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Shortly after my father turned 18 years of age, he read the editorial page from a church magazine where George Albert Smith quoted the following scripture:

“But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these (material) things shall be added unto you.” (Matt. 6: 33).

Then for emphasis Smith added, “Remember to seek the kingdom of God first not last.” The force of this thought has never left my father and he and my mother attempted to implement this concept in their life and that of their family. My father once gave this sound advice to his children when he wrote:

“The materialistic society in which we live requires that this principle be part of our thinking on a daily basis to have proper priorities in our life. The poet Wordsworth rightly observed many years ago:

“The world is too much with us;
Late and soon
Getting and Spending,
We lay waste our powers.”

Seeking first the kingdom of God means, of course, that on appropriate occasions it has priority over personal desires, professional work, personal relationships, and even family members. The important question to answer is, “What does our Father in Heaven want us to do?” Hugh Nibley once wrote:

“I have always been furiously active in the church, but I have…never held an office or rank in anything; I have undertaken many assignments given me by the leaders of the church, and much of the work has been anonymous. No rank, no recognition, no anything. While I have been commended for some things, they were never the things which I considered most important—That was entirely an understanding between me and my Heavenly Father, which I have thoroughly enjoyed, though no one else know anything about it.”

My father concluded his written remarks:

“Once we understand what seeking first the kingdom of God means within each of our circumstances, we should pursue it with vigor. A wise writer has said: “Each morning we must have unfinished business that causes us to get up from our resting place with enthusiasm to further our goal seeking journeys. That’s life at it’s best.”