The second part, really, of last
week's sermon. We've been working our way through
the book of Matthew. And here we are in Matthew 6. This is the first time I've ever really taught through the book
of Matthew. So it's quite an education for
me and a blessing. That's the way the Word of God
is. You study it, and you study it, and the Lord graciously gives
you a connection between one verse and another. And in that,
you receive the blessing of seeing Christ there. I think it was
Charles Spurgeon who said that until you see Christ in the passage,
you haven't understood that text of scripture. And if that's what
he said, he said it right. It says in John, I think it's
John 5, 39, Jesus told the Pharisees, you search the scriptures. For
in them you think you have eternal life, but they are they that
testify of me. So let's look at Matthew chapter
6. We're going to be reading from verse 19 again to the end
of the chapter. And we'll just pick it up from
there. Verse 19 of Matthew 6. Lay not
up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth
corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up
for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth
corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal.
For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. The
light of the body is the eye. If therefore thine eye be single,
thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be
evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore
the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness! No man can serve two masters,
for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he
will hold to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God
and mammon. Therefore I say unto you, 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 than raiment? Behold
the fowls of the air, for they sow not, they don't plant, neither
do they reap, nor gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father
feedeth them. Are you not much better than
they? Which of you, by taking thought, can add one cubit unto
his stature? And why take ye thought, for
raiment? Consider the lilies of the field,
how they grow. They toil not, neither do they
spin. And yet I say unto you, that
even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which today
is, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more
clothe you, O ye of little faith? Boy, doesn't that description
fit. Little faith. Therefore take no thought, saying,
What shall we eat? or What shall we drink? or Wherewithal
shall we be clothed? For after all these things do
the Gentiles seek. For your Heavenly Father knoweth
that you have need of all these things. But seek ye first the
kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be
added unto you. Take therefore no thought for
the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought for the things of
itself. Sufficient unto the day is the
evil thereof." Now in many ways when you read through this passage
of Scripture, it's almost self explanatory. It's very clear,
isn't it, what Jesus said here. Don't take thought. But as I
was studying this, I found that in these verses of scripture,
it points believers to Christ in all of the cares and troubles
of life. Exhortations here are given to
only treasure what God treasures. And what is that? It is Christ
and His people. If we understand that from here,
I think we'll get the rest of the text. To look only to Christ
as our only life. All of our truth and all of our
salvation. To obey only Christ. To trust
only God, our Heavenly Father and the Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ. And to seek only the Lord Jesus Christ and His Kingdom.
That's what these verses are talking about. In all these positive
exhortations, there are corresponding negatives as well. We're not
to lay up treasures on earth. That's the negative. We're not
to hold divided devotion and trust between the world and Christ. That's another negative. We are
not to attempt to serve two masters, the world and Christ. We are
not to give our loyalty and trust to the world. as if we depend
on them for what we have in our life. Not in our comfort, not
in our trouble, none of those things are we to look to the
world for. If we look to the world for those
things, where will our loyalties be? It will be to the world.
Like it says in Psalm 20, some trust in chariots and some in
horses. But we will remember the name
of the Lord our God." I think the first time I heard that verse,
it was spoken by Glennis' husband, Neil. So with that as a summary,
we have been working through the outline of this text as follows.
First of all, in verse 19, you can see it, hold one treasure. Hold one treasure. And what is
that? Well, we'll get to that. Have one light. That's what it
says next, where if you have the light of the body as the
eye. Have one light. And the third one is, love one
master. one master, and then after that
it's trust one father, and then finally pursue one goal. Those are the things that I see
this. Now, the best way, as I said last time, the best way I know
how to understand these scriptures is to start at the end and work
our way backward. If we see the conclusion, as
is often the case, it clarifies and set in order the whole text. And our Lord summarizes the sermon
with a single memorable exhortation in verse 33. Seek ye first, that
means preeminently, to the exclusion of all else. Seek ye first the
kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be
added to you. I think we could probably all recite that text
of scripture. Haven't we heard it a number
of times? The message of this one verse, verse 33, seek ye
first the kingdom of God, summarizes all that precedes it. If we fail
to trust God, our Father, we will make this world our treasure.
