Do you desire the Kingdom?

Matthew 13:44-46

Good morning, Wayne St Connection Church!

Its my honor to be able to present to you the Word of God this morning.

I want to start by recapping a few points for PE’s series on the Kingdom of Heaven.

What a topic?!

As I have watched online, I have noticed some main points, thoughts and questions that he has been attempting to answer for us.

Basically we are two opposing kingdoms. The kingdom of God and the kingdom of this Earth.

The main question is which one are you living for? Which one are you walking in? Which one are you seeing and understanding?

A few of the questions he has been asking have been,

Where is the Kingdom of Heaven?

Do you see the Kingdom? You personally?

Do you YOU hear the Kingdom?

Do you understand or perceive the Kingdom?

Understanding affects the very ground under you on which you stand.

Your perspective of the Kingdom of heaven affects so much of your life!

Church, my question for you is similar to those PE has been asking you over the past few weeks, but a little different.

PE has done a great job these past few weeks talking about the differences between the little Earthly kingdom vs God’s Kingdom,

The question for this morning, that I have for you is:

Which kingdom do you desire more, the Kingdom of Heaven or the kingdom of man or this world?

Or another way of asking:

Which kingdom do you value more in your life?

Jesus talked about it over and over again in His ministry. So, there must be something to it that He desires us to see it, hear it, understand it, perceive it and desire it!

We have been in Matthew 13 where Jesus is giving parable after parable on the Kingdom.

PE has walked us through the parable of the sower and the weeds, and the mustard seed.

And right there is the middle Jesus gives a little insight to those with a little insight into the Kingdom.

Jesus tells His disciples, Matthew 13:11-13 (Highlight the main points only.

So, Jesus was teaching about the Kingdom to a bunch of people who couldn’t see it, hear it, understand it or perceive it.

So, who was He really telling about the Kingdom?

If you are already in Matthew 13, look at verse 16-17.

Matthew 13:16–17 ESV

But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. For truly, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.

Jesus is talking to His disciples and tells them that they are blesses because THEY CAN see it, THEY CAN hear it, but they are struggling with the understanding part of it sometimes.

So, as I was rereading the chapter in preparation for the this morning a question came to mind.

Why them?

Why the disciples?

Why were they about to see the kingdom and hear the kingdom?

What was so special about the them that put them in the position to receive the teachings about the Kingdom of God?

It is my belief and contention this morning that one of the chief reasons that they were able to see God’s Kingdom, hear God’s Kingdom, understand God’s Kingdom is because they desired it more than anything else.

They valued the kingdom of God over everything else in their lives.

I think there is a few things that they did to show that and these are things that we have GOT to apply to our lives if we want to see the Kingdom of God come!

They showed that they desired the Kingdom because they lived with Jesus.

So, if most of the other people that Jesus taught about the Kingdom could not understand what He was talking about, then Jesus’ repeated teachings on the Kingdom of Heaven must have been for those who heard all 126 times Jesus mentioned the Kingdom and hear all 13 parables about the Kingdom!

The disciples!

And how did they hear them all?

They lived with Him, they dwelled with Him and His teachings! They listened to the words that He said and desired to understand what He taught.

They could see the Kingdom, hear the Kingdom, and understand the Kingdom because they were abiding with the Father’s representative for the Kingdom and the soon to be crowned King of that Kingdom!

They could see it and hear it because they were looking right at Him and listening to the living, breathing Word of God!

It was right in front of them the whole time and they desired be with Him all of the time!

Church, if you desire to see the Kingdom of God better, look to Jesus!

If you truly desire to hear the Kingdom of heaven, listen to the Words of God breathed out into the book on your lap!

Jesus said, abide in me, apart from me, you can do nothing! Abide in my Word!

Church if you REALLY desire and value the Kingdom of God in your life, and if you really want to see it and hear it, you will do everything that you can do to abide with Jesus. To dwell with Him throughout your entire day. To walk with Him wherever He may lead you. To meditating on His Word day and night!

Abiding with Jesus is essential to seeing, hearing and understanding the Kingdom of God.

The question is do you desire it enough to abide with Him and His Word daily?

The second thing that the disciples did to show Jesus that they desired to see, hear and understand the kingdom is a simple one.

