Stewarding our Treasure for the Kingdom (Part 2)

You can open your Bibles to Matthew chapter 6:25 [YouVersion]… we are in a sermon series called “Good and Faithful: Stewardship as a way of life”

Our goal for this series is that we would learn to use everything God gives us for the sake of his kingdom.”

We are looking at how our time, our talent, our treasure, our relationships.... all of them are resources entrusted to us by God so that we can use them to advance HIS kingdom purposes in OUR lives... and in the lives of the people around us…

This series is being preached by a group we have called a preaching cohort… it’s a group of men who have been meeting monthly to get trained up in the essentials of preparing and preaching a sermon… we started this training all the way back in January… we’ve worked on this monthly together...

We’ve had two of those men… two of our elders… preach already… this is the only sermon in the series that I’m preaching… and then we will have four more men preaching in the weeks to come...

And I’m so encouraged by the work that they have put in and the ways they are humbly learning and growing… but even more I’ve been totally in awe of how God put this whole thing together...

Because 4 months ago when we were determining what passages we would preach and talking about the idea behind this series, we had NO IDEA what would happen during these 7 weeks.

4 months ago, as far as we knew, I was supposed to be on sabbatical right now…

The church was going to be growing through a season of everybody having to step up in new ways...

We were all going to be growing together… meeting in the same place...

And back then, our understanding for how God was going to use this series was TOTALLY different than what it is today…

But God, in his infinite wisdom, had different plans for us… don’t you love a God who knows our past, present, AND future? Don’t you love a God who is intimately involved in the details of our lives and cares enough to reveal himself in specific ways to his people? God is doing that for YOU right now if you would lean into what he is saying...

He knew that we would be going through the COVID-19 pandemic...

He knew that our church would be scattered in our different homes and our different situations and need encouragement every week…

He KNEW that many people in our church would have their hours and wages cut at work… some of you even losing their jobs...

He KNEW that there would be a lot of conversation in our society about what types of work are “life-sustaining” or “life essential...”

He KNEW that we would be learning to no longer take for granted a stable economy and the basic provisions of life…

He KNEW that staying healthy and preserving our lives would be on our minds… A LOT...

HE KNEW.

And in his knowing, he worked through a group of Spirit-led men to organize a series that spoke directly from his word to these pressing issues of our day before we even had a clue what they would be...

And I believe this is especially true today as we look at Matthew 6 and “Stewarding our TREASURE for God’s Kingdom.”

Keith had an object for each of our stewardship lessons, and today the item was a wallet… our money and what we buy with it.... the provisions God gives us…

And I firmly believe that one of the things that God is doing through this Coronavirus pandemic is helping us see just how fleeting and failing are the treasures and values of the kingdoms of this world...

And just how unshakeable is his eternal kingdom...

In an instant, a tiny little virus can undo the entire global economy...

It can leave the rulers of this world in utter confusion...

But God is not shaken one bit…

This virus and its effects have produced the perfect setting for us to learn to be good and faithful stewards for HIS KINGDOM… trusting that he is a good and faithful Master...

...whether we have been entrusted with what we think is a little... or with what we think is a lot.

The passage we are in today directly addresses what so many are thinking about and feeling right now… anxiety about provision.

Will the economy be able to rebound from this shutdown?

Will my workplace ever be the same?

Will my wages get back to what they once were?

Will I be able to keep up with my bills and basic necessities?

How will this shutdown come to affect me later down the road?

For you kids… maybe you’ve read the news or overheard a conversation and you aren’t sure what it means for your family and your future and you are a little worried.

I believe with all my heart that God planned THIS passage for THIS moment to point us in THIS direction:

Big Idea: Do not be anxious about provisions: just seek God’s kingdom.

That’s our big idea for today. It’s not something I made up… it comes straight from our passage today… Your Bibles are open to Matthew 6:25. We are going to read verses 25-34.

This passage is really part 2 of what Alden Bowman preached last Sunday...

And we find it in the greater context of what we call “The Sermon on the Mount”...