That's what this is saying. If we look to the world for everything,
we will yield our allegiance and our devotion to the world
for the things of life. So first then, let's begin by
reviewing verse 33. Paul told the Romans in Philippians
3.1, And so, as I was thinking about this and having to review
this, I thought, well, it might seem like a review, but it's
worth reviewing. First, what is the kingdom of
God? Do you ever ask the questions
when you read the scriptures, what does that mean? What is
the kingdom of God? First of all, it's the place
where Christ reigns as king. And Christ reigns in heaven.
He reigns over all things. This is said in many places of
scripture. Matthew 28, 18, just before Jesus ascended to his
father, he said, all power, all authority in heaven and earth
is given unto me. That's a huge statement, isn't
it? All power, all authority, over all things, in all places,
at all times, is given to the Lord Jesus Christ. In Hebrews
1.3 it says, "...when He had by Himself purged our sins, He
sat down on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty on
high." Christ reigns in heaven. And Christ dwells in His church. It says in 1 Corinthians 3.16,
the church is the temple of Christ, the temple of the Spirit of God.
He is king over His people to save them. first of all, to provide
for them, to care for them, to protect them, just like a king
would his own people, or a shepherd. They are His people. How did
they become His people? God gave them to Him. Look at
John 10, 29. Jesus says in John 10, 29, how his people became his people. He says this, and it's not a
mystery. It's written here, but it's good
to have it. John 10, 29. My father, speaking of his father
and the sheep, he says, my father which gave them, the sheep, to
me is greater than all. And no man is able to pluck them
out of my father's hand. So he says here in the very first
phrase of the verse, My Father which gave them to Me. How did
the sheep become His? God the Father gave them to the
Lord Jesus Christ. And so the church are His. They're His people, His sheep.
And He's the King, the Shepherd over them. And so this is the
Kingdom of God. Not only the church collectively,
but each individual in the church. 1 Corinthians 6.19 it says, Don't
you know that your body is the temple of the Spirit of God?
Each individual believer And all individual believers together
make up the church, make up the place where Christ dwells. He
dwells in heaven, but by His Spirit He dwells on earth in
His people. He saved them, and they are subject
to Him. That's the Kingdom of God. They
own Him as Lord. And the kingdom of God, therefore,
is found in the hearts of every chosen, God chose them, every
redeemed, Christ redeemed them, and every believing sinner, because
God gives His people faith to look to Christ only. Look at
Luke 17, 20. Luke chapter 17. The disciples,
or someone was asking Jesus when the kingdom of God was going
to come, and He said these words. In Luke 17, 20, he says, when
he was demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should
come, he answered them and said, the kingdom of God cometh not
with observation. You can't see it. He says, neither
shall they say lo here or lo there for behold the kingdom
of God is within you so Christ reigns in heaven and he reigns
in the hearts of his people and he reigns with them when they're
gathered to he's with them when they're gathered together meeting
in his name as we are today. So in this kingdom Christ has
saved his people from their sins. He's delivered them from their
enemies. Who are the enemies of God's people? When we think
about enemies sometimes we think about our neighbor who's growing
drugs or using them. Or we think about the dog who's
barking. Or we think about the Russians or the Chinese or the
Who are they called? The terrorists. We think about
a lot of people. We might think about somebody
who did us wrong in the past. Those are our enemies. Those
are not the enemies of God's people. Who are your enemies? Remember when David killed Goliath?
One stone sunk into his forehead, dropped him. And with Him, the
whole army was defeated. The Lord Jesus Christ, when He
hung on the cross, defeated our enemies. What are they? Sin. Is sin your enemy? If sin is
not your enemy, then what is it? It's your friend. So sin
has to be our greatest enemy. And death. Death, the wages of
sin. Isn't that our enemy? And hell.
And Satan. And our flesh. And the world.
