On This Day: The First Will be Last and the Last First

 

“But many who are first will be last, and the last first.” (Matthew 19:30)

“So the last will be first, and the first last.” (Matthew 20:16)

    Here are my “first” thoughts of what Jesus may have meant with his statements about “the first shall be last, and the last first”.

   It has the sense, to me, of coming into the kingdom with the first and foremost qualities of poverty of spirit, mourning, meekness, hungering and thirsting for righteousness, but being in the church long enough that these slowly revert to pride, smugness, self-dependence, stagnation, so that someone ends up “last” in qualities that attach us to Christlikeness, while the last to come in are front of the line with their humility and first love.

   The application is at least very convicting, and the first of the letters to the seven churches in Revelation provides a reality-check for how we are doing in this regard, along with the remedy of the 3 “R’s” (remember, repent, return). 

“‘I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance, and how you cannot bear with those who are evil, but have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and found them to be false. I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my name's sake, and you have not grown weary. But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent'" (Revelation 1:2-5).

 

© 2024 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8

Email: in2freedom@gmail.com

Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.)