2.8.12 2.16.2025 Matthew 6.19-34 Kingdom Values in the Real World
Mathew: Proclaiming the Kingdom, Building the Church • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Entice: No nation ever has had more “stuff” with less contentment than the contemporary United States of America. No nation has the wealth and security. Yet, despite that wealth many are not happy.
It does to matter how quickly you climb a ladder to the top of a burning house. Maybe we need to move the ladder and quit the dogged pursuit for more which weighs us down.
When you want the wrong things and neglect the call of your creator you will not be happy—by design. You are not supposed to feel good about doing bad or relived at the prospect of getting the very desires that wreck us. That is conscience. That brings us to this famous verse the subject of prayers and even choruses.
33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
Engage: How do we “seek first the Kingdom?” What is the point Jesus is trying to make? This verse is so powerful and flexible that it could be called a key to the entire Gospel of Matthew and the ministry of Jesus. Jesus taught His disciples both why and how to seek the Kingdom. Matthew preserved the teaching of Jesus to make this a lynchpin of this “teacher’s manual for the Church”. We extract this verse (I think rightly) into many varied contexts because it is a powerful reminder of what we are here for. We often use the verse without actually getting the point.
He is not merely encouraging us to seek the Kingdom.
He is not merely encouraging us to seek the Kingdom.
He identifies many of the impediments that prevent it.
He identifies many of the impediments that prevent it.
Expand: It is true that Jesus lived in a different time, place, and culture. Yet fallen-human nature is pretty much the same.
We are
lookers,
lookers,
we are
getters,
getters,
and we are
worriers.
worriers.
It doesn’t matter if it is the honor-shame matrix of Jesus’ culture or the autonomous self of the 21c.
Explore:
We cannot seek the Kingdom while carrying the baggage of the World.
We cannot seek the Kingdom while carrying the baggage of the World.
Expand: The baggage we lay aside consists of human distractions distorted by sin.
Body of Sermon: In today’s text Jesus addresses some of these distractions.
1 Accumulation of Assets.
1 Accumulation of Assets.
discussed in Matthew 6.19-21, 24
It is not just investment in stuff but a love for it, a pursuit of it and an immersion in it which is unhealthy.
1.1 Its value is temporary, expendable, decaying, and vulnerable.
1.1 Its value is temporary, expendable, decaying, and vulnerable.
19 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal,
20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.
1.2 Its Lordship is idolatrous.
1.2 Its Lordship is idolatrous.
A matter of our heart and it’s loyalty…
A matter of our heart and it’s loyalty…
21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
A matter of our ultimate allegiance….
A matter of our ultimate allegiance….
24 “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.
The next distraction is our...
2 Attraction to Appearance.
2 Attraction to Appearance.
22 “The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light,
23 but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!
2.1 Do we see things “clearly”?
2.1 Do we see things “clearly”?
2.2 Do we see things “darkly”?
2.2 Do we see things “darkly”?
The final distraction is our…
3 Addiction to Anxiety.
3 Addiction to Anxiety.
Anxiety comes from either misunderstanding some primary questions about life or accepting the wrong, worldly answers. Jesus wants us to know that our anxieties are a faith issue when grounded in the specific, sinful behaviors or the culture cultivated by the fall.
A caveat. Neither Jesus nor I are addressing diagnosable, medical, “anxiety” disorders which are forms of “depression.”
Jesus is addressing the kind of anxiety which looks to others, to culture, to the “tastemakers” to inform me of how I should behave and think. Unfortunately, the sinful desires of the past can quickly become the diagnosable sicknesses of the present when injected with dopamine-driven doses of social-media.
Pointless anxiety disrupts our ability to process some elementary questions about our lives…the first question
3.1 Am I valuable?
3.1 Am I valuable?
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?
26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?
Not because of where we live, what we wear, the foods we eat or any necessity we turn into a “identity marker.” not stuff or status driven value.
Next question,
3.2 Am I faithful?
3.2 Am I faithful?
27 And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?
28 And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin,
29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
31 Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’
Why is this a faith issue?
We cannot change the span of our life.
We cannot change the span of our life.
We did not invent “universal human needs.”
We did not invent “universal human needs.”
Humans have always needed food, clothing, shelter.
God’s estimate of us is more important than our perceptions of what the world would have us believe…
God’s estimate of us is more important than our perceptions of what the world would have us believe…
(It is this perception Jesus names “littlefaith.”) v. 30
next question…
3.3 Am I content?
3.3 Am I content?
32 For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.
3.4 Am I patient?
3.4 Am I patient?
34 “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
Shut Down
I have always cherished the song “Seek Ye First.” We sang it at camp not always grasping how essential that commitment is nor how my own worst instincts can divert from that course.
Jesus is serious…but also understanding, even playful about our deficiencies. In vs. 31 He uses the term “ὀλιγόπιστοι” Most translations turn it into an objective prepositional phrase. I think there is a good argument for it being a nickname for the disciples both individually and collectively. Like a good nickname it pokes fun at something Jesus thinks needs to be changed. The point being—He CAN change it.
For us to go from Little faiths to big faiths means that we need to abandon the idea that happiness is to be found in
piles of stuff,
piles of stuff,
what appeals to the eyes,
what appeals to the eyes,
or anything which can become the object of obsessive worry.
or anything which can become the object of obsessive worry.
The only way to “grow” up into Kingdom maturity is to say goodbye to the distractions which miniaturize our faith. He bids us to follow and find a new way to value the world, pursuing a meaningful life beyond fleeting happiness. Why would we wait any longer?