It’s really a compilation of teachings that Jesus preached on a regular basis as he traveled throughout the towns and countryside of Israel..

In this particular setting, Jesus is preaching a sermon on a mountain to a group of people who followed him closely called disciples…

So just get the setting in your mind… Jesus on a mountainside with a hundred disciples or so…

and in addition to those people, there were large crowds that had gathered around to listen as well… just trying to see what this Jesus character was all about…

They weren’t really following him yet… but they were curious...

Maybe that’s you this morning… you don’t really know Jesus in a personal way… you are just a by-stander watching from the outside… I’m so glad you are here, because this is a great window into how Jesus changes our lives…

But the crowds were missing a few pieces of who Jesus is… You see, Jesus had been preaching and teaching and healing people… and people were starting to wonder (rightly so) if he was the Messiah…

if he was the one God had promised who would be the Savior King who would restore the nation of Israel…

And honestly their suspicions were correct… Jesus WAS and IS the Messiah… just not in the way that most people thought...

They thought he would be a ruler who was powerful and would deliver Israel from their oppressors back to great wealth and prominence like King David or King Solomon had done...

They thought his top priority was giving them the things that THEY wanted that would make THEM look and feel good.

Really… just like many of us… they wanted someone who would come and secure their own kingdom for them… who would vindicate and validate what they were already doing…

But in Matthew 5-7, Jesus is showing that this is NOT his purpose… that his kingdom is upside-down... and inside-out... compared to the kingdoms of this world… and it’s going to require a transformation of their hearts.

The Kingdom JESUS brings is all about us recognizing our lowliness before God and our dependence upon him...

It’s all about recognizing the priority of our hearts… that we need more than external conformity or religious performance or looking good before others:

we need genuine heart transformation to follow after the ways of God.

And the fact that Christ’s kingdom is so different from our kingdoms… demands that we repent...

That we turn from the values and priorities of the kingdoms of this world… and we seek first his kingdom.

Repentance and saving faith changes everything about our lives just like it did for the first disciples: it changes the way we use our time… the way we relate to others… it changes our emotions and choices… ...and it changes the way we view earthly treasure or material resources.

Alden preached last week that when it comes to treasure, we need to make God’s kingdom our greatest treasure…

The focus of our hearts must be storing up treasures in heaven… using earthly provision for eternal purposes...

The focus of our eyes must be on seeing the great worth of God...

and the focus of our lives must be serving the TRUE God, not the god of money.

But if we do this… if we make God’s kingdom our greatest treasure… then we might ask the question, “How can we guarantee that we will have what we need?”

You might be saying, “I mean, this spiritual kingdom stuff is good and all… but I still live in “the real world”… I still live in a world that I have to put food on the table and clothes on my family…

“And I have rent or a mortgage to pay and utility bills to keep up with… and so how do you really expect me to stay focused on God’s kingdom?”

Which is why Jesus says what he does in verse 25 [READ FROM BIBLE]… “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?” (Matthew 6:25, ESV)

That’s the heart of our big idea again: Do not be anxious about provisions: just seek God’s kingdom.

Now I totally realize that saying, “Do not be anxious” to someone who is already anxious sort of falls flat.... And so I want you to notice that when the Bible tells us not to be anxious, it always gives us a rock-solid reason.

This isn’t just “stuff your anxiety down”… this is “inform your anxiety with truth.”

In this text, we can actually find…

Three Rock-Solid Reasons to Not be Anxious

1. God has more resources than our self-reliant hearts can imagine. (v. 25-30)

The word that is used here for anxious means “to be concerned” or “to strive after” (like you are fixated on something)… or “to brood, speculate, or inquire.”

It’s used about concerns that keep us up at night and keep us from feeling like we can rest because we have to keep working, keep producing, keep storing up if we are going to have enough.

Have you ever felt that way? THAT’S what Jesus is addressing.

We think that our toil and labor are the ultimate source of our provision.

So Jesus says in verse 26 [read v. 26-27]

As Katy has been schooling our boys, she wanted to do a little something extra and out of the ordinary for the last weeks of the school-year, so they have been learning about bird-watching...