They asked.

In Mark’s account of the parable of the sower the disciples looked to the one they were dwelling with and simply asked the question, “Lord can you explain this us?”

I know that’s a simple one but I believe that in a love centered relationship with Jesus, He desires us to desire understanding enough to ask Him to explain it to us!

James 4 tells us that you do not have because you do not ask!

I’m a questions person! If I truly want to know the answer to a lesson, I need to ask a question or two really get it.

Now, I get it. The disciples were literally living with Jesus. We have the Word and sometimes it is really difficult to understand. You can see it and hear it but understanding can be tough.

Well, after Jesus’ death and burial, on the glorious Resurrection day, Jesus met with His disciples and showed them His hands and feet to prove He is risen!

Now, John’s account and Luke’s account vary slightly but I believe they are saying the exact same thing!

Check this out.

John 20:19–22 ESV

On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.

Now, let’s look at Luke’s account.

Luke 24:36–39 ESV

As they were talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, “Peace to you!” But they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit. And he said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.”

Luke 24:45 ESV

Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures,

Do you see it?!

Jesus opened their minds to understand the Scriptures at the same time that He breathed the Holy Spirit on them!

Church, you may not be able to literally sit across the dining room table with Jesus but you are indwelled with the Holy Spirit of God and He has the ability to open you minds to understand the Word of God!

Jesus calls Him the Spirit of Truth!

Sometimes, all you’ve got to do is ask!

If you truly desire to know and understand the Kingdom of God, all you have to do is ask for wisdom from God, and He gives it generously to all without reproach.

Do you desire it enough to ask the Holy Spirit to explain it to you?

The third and final point this morning is:

They desired the Kingdom of God enough to give up everything to be in it.

This brings us to parables that PE read for us this morning.

Matthew 13:44–46 ESV

“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it.

Even if you can see it or hear it, you are not going to be able to attain the Kingdom of God in your life until you see the intrinsic value of the Kingdom!

You absolutely must value the Kingdom of God higher than all of the riches and possession that this world has to offer!

You are not going to seek first the kingdom of God if you value what you will eat more or what you will wear more than the Kingdom!

Do you value the Kingdom enough to say, “Lord, I desire to see your Kingdom come and your will to be done on this Earth as it is in heaven, greater than all of my earthly possession!”

You can have it all Lord, just show me the Kingdom!

The disciples did!

Jesus said, follow me! They followed.

Jesus said, drop your nets. They dropped them.

All of their needs were met!

Jesus said, follow me and trust me with your lives, your families, and with all that you have and you will see the Kingdom of God that you have been waiting to come and free you from oppression, slavery and sin.

Jesus didn’t just teach this here. Six chapters latter, a rich, young man approaches Jesus to receive eternal life.

and he couldn’t enter into the Kingdom of Heaven because he valued his wealth more than he valued the kingdom of God!

He looked at the two kingdoms, the little earthly kingdom and the kingdom of God and he simply did not believe that the kingdom of God was valuable enough to give up all that he had for it!

Now, the other end of the spectrum, Jesus explains this to His disciples and brave Peter says this,

Matthew 19:27 ESV

Then Peter said in reply, “See, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we have?”

Seems like a selfish question doesn’t it?

But is it?

Does Jesus condemn him?

Does Jesus correct him?

No! I fact, Jesus gives them of the most incredible promises because they did that!

Matthew 19:28 ESV

Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.

Whoa! What an incredible promise! What an incredible reward for valuing the kingdom of God greater than the kingdom of the earth!

Now, I believe that is a literal promise for the disciples that you can see fulfilled in Revelation 21.

But verse 29 covers many more people who make this same decision to give it all up with the sake of the kingdom.

Matthew 19:29–30 ESV

And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last first.

Basically He is saying you will receive abundant life and eternal life!

Remember, eternal life is this, knowing the God the Father and His Son that He sent.

And Jesus said the He came to bring life, life abundantly!

In this verse and the parable of the sower, Jesus promises a return of a hundred-fold what is invested in the kingdom!

I love kingdom math!

Its multiplication by subtraction!

If I give up this for the kingdom, I will receive a hundred fold!

Let me help you see this, if I have a dozen chicken wings, and I give them to the Lord to use for the kingdom He is saying that He will give us back a hundred-fold back!