These are the things over which Christ has gained the victory
in His death on the cross. He saves His people from their
enemies. And we look to Him. So the Kingdom
of God is just those things. God reigns on the throne. And the Lord Jesus Christ is
God on His throne. He is the Son of God, and the
Father and His Son reign on His throne. It says in Hebrews 1.8,
Thy throne, O God, speaking to the Son, is forever and ever.
And so that's the first thing. Christ reigns in the hearts of
His people. And then the second thing is,
what is this righteousness that we are to seek? What is this
righteousness? Notice, it doesn't say righteousness
only. It says, Seek ye first the kingdom
of God and His righteousness. This is not a man's righteousness
only. This is not the righteousness
of you or the righteousness of me. We don't have any righteousness. There is none righteous. No,
not one. And didn't we just read in Psalm 71 16, I will make mention
of thy righteousness, even of thine only. It's a shock to people
to find they don't have any righteousness. In fact, it's such a shock, it
hurts people. There's nothing more painful
for a person, a man or a woman, or a boy or a girl, to find out
that all they've done, all their life, all the intentions, stack
them all together, God says it's all together unprofitable. It's
worth nothing, less than nothing. And so the righteousness we're
commanded to seek is His righteousness. And it's called His righteousness
because it's a righteousness that God provided. It's a righteousness
that God required. It's a righteousness that God
approved. And it's a righteousness that
was worked out by the Lord Jesus Christ. The righteousness of
God, to put it simply, is the obedience. of the Lord Jesus
Christ to His Father, for His people, in His death, in the
atoning work He did on Calvary. When He cried in John 19, 28-30,
It is finished! That righteousness was everlastingly
established by Christ. This is the righteousness of
which it says in Philippians 2, 5-8, that He came and humbled
Himself and made Himself of no reputation and became obedient
unto death, even the death of the cross. That's the righteousness
of God. It's the only righteousness that
God will accept. now or in the day of judgment. The only thing God will accept
from you or from me is the obedience of his Son. That's the righteousness
we are to seek. And what is it to seek this righteousness? What does it mean to seek his
righteousness? It means to renounce everything, everything in me
or from me as earning acceptance with God both before and after
my conversion. Can you do that? It is to abandon
all hope and trust and peace that comes from any obedience
on my part, and to lay hold and rest in and find perfect peace
in the obedience of Christ only on my behalf." That's what it
means to seek His righteousness. It means to look for what I need,
or what I don't have, or what I feel like I've lost, a sense
of loss, and find it and lay hold on it and come to God in
it. by faith. That's what it means
to seek His righteousness. To seek His righteousness is
to look for Christ in the gospel, and to look to Him as He has
declared Himself there. He is everything in my salvation. The Bible says He's our surety. And a surety is understood in
Scripture As one who stands for someone else and obligates himself
for their debt, entire debt. And fulfills all of the requirements
on that other's behalf. When Judah stood before his father
Jacob and Benjamin was about to go back to Egypt with them.
And he took Benjamin and he looks at his father and he says, Send
the lad with me. I will be surety for him. If
I don't bring him back to you, I will bear the blame forever."
And God made Christ the surety for His people. He laid all of
the obligations that He required of them, and all the demands
of His justice, He laid them on His Son. And the Lord Jesus
Christ voluntarily said, like Judah to His father Jacob, He
said, I will be surety for them. And when God laid the requirements
of His people on Christ, He stopped looking to His people for those
requirements. Every demand of justice and every
requirement for righteousness, the Lord Jesus Christ fulfilled.