And every day I come home from the office, I get a rundown on the birds that my kids saw on a walk… they are very excited about it…

They have been looking up birds in a field guide… identifying birds on walks with their binoculars… They’ve been drawing birds…

In fact, you kids who are listening… why don’t you draw a picture of a bird right now as you listen to me…

And as you draw that bird, think about how it gets its food...

What does it eat? Does it have a garden where it plants seeds? NO!

And where does it store it’s food? Does it have a big chest freezer in the basement where it keeps a whole bunch of worms? NO!

Does it have a shed where it stores up seeds for he next five weeks? NO!

When a bird gets hungry, it just flies over the land and finds a seed or a worm… and there is always one there… and there’s always PLENTY.

There are millions of birds… and they always have enough.

So who is feeding them? Kids, tell your parents who is feeding them… GOD… but notice what Jesus calls God… Not THEIR heavenly Father… YOUR heavenly Father…

I love how he uses the words, “Your Heavenly Father” when he is describing God… because he is reminding them of just how near God is to his people.

Those who put their faith in Jesus and seek his Kingdom become not just citizens of the Kingdom with a far-off king, but they become children of the king.

It’s like Jesus taught them to pray earlier in the sermon… “Our Father in Heaven...”

The God who is enthroned in heaven is YOUR Heavenly Father if you surrender your life to him.

The one who takes care of the birds who always have plenty is the one who takes care of you… Jesus says, “You are of more value than those birds.”

And God has more resources than our self-reliant hearts can imagine.

Every time you see a bird from here on out, I want you to actively think, “God feeds the birds every day, and he can take of me today as I seek his kingdom.

In our anxieties, we strive and we toil after provision so that we can preserve our lives… but Jesus points out in verse 27, “by being anxious, we cannot add a single measure to our lifespan.”

That’s possibly the most immediately convicting statement Jesus ever made… because how often do I try?

Contrary to our common thinking, our provision is not ultimately the result of our toil.

I’m not saying that we don’t need to work. The Bible is clear, if we don’t work (when we are able) we should not eat.

But I’m saying that ultimately it is God who opens his hand and provides food for every living thing through our work.

God is the one who gives you ability to work.

If you are unable to work at a job and need assistance, God is the one who put you in a church and in a country who takes care of those who are vulnerable. The country may do it imperfectly, but God is the one providing.

God is the one giving you calling to work for his purposes.

He is the one who provided your workplace the means to pay you… and should they no longer be able to do so, he has a million other revenue streams.

He is the one giving you the results of your work… HE puts food on your table and clothing on your back and gives you every other provision in your life.

Don’t give yourself... or your workplace... or the government… too much credit… you can’t add a second to your span of life through toil… you are not the source of your provision.

And God has more resources than our self-reliant hearts can imagine.

In verse 25, Jesus had mentioned two types of provision that we might be anxious about: food and clothing… the most basic necessities of life… and so he uses birds as the illustration for the food we need... and then he uses flowers as the illustration for the clothing…

Look at verse 28 [read v. 28-30]

The word that is used for lilies can also just be a general word for flowers of any variety… probably wildflowers of some sort…

And so I imagine Jesus pointing to a patch of wildflowers as he teaches on this mountainside… and he says consider these...

My family spent a lot of time at our house planting flowers this past week… some of our favorites: peonies, lilacs, tulips… [there are some pictures of them and others on the screen]

And God shows so much of his creativity in the varieties of flowers that are out there…

Jesus says, “consider them...” that word means, “Examine them closely… take a moment to inspect them...”

I imagine Jesus pausing for a moment to let his disciples take in the beauty of these flowers…

In fact, let’s do that... maybe take just a moment and have each person in your family share which one is your favorite and put it in the comments the one that gets the most votes (or if you aren’t watching with your family, just share with us your favorite (even if it’s not pictured here)...

Consider these flowers… consider their beauty...

So what he wants them to consider as they consider these flowers is that they are more finely clothed than Solomon (who was the wealthiest king in Israel’s history)…

They are clothed in splendor without toiling or spinning… without working at it at all… just clothed by God…

And his conclusion: If God clothes disposable grass, how much more will he clothe you?