That’s 1,200 chicken wings!

I’ll take kingdom math all day long!

I can hear your thoughts now, Pastor should we be talking about this? Should we really be talking about the rewards of following Jesus and giving it all up for Him? Isn’t that a little prosperity gospel?

I’ll ask this question in return, if it was selfish and sinful to talk about and think about the eternal rewards, why would Jesus teach about the rewards of following Him 40 different times in the gospels?

Do you think He would have answered Peter’s question that way?!

The very essence of the main parable in Matthew 13 today is someone who sees the value and reward of the treasure and pearl are greater than the value of everything that they own!

In fact, it is greater than all of other things in the world combines!

With Joy! He goes and sells all that he owns to attain the great reward of having the Kingdom of Heaven!

But he had to believe it was!

Honestly, one of our main issues is that we simply do not believe that the Kingdom of God is more valuable than the things of this Earth.

We just actually don’t think its better.

Because if we did, we would be seeing a whole lot more of the Kingdom of Heaven moving right here in our midst.

We have a flawed perspective on the Kingdom.

One of the flawed perspectives on the kingdom is the view that the multiplication by subtraction is for my benefit.

The kingdom perspective of rewards is if I give up my 12 chicken wings and God give me back 1,200 chicken wings, what should I do with them?

Maybe invite 100 widows, orphans and homeless to have a dozen wings!

Now, what if I do that and then God gives me a hundred fold of that? That’s 120,000 wings!

So, what do we do with 120,000 wings? We feed 10,000 people!

That’s Kingdom math and that’s kingdom perspective on rewards!

That’s loving your neighbor!

Maybe your sitting there all cynical and saying come on Brian, you really want me to believe something like that?

Look over one chapter!

Matthew 14, Jesus takes 7 items, 5 loaves and 2 fish and feeds upward of 15 to 20 thousand people!

That’s not a hundred-fold, that’s 2,100 to 2,800 fold!

That’s kingdom math!

And guess what, that little boy who subtracted His lunch to Jesus was one of those filled and satisfied.

Kingdom perspective on rewards is not for my sake but for the kingdom’s sake!

James 4:3 ESV

You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.

We desire and seek the promised rewards of following Jesus but we cannot ask and seek for our own selfish pleasures.

Everything is kingdom and everything is for the King!

I have often heard the phrase, when someone goes through a trial or tough season, or when some makes a big decision for the Lord “Well, there is another jewel in my crown.”

I really question that thought. I know that the Bible talks about our crowns that we will receive, but what do you think follows that?

Do you think we are going to be able to strut around heaven wearing a crown to show off to everyone else how big or how many jewels are in my crown?

Do you think that we are going to let people with bigger or shiner crowns to head of the table at the feast?

Because when I see crowns on the heads of people in Revelation they are right before they are cast at the feet of the throne of God and at the feet of Jesus!

And with the living creatures and the elders shout,

“Worthy are you, our Lord and God to receive glory and power and honor and power, for you created all things and by your will they existed and were created!”

That’s where I see my crown spending eternity, at the foot of the throne of God!

Listen Church, the kingdom perspective on rewards can not be with the mindset of this being a one time investment that is going to give me a great ROI for my future.

It can not be if I give God my 100 wings, I’m going to get 10,000 wings and that’s enough for me to eat a dozen wings once a week for 16 years.

(Never has so much chicken math gone into one sermon...)

The kingdom perspective on rewards and crown and mansions has to be to give it back to the Kingdom.

Everything we have will not repay God for all that He has done for us.

Kingdom rewards perspective is God give me more so that I can give you more!

It is more blessed to give than it is to receive.

And if you believe that, if you believe that the value of the kingdom of God is greater than the Kingdom of this earth, then may you like the man in the parable. give it all up for Jesus.

Pastor Eric said, there is something about this all in things with Jesus.

Jon Tyson, says, God shows up where He is wanted.

The main challenge question for you today is do you truly desire to see the Kingdom of God?

Do you actually believe that the Kingdom of Heaven is better than all of the things of this world combined?

If you do,

Be like the disciples,

Abide with Jesus and His Word.

Ask for the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

And live like the Kingdom of God is better than anything of this Earth.