That's what a surety is. So that in Philemon chapter 1,
there's only one chapter, Paul expresses this in his plea to
Philemon on behalf of Onesimus, he says regarding Onesimus, he
says, receive him, that is mine own bowels, receive him as myself. And this is exactly what God
means when he says in Ephesians 4.32 I think it is, or 28, that
God has received, he's forgiven us for Christ's sake. That's
what a surety is. That's what it means to seek
His righteousness. It means to go out of myself, to abandon
all hopes that I have in myself, and to lay the eternal weight
of my soul on the Lord Jesus Christ. Not because I do that. Not because I can somehow transfer
my guilt to Him and move His righteousness from His account
to mine. But because God has declared and proclaimed to us
what He's already done in His Son. And He's laid it there,
and He's put it there, and Christ says, seek it. Seek Him. Seek
His righteousness. It is to worship God in Christ
alone. It is to glory in what He has
done. Look at Galatians 6.14. Galatians 6.14. What does it mean to seek His
righteousness? It means to find all of my satisfaction
in what the Lord Jesus Christ has done. He says in Galatians
6.14, but God forbid, this is the Apostle Paul, And I know
that I have no hope of ever becoming even close to what this man was
in his devotion and his service and his knowledge and his work
and labors. Not even close, but look what
he glories in. He doesn't glory in the fact
that he was an apostle. He doesn't boast in that. He
doesn't think back with confidence in all the things that he's done.
He says, but God forbid that I should glory save in the cross
of our Lord Jesus Christ. to whom the world is crucified,
by whom the world is crucified to me, and I unto the world.
I'm a dead thing to the world." They look at me and they think,
he's foolish. Christ is hanging on the cross
in his blood, and his sweat, and the spit, and the agony,
and his weakness, and we've made a mockery of him. And the thief
looks to him and he says, while he's hanging there in weakness,
and people are crowding around and hurling insults at him, and
he says, Lord, remember me when you come
into your kingdom. That's what he gloried in. It
was the cross of Christ. That's what it means to seek
his righteousness. It means to look at Christ. The
author, the beginner and the finisher of my faith. The one
who is the object of my faith. The one who is the one who gives
me faith to see him as that. And so, this is what it means.
And understanding this in Matthew chapter 6, when we look at this,
to see this anchors, it draws the conclusion on the whole chapter.
So that we understand, this is the message of the gospel, the
message of all of scripture. What Christ has done and what
God thinks of it. What is God's treasure? What
does God want and desire and delight in but His Son? What has He given everything
to but His Son? And why has he done this? To
have a people, to have his adopted sons, to bring them to glory.
Just like Jacob said to Judah, I cannot let Benjamin go. If
he goes from me, he will die and he'll bring my gray hairs
to the grave in sorrow. And Judah said, I will be surety
for him. I'll bring him back again to
thee. He said, lay it on me. And Christ did that in eternity.
And God laid everything, the weight, He laid His glory, He
laid His people, He laid the magnification. All of the perfections
of God were laid on Christ. And He did that all. And if we
understand that, we'll see what God's treasure is. It's the Lord
Jesus Christ and His people. And that is the treasure that
we are to pursue. We are to pursue the glory of
God in the salvation of His people. In the edification of His body.
Those who have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. And we're
to seek it to the glory of God. Because we love them. Because
we love the honor of our Savior and we are to seek to be found
in Him alone and to glory in Him alone. Our desire is to Christ. Our desire is to Him and our
expectation is to Him. Everything that we are and have
is to Him. And secondly, the second thing
is that we want to look at now is this treasure. In this treasure
we are to have one treasure. one treasure. He says in verse
19, he says, "...lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth,
where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through
and steal." If you've lived more than a few years, you realize
that all the treasures that you can accumulate on earth are empty. Even when you get them, even
if you can look at a bank account number and find a sum there and
you look at that amount and you say, there's my treasure. There's
just an emptiness to look at that, isn't there? What good
is it? What good is it? I'm breathing,
I'm thinking, I'm living. What good is the money going
to do? It's not going to do me any good. Not in eternity. What did the Lord say? He says,
what would it profit a man if he gains the whole world and
loses his own soul? What could a man give in exchange
for his soul? Lay not up treasures for yourself
on earth, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither
moth nor rust doth corrupt. Look at a few things on this
treasure. Look at Matthew 26 and verse 7. Jesus was in Bethany in the house
of Simon the leper. I'm sure they were rejoicing.
over the fact that Simon, who had been a leper, now was healed,
and he's in his house eating and drinking with those that
the Pharisees considered to be the off-scouring of the world,
the diseased. And this woman, look at verse
7. There came unto Jesus, unto him, a woman, having an alabaster
box of very precious ointment, and poured it on his head. as
he sat at meat. But when the disciples saw it,
they had indignation, saying, To what purpose is this waste?