And then he adds this little tag: Oh you of little faith… oh you who are anxious about food and clothing… who are fixated on the provision of earthly needs...

Apply: You can seek first the kingdom of God because God has more provision than your self-reliant heart can imagine.

Your provision is not ultimately from your job.

Maybe you’ve taken a pay cut and you wonder how the bills are going to get paid… if you turn to him in faith and seek his kingdom, he will give you everything you need.

Maybe not everything you WANT to build your kingdom, but everything you NEED to build his.

Maybe you’ve been struggling with the thought of having to go on unemployment… or not being able to work for a season…

And you were a proud worker who worked hard and earned your wage...

I want you to know that your provision was never directly the result of your work.

Your identity… your security… was never truly the result of your work.

Your provision was directly the result of a God who cares for you and gives you what you need.

And if he chooses for a season to do that through the unemployment office, praise God for his provision.

I’m not saying, “Be lazy and live off the fat of others...”

I’m saying, “Receive what God has given and use all of your energies that you WOULD have spent on anxious toil for the sake of advancing his kingdom.”

Maybe you are frustrated that your unemployment or your stimulus check didn’t come through when you expected…

I want you to remember today that the government is not your ultimate provider… God is.

And that stimulus check will provide you no more security than you had the day before you received it.

And he will give you your daily bread… the provision that is necessary for you TODAY… as you seek him and his kingdom.

God has more resources than our self-reliant hearts can imagine.

Therefore, (verse 31… read v. 31-33)

The second rock-solid reason not to be anxious is this:

2. God has more purpose than our earth-bound hearts can dream. (v. 31-33)

Explain: Jesus draws out this contrast between the people of his eternal kingdom and the Gentiles… that word means, in this case, pagans… those who don’t know God… those who are alienated from God and enemies of him because of their sin…

This is how WE ALL start out as sinners...

The Gentiles seek after (and worry about) these things: “What shall we eat, what shall we drink, what shall we wear???”

Sounds pretty common to a typical day in quarantine, doesn’t it? ;) Just finished breakfast, what’s for lunch? Should I change my clothes today??? Nah...

But for the Gentiles, It consumes their thoughts…

It’s all they have to focus on because their hearts are earth-bound.

They are concerned about these things because all they have to live for is this life… let’s eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die!

But that’s not what citizens of Christ’s kingdom are living for… we have a God who has eternity in store for us… and the purposes of his eternal kingdom are vastly different than the purposes of earthly kingdoms.

Eternity is centered not on enjoying stuff as ultimate… it’s centered on enjoying GOD as ultimate…

So Jesus has this contrast between the Gentiles and his disciples…

The Gentiles purpose their hearts toward building up earthly kingdoms and acquiring physical provision… the disciples who aren’t concerned about those things… they just want to build God’s kingdom…

Remember what Alden was talking about last week… we can either store up treasure on earth or we can store up treasure in heaven.

Which kingdom are you living for?

The mark of true believers… true disciples of Jesus.. is that they are living for an eternal kingdom...

It’s not just that they don’t want to die and so they say that they believe in Jesus so that they can get eternal life… that’s not a true believer.

A true believer is seeking the eternal kingdom in which God is their God and they are his people...

You see, without Jesus, we are separated from God… we are separated from his kingdom…

In fact, in our sin, we are enemies of God.

And God must judge our sin.

He placed us and all of creation under a curse and promised that because of our sin, we would experience death… not just physical death, but spiritual death in which we are separated from him forever.

And because of that curse, all of creation is groaning under the judgment of God.

But God, in his mercy, sent Jesus, his Son, as the only one who could save us from that curse of death.

And he took on that curse for us and he died in our place on a cross.

And on the third day he was in the grave, God raised him again… and he ascended to heaven where he now sits at the right hand of the throne of God ruling over all things...

And we must turn our hearts from the things of this world to trust him alone for our salvation and to worship him alone as Savior and Lord over all.

