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Muskegon SDA Church

Godly Living

Jason Sliger

Called to Be Saints

Called to be Seekers

Called to be Courageous

Father in heaven, we thank you that we can assemble ourselves in your home, in your house.

And Father, we seek more than anything for your presence to be here, to be felt, And that the message from your word would resonate in our hearts That your Holy Spirit would draw us up yet a little higher And I'll walk together with you.

Today we live in 1 of the most seeking, searching, quest-finding generations that has ever existed.

The unknown is a place where man, for some reason, likes to explore.

And it's because of this that this curiosity of the unknown that we have been driven to the far-flung places, not only of this planet, but of others as well.

It took us to outer space and then eventually to the moon and now they are seeking to find a way to Mars.

This curiosity has caused us to dive to the depths of the ocean some 7 miles below the surface of the water.

It has driven us to crawl to the belly of the earth, some 7, 000 feet below the surface of the earth as we know it.

Curiosity, seeking, is something that is in our DNA as human beings and we see this in the world we live in today.

But it's strange to me as I was thinking about this and meditating on the passage that we are going to study together this morning, that we as Christians oftentimes will applaud and praise and maybe even look up to these people who have perhaps put their life in harm's way to seek out the unknown.

But yet when we come across a dedicated Christian who is willing to put everything on the altar in their quest to know, to serve, and to give their hearts undivided to God, we tend to think that to be perhaps a little strange.

And I find this to be a contradiction oftentimes that we see in our church.

As though the discovery of the unknown, these great places that men have gone, is a nobler quest than giving our hearts to the Lord and seeking first his kingdom.

The great preacher Charles Spurgeon put it this way.

He said, it is to be feared that many give their force to worldly pursuits and their feebleness to their religion?

Should it be so that self should have our energies and Christ have our lukewarmness?

It's something to reflect upon as we think about where we are at in our spiritual journey with God.

I would submit to you this morning that we live in 1 of the most distracted times of Earth's history.

Not necessarily distracted with bad things, but we're distracted.

We're distracted with things that we need.

We're distracted with things that maybe we're trying to convince ourselves that we need.

We're distracted by things maybe that we don't even want, but we live in a time where we are distracted from that which is the most important in our lives.

And lukewarmness has become the new norm in our churches of North America.

I believe the Bible is describing something different for God's people.

We live in a generation that's not just distracted by the world, but we live in a time where we are spiritually distracted from what God would have us to seek after.

And I invite you to go with me, if you would, in your Bibles, to Matthew 6.

We're gonna take a look at a short passage here that is well-known.

As you are turning there, in many ways, Jewish society in the time of Jesus as he shared these words that we're going to take a look at today.

In many ways, the Jewish society was also greatly distracted.

They were distracted by the desire for earthly gain.

They were distracted by the desire for the arrival of the Messiah to break the yoke of Roman bondage upon them and to set up a kingdom here on this earth where all would be good, where they would prosper, where they would have all of their needs met, where all of their physical needs would be met, their health needs would be met.

That's what they were looking forward to.

They were distracted by what God ultimately wanted for them because they wanted what the world had to offer.

And to this spiritually distracted generation in the time of the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus spoke 20 words that are probably the second most famous passage in all of scripture next to John 3, 16.

20 words that are packed with depth and meaning.

20 words that you could probably recite off of the top of your head, but they are 20 words that are so revolutionary that many of us do not follow it.

Matthew chapter 6 and verse 33, to a distracted generation in a time of Matthew and to the distracted generation today, Jesus says, but Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.

Matthew 6 and verse 33 is the gospel in miniature form.

You don't have to have all 4 gospel books in your back pocket or memorized in your mind.

If you carry with you this 1 Bible passage, you are carrying with you the gospel in miniature form.

And those who obey this revolutionary passage that is extreme by Christian standards today will find themselves 1 day in the place that they have been seeking after, the kingdom of heaven.

This is godly living, in my humble opinion.

This is godly living at its finest, bare and simple.

Now as powerful as these 20 words are, at least in the King James Version.

They are tenfold more powerful when they are read within the broader context of the passage of Scripture.

In Matthew chapter 6, we find Jesus in the midst of the most famous of all sermons that has been preached, the Sermon on the Mount.

The sermon, as you know, is being preached by the greatest of all preachers who has ever walked on the face of this earth, Jesus Christ himself, and the sermon is being preached in the greatest cathedral that earth could ever think of, and that is on the grassy hillsides surrounding the city.

Thousands of people had assembled themselves around Jesus' feet as he gives his, what some people call his inaugural address.

Shortly after his baptism and then his temptation in the wilderness, Jesus is now found on the grassy hillsides proclaiming what I believe the qualifications for what it means to live a godly life.

And I would suggest to you that if you haven't already, that you go back and review this great historic sermon that spans several chapters and is, as I said, the qualifications not only for godly living, but 1 day to be a citizen in the kingdom of heaven.

Go with me to verse 19, Matthew chapter 6, verse 19.

Notice the context of how Jesus, or the context of this passage of Matthew 6, 33 and what Jesus says.

He says in verse 19, lay not up for yourselves treasures on the earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal.

But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moss nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through "'nor steal, for where your treasure is, ' what does he say?

"'There will your heart be also.'" So In the context here, Jesus is saying, seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you.

But before he does that, before he tells us what we should seek, he tells us what we should not seek.

Don't lay up for yourselves treasures here upon the earth.

Notice what we find in Testimonies for the Church, volume 6, page 44.

There are only 2 places in the world where we can deposit our treasures.

And all that is not devoted to Christ's service is counted on Satan's side and goes, Lord forbid, to strengthen his cause.

Are you seeking first the kingdom of God?

Or are you laying up treasures here on this earth?

There's only 1 of 2 storehouses, and if we are not working to support the 1, we are by default supporting the other.

And Lord forbid that anybody that is part of the Muskegon Seventh-day Adventist Church would be supporting the cause of darkness.

Now Jesus goes on in verse 24 and he says this, Matthew 6, 24, no man can serve 2 masters, for either he will hate the 1 and love the other, or else he will hold to the 1 and despise the other.

You know, it's interesting to me in the Bible passage, Jesus doesn't say you shouldn't serve.

It's impossible to serve God and mammon, yet I believe that this is 1 of the great frustrations in Christianity because we try to do what Jesus says we can't.

We try to have a little bit of spirituality and a little bit of worldliness.

We try to balance things out, if you will.

If we do enough good, then it'll balance out the few bad things that we do.

If you do that, it will drive you spiritually insane.

The interests of God and the interests of mammon have no union together.

He kind of goes on a little preacher's rant, if you will, where he repeats himself a number of times.

He says, therefore I say unto you, what are the next 3 words there?

Take no thought for your life, what you shall eat, "'or what you shall drink, nor yet for your body, "'what you shall put on, is not the life more than meat, "'and the body more than raiment?' He goes on and he repeats himself again.

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Series

Godly Living

Called to be Seekers

Transcript

Parent Series

Sponsor

Recorded

Dave Fiedler - Adventism: Past and Future

Consecration and Fanaticism

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Plenary

Congenital Christianity

1h 47m

Morning Devotional

Faith and the Final Crisis

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Plenary Sessions

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What Can I Give Him?

32m

The Way of Love

The Way of Love- Part 9

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Our Heritage of Truth

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PRAY Like Never Before

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The Way of Love

The Way of Love- Part 4

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Dunamis 2005

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Just This One Time

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Sound Doctrine