For this ointment might have been sold for much, and given
to the poor. When Jesus understood it, he
said to them, Why trouble you the woman? For she hath wrought
a good work upon me. Verse 11, notice it. For ye have
the poor always with you, but me you have not always. For in
that she hath poured this ointment on my body, she did it for my
burial. Isn't that what we just read
in Galatians 6.14? What did this woman treasure? What was the
thing she prized the most? Was it the alabaster box full
of precious ointment worth untold amount? I mean the disciples
had great indignation. We could have done a lot with
that money. No, there was no price too high to just expend
it entirely on the Lord Jesus Christ for His death. She says in her heart and did
with her actions what Paul said in Galatians 6 14, God forbid
that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ
by whom the world is crucified to me and I into the world. Nothing
was too high for her. And then look at Matthew chapter
13. Matthew 13. A couple of verses
there in verse 44. It says, The kingdom of heaven
is like unto a treasure hid in a field, the which when a man
hath found he hides it, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth
all that he hath, and buyeth the field." Here's a man, he
stumbles across a treasure, it's in a field, he goes, whoa! Everything he had seemed insignificant
compared to that treasure. He knew whatever he bought that
field for, it was a bargain. And so he went out and sold all
that he had, that he might have that field, because he wanted
the treasure that was in that field. And then look at the next
verse. Again, the kingdom of heaven is likened to a merchant
man seeking goodly pearls, who when he had found one pearl of
great price, went and sold all that he had and bought it. You
see, what is this treasure? What is this treasure in heaven?
It's the treasure of Christ. It's the treasure of having Him.
Song of Solomon 6.3, it says, "...I am my Beloved's, and He
is mine." That's it. If I have Him, I have everything. Everything. And so, another part
of this treasure that we have, as I mentioned before, is the
people of God. Look at 2 Thessalonians. I'm
sorry, 1 Thessalonians. 1 Thessalonians, chapter 2. These words are amazing, astounding. Paul expresses his love for God's
people in so many ways. But I enjoyed reading these,
so we'll look at this. 1 Thessalonians, chapter 2, verse
7. Look at verse 6 too. Actually we'll read verse 6 through
8. Nor of men sought we glory, neither
of you nor yet of others, when we might have been burdensome
as the apostles of Christ. But we were gentle among you,
even as a nurse cherisheth her children. So, being affectionately
desirous of you, we were willing to have imparted unto you, not
the gospel of God only, but also our own souls, because you were
dear unto us. Do you see that? That's the Apostle
Paul speaking. He loved these people. Look at
verse 19 of the same chapter. This is Paul. He says, verse
18, he says, Wherefore, we would have come to you, even I, Paul,
once and again, but Satan hindered us. For what is our hope, or
joy, or crown of rejoicing? What is the thing? What is our
expectation? What is the joy we will have
when we receive that expectation? What is our crown of rejoicing?
What is that thing we're really striving for and we really want
above all things? Paul says, "...are not even ye
in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming? You are
our glory and joy." The Apostle Paul said to the Corinthians,
I will gladly spend and be spent for you. He wanted above all
things, just like John the Baptist, to see the people of God joined
to their husband, the bride of Christ, in with no one in between. And he thinks about the time
in the future, in glory, when he will stand before the throne,
not as the leader, but as just one of them, standing there before
the throne of Christ, looking upon their Savior, knowing they
were washed in His blood and they received from Him all these
blessings. And here he is with the people
to whom God gave him to minister the gospel. And he says, that
will be all my crown and rejoicing, just to be there with you. That
was His treasure, and so that's what He sought after. And so
you see this, lay up treasures in heaven, means we don't lay
up things in heaven, we lay up as our treasure, looking for
the glorious appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, His coming,
and His revelation to us, seeing Him face to face, and His people
with Him. We desire Christ, we glory in
Him crucified, and we desire His people to be joined to Him.
