watch over you’” (Psalm 32:8). And again, “This is what the Lord says — your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: ‘I am the Lord your God, who teaches you what is good for you and leads you along the paths you should follow’” (Isaiah 48:17). Are you convinced?

If you are skeptical of the idea that God has the best plan for you I encourage you to recognize what he has already done on your behalf. He sent his son, Jesus, to the earth to die in your place. This is because sin took hold when you said to God, “I’ll figure out what’s best for me.” I have done this and I still struggle with slipping back into this independent mindset. This is what has separated us from him. When we find ourselves in this condition we have to prioritize our relationship with God.

We must repent, or turn back to God, looking for his guidance and trusting his direction in our life. When we do, he will accept us because Jesus took the judgment we deserve. Jesus rose from the grave three days after his death. This gives us hope that we have a new life. God has done this for you. In this new life, what is important to God has got to become what is important to you. You will live your best life when you are looking to God for what is best for you in every area of your life.

(Hunter Christner is associate staff at Campus Ventures at Northwest College.)