Single-Mindedness
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Greetings…
Theme for this year has been “The Life Of Christ.”
Lately we have been looking a certain aspects of the Sermon on the Mount from Matthew 5-7.
Today, we find ourselves examining the text in Matthew 6:19-24 with Jesus pointing out the necessity for Christians to have a “Single-Mindedness.”
Let’s read that text now.
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. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
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! 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.
With this fresh in our minds let’s examine our lesson for this morning.
Focus
Focus
Satan Wants Us Unfocused.
Satan Wants Us Unfocused.
We begin teaching children first “no-no” and not “yes-yes” for a reason.
In fact, one parent put it, “He doesn’t hear yes-yes until he is about twenty-five.”
With children you bring a big bouncing red ball out and they want it and are happy to play with it.
You then bring a helicopter out and they drop the ball and want the helicopter and if you give it to them they will begin playing with it now.
Then you bring a truck and they will want that as well.
Why, because a child is never content with what they have.
They are so double-minded that any new tow makes him drop his old toy.
Satan is good at offering God’s creation “new toys” and keeping us double-minded.
Whatever Satan offers today makes us drop what we had yesterday.
When this lifestyle happens there is no rhyme or meaning to it.
We have no idea who we are or why we are here or where we are going.
However, from what Jesus stated we read that…
God Wants Us Focused.
God Wants Us Focused.
James is clear that if we are lacking wisdom and ask for it God will grant us wisdom liberally, but that a double-minded man will receive no wisdom.
5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. 6 But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. 7 For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; 8 he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.
A double-minded person has a double heart.
This is why they are pulled by one urge today and another urge tomorrow.
The double-minded or double-hearted person is literally being pulled apart; no wonder this lifestyle is so miserable.
Paul describes this person, from a religious perspective, in Romans 14:23.
23 But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith. For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.
This is a person trying to straddle the fence.
This is one trying to have the “best of both worlds” and it simply will not work.
A person cannot succeed at anything if they never try.
A person will never develop strong muscles if they never work out.
A single-minded person, on the other hand, knows what they must do and are singularly focused on the objective.
Jesus understood this a young age, at age 12 he said this…
49 And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?”
In the “Beatitudes” we read this…
8 “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
The word “pure” here means, “single-hearted, single-eyed, without any foreign mixture.”
Why was the apostle Paul such a wonderful and outstanding Christian?
Philippians 3:13 (ESV)
13 Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead
The bible records that the early church had a singleness of heart.
Acts 2:46 (ASV 1901)
46 And day by day, continuing stedfastly with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread at home, they took their food with gladness and singleness of heart
We cannot do to things at once when it comes to our walk with God.
We cannot have a heart steadfast on the world and steadfast on God at the same time.
7 My heart is steadfast, O God, my heart is steadfast! I will sing and make melody!
Summary
Summary
Many Christians today are listening to the drumbeat of too many bands.
Jesus said you are either interested in heaven or earth, God or mammon, right or wrong.
One cannot have both.
So…
How Do We Do This?
How Do We Do This?
Daily Take Up Our Cross.
Daily Take Up Our Cross.
A single-minded child of God will carry his cross every single day.
24 Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
This mentality is further demonstrated when Jesus’ talked to the crowd about what it would take to “take up one’s cross.”
25 Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, 26 “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. 27 Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.
28 For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, 30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’
31 Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? 32 And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. 33 So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.
A Christian has his mind focused on the cross of Jesus.
A single-minded Christian never has to ask themselves if they are going to meet with the brethren to worship or study God’s word or doing show cattle, plow a field, cook food, or anything else because they are singularly focused on God.
A single-minded Christian never has to ask if themselves if they are going to give after the Lord has blessed them and they have financially prospered.
A single-minded Christian never has to ask if they are going to pray each day, study God’s message each day, or any number of daily, weekly, or other tasked asked of us.
Why, because they counted the cost to have their sins washed away and determined God’s way, the single-minded way, is the best way for their life in this life and the next.
Summary
Summary
To many people, even in the church, think they “deserve to be happy.”
The truth is we don’t “deserve” to be happy, we deserve to be in hell for our sins and rejection of our loving God.
The only reason we can be truly blessed in this life or happy in this life is because God demonstrated what mindset it takes to be happy.
That mindset is a singular focus on him and his will.
13 Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, 15 but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”
Conclusion
Conclusion
A cross carrying, single-minded, and pure-hearted one that is striving for holiness is the only one that will find actual “pure joy” in this life.
Happiness does not come to the selfish and double-minded because they can never be satisfied.
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
Invitation
1 Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; 2 but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.
6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.
6 And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
30 The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent,
32 “Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in heaven.
8 in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.
1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. 3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,
3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.
7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.