If you have never done that, I would urge you to do that today and let us know that you did so that we can walk with you in following Jesus.

Because when we surrender our lives to him through faith, our lives become entirely about his kingdom work.

Followers of Jesus seek first the kingdom of God… and they trust him for the things of food and drink and clothing.

He promises, “Seek first the kingdom of God… and ALL THESE THINGS… all the provisions you need to live for his kingdom… WILL be added to you.”

It’s not that you stop NEEDING them and then stop worrying.

It’s that your Father knows that you need them... and you can trust HIM to provide WHEN you need them..

Don’t be anxious about provision: just seek his kingdom.

We saw this purpose in our reading plan this week if you were reading along. I encourage you to do that (the reading plan is on our website)…

(and you need God’s word every day and this plan is designed to add context and color to your understanding of the sermons that are coming on Sunday mornings.)

This week we read Acts 4… and in Acts 4, the church was only a few months old, but it was over 3000 people strong… a lot of them were there from other regions and even other countries… and they didn’t have livelihoods in Jerusalem… and so there was a lot of potential for need…

But what we see in Acts 4 is supernatural… the lives of the believers had been radically transformed by Jesus.

They believed in the power of their resurrected Savior King… they believed that he was the one they had been waiting their whole lives for…

They believed with all their hearts that he would return and set up his kingdom and that everyone needed to know who he was.

That this was the most important thing in their lives and worth spending everything on…

and so they start selling their land and houses… can you imagine that?

Selling your most valuable earthly possessions… the only things that gave you security in this world...

And they laid the money down at the apostles feet to be used for two purposes:

First, to make sure the needs of their fellow believers were met...

By the way, that’s how God was fulfilling the promise of Matthew 6 that all his disciples would have what they need… God uses his church to care for his children.

And then second, they used the proceeds of the sale to make sure the apostles could keep preaching of the power of the resurrection. They enabled the mission to continue.

This church was ALL IN on making sure that the world knew about Jesus… and it showed in the way they used EVERYTHING God gave them for the sake of his kingdom.

They used the proceeds of their labor… the provision God had given… to reinvest in the building up of his kingdom.

And we see this throughout the Bible in people like Priscilla and Aquila who used their tentmaking business as a platform for telling people about Jesus and for funding the ministry of Paul...

We see this in a woman named Lydia who was a seller of expensive purple cloth who used her large home for the gathering of the church in Philippi.

Again, from our reading plan, we saw it in 1 Timothy 6, when Paul tells Timothy, “As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.” (1 Timothy 6:17–19, ESV)

This is how we are to seek the kingdom: we are to do good… be rich in good works… be generous… and be ready to share (that word for share is the same root word as in Acts 4… to have all things in common… it’s extreme… and it’s how our wealth is enjoyed in light of eternity...

This is not some ideal that only happened only once in the history of the church… this is the baseline for what the church is called to be… every disciple seeking an eternal kingdom in the way they use their ALL of their earthly treasure.

The way we use our earthly treasure says a lot about the purpose of our hearts. Are we earth-bound or heaven-bound?

With my son Levi, we are teaching him how to manage money… maybe you kids have something like this… Levi has three jars…

This isn’t an idea that is original to us… my parents did it with me as a kid… most instructions out there tell you to label your three jars something like, “Give, save, and spend.”

Some for God… some for the future… some for spending on yourself...

But we labeled ours a little bit different… we labeled ours “give, save, and use.”

Because I want my kids to learn at an early age that we don’t just give a portion to God and then spend a portion on ourselves...

We are called to USE everything God has given us for his kingdom.

And Levi may choose to buy something fun with that “use” money, but I ask him to think about how he will “use” that fun thing to be generous… to do good… to use it for the kingdom.

So here’s a little excercise for you… do this as a family after the service if you are watching together… pick up an object in the room that you are in right now and I want you to think, “how can that provision be used for the kingdom.”

I’ll give you an example: the couch you are sitting on… how can that couch be used for the kingdom??

It’s a provision God has given you. He wants you to enjoy it… ultimately he wants you to enjoy him and his purposes with it… that’s where true life is found.

And so your couch could be a place where you teach your kids about loving God and neighbor...

It could be a place where your family has tickle fights and early morning cuddles, expressing the love that you share and you glorify God for that love.

Your couch could be a place where (post-pandemic) you show hospitality to your neighbor to show them the love of Jesus...

Your couch could be a place where you counsel a brother or sister in Christ with the truth of God’s word… or where you host a Gospel Community in our church...

There is so much that a simple couch can and must be used for in the kingdom..

So that’s just one example… When you make a purchase of ANYTHING… do you think about how you are USING it… stewarding it… for God?

Your food... your clothes.... your home… your car…

And maybe your like, “But if I did that with everything, that would just blow my mind!” Right...

God has more purpose for our wealth than our earth-bound hearts can dream. (v. 31-33)

Apply: This needs to start in prayer…

We need to learn what it truly means to pray, “Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” BEFORE we pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.”

If you are facing a potential lack of provision, you need to know that you can go to God and ask him for your daily bread and trust him.

But as you are praying, ask yourself, “What am I seeking God for right now? The restoration of my own kingdom, or the building up of his?”

Ask him… but ask him with the right desire to see his kingdom advanced in your life.

Now maybe you are still struggling with this thought… maybe it all sounds too spiritually minded to be of any earthly good.

Maybe you are still trying to justify by saying, “Yeah, but I still need to have food and clothes for tomorrow. Can’t I just make sure I have everything I need and THEN serve Christ’s kingdom after I feel good about what I’ve stored up?”

To that person, Jesus says this in verse 34, Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

We must not be anxious about tomorrow because God has more resources than our self-reliant hearts can imagine… he has more purpose than our earth-bound hearts can dream… and finally...

3. God has more power than our time-bound hearts can control. (v. 34)

The truth is, even when we try to control tomorrow, we can’t.

Tomorrow is not within your sphere of authority. It has not been given to you to know.

We are totally feeling the weight of this right now aren’t we?: The pastor of one of our GCC churches posted this the other day on Facebook and I thought it was simple and helpful:

Two things that will not help your heart today:

1) Feeling bad for yourself for having to live in this “new normal.”

2) Obsessing and speculating on when and what the new normal will look like in the future.”

THE news and the government wants to try to figure out what tomorrow and next week and next month will look like… and we want to demand that they do...

But for all the wise planning we can do… we simply do not know. And that is for our good.

We do not have the power to handle controlling tomorrow. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

It’s not within your sphere of authority. But what is implied here is that tomorrow IS in God’s authority.

For all you know, Jesus may return tomorrow and usher in the events leading up to his physical kingdom being established…

And when he comes, he will not be looking for how much earthly treasures you have built up with your great savings and investment expertise...

He won’t be impressed that you had every contingency plan covered in case of emergency.

He will be looking for how you used your earthly treasure in faith for his eternal kingdom.

He will be looking to see if your hope was set there… or your eyes were fixed here.

And when he comes, will he say, “Well done good and FAITHFUL servant. You were faithful over a little, I will set you over much.”

Sometimes in being anxious about tomorrow, we miss the kingdom work that God has put in front of us today.

The ways that he wants us to use our treasure today.

Apply: Focus on today. Focus on what God has called you to do in building up his kingdom.

Start in prayer. "Your kingdom come, your will be done.” Ask him for your daily bread. And then use your earthly treasure for his eternal kingdom.

What good has he set before you to do with it? For your family? For your neighbor? For your fellow church member?

Are you using even your possessions your home and your car and your for the kingdom purposes of God?

Are you generously giving to the church so that we can continue proclaiming Jesus and equipping servants and sending witnesses?

So many of you are, by the way, thank you...

But it would not be uncommon for someone to say, “you know what, things are a little uncertain right now… I’ll give when things stabilize...”

If that’s you, consider who you are trusting as the king of your resources.

I want you to identify one specific way that you can purposefully use your treasure for God’s kingdom purposes this week? Be generous (make it something that requires faith). Do good. Be ready to share.

Do not be anxious about provisions: just seek God’s kingdom.