And then verse 22, he says, and notice in verse 21, "...for where
your treasure is, there will your heart be also." If your
heart is in heaven, it's because your treasure is there. But if
your treasure is not in heaven, then your heart will be on earth,
and you have no treasure in heaven. If you have no treasure in heaven,
Then your heart can't ever be there. God has to give you by
grace to see the Lord Jesus Christ as everything. That's what we
read in verse 33. Seek ye first His righteousness,
His kingdom. Now in verse 22, look at this. The light of the body is the
eye. Now think about this. When you go into a dark room
and no lights are on, and you close the door, what do you see?
Nothing. It's dark. When you go outside
at night and there's no moon, and you look up into the sky,
you don't see any birds, do you? It's dark. All you can see are
the stars. Or if you've ever been in the forest and the trees
are tall and you can't see the stars or the moon, what do you
do? You bump into things so you can't
move around. It's completely black in the
forest at night. We were camping with the kids
several years and I remember being there with the canoers
and having to walk from our tent just a couple of hundred feet
to the bathroom and it's completely dark and the trees were tall
and I couldn't see where I was going. Even after letting your
eyes adjust. You couldn't see the animals,
you couldn't see the bugs, you couldn't see anything. The snakes,
nothing. And they were all laying aside quiet probably because
they couldn't see either. The point is this, that the light
of the body is the eye. If there's no light, you can't
see. Your body is full of darkness
if you have no sight. In scripture, the corresponding
light of the soul, what is it that we see with in our souls?
It's faith. 2 Corinthians 5, 7. We walk not by sight, we walk
by faith, not by sight. So if the light of the body is
the eye, the light of the soul is faith. Understand these words
then, in this light. The light of the body is the
eye, if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall
be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall
be full of darkness. So if you have faith, and the
object of your faith is what is true. Because in Scripture,
darkness is the absence of truth. Darkness is sometimes not only
the absence of truth, but is also the evil that we receive
as a just consequence of our disobedience and unbelief. God
separates Himself from us in the absence of His presence.
We have no light. We have no understanding. We're
in total confusion. We have no truth. We can't understand
the things of God. 1 Corinthians 2.14 The natural
man cannot... Let's look at that together.
1 Corinthians 2.14 Because sometimes I'm going to misquote it and
I don't. Besides the fact that it's good for you to see it.
1 Corinthians 2.14. He says, "...but the natural
man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they
are foolishness to him." The things of the Spirit of God are
foolishness? That's a man who's in darkness.
You see that? Neither can he know them. This
is true of all of us. Jesus told Nicodemus in John
3.3, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of
God. You're blind. You cannot see
it. How then can I be born again? Remember the question? Jesus
answered it later. He says here, He says, "...the
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,
they are foolishness to him. Neither can he know them, because
they are spiritually discerned." You see that? And how can we,
since I asked the question, how can we be born again? Remember
what Nicodemus asked? How can these things be? How can they be? The wind blowing
where it will. And you hear the sound of it,
but you can't see the wind. You only see the effects of it.
How can these things be? And Jesus gave the answer in
John 3. He said, As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness,
even so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that whosoever believeth
in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. You're born
again. When you realize that God has
done all in Christ required to save your soul, and you see that,
and you're persuaded of it, and you rest upon it, and you embrace
it, and you confess, Christ is all my hope. That's the evidence
of being born again. And so when Jesus tells us to
Nicodemus, He's telling him, I can't give you the process
by which the Spirit of God works in a man's life, but what I'll
do is I'll point you to what the Spirit of God points a man
to when He gives him life, which is Christ and Him crucified.
Everything. hangs on Him. If the Spirit of
God has given you life, life is in Christ. He's given you
faith in Him. So the light of the body is the
eye. If your eye is single, if you
have faith, and that faith is in Christ, then your whole body,
your whole soul is full of light. But if you look somewhere else,
then other to Him. And that's consistent, right?
One treasure, One master. One father. One pursuit. One
kingdom. One righteousness. One light
in the eye. One object of our faith. One
object of our faith. It's Christ, isn't it? Isn't
that the answer to every question? What question can you raise that
you can't answer by Him? How can God be just and the justifier
of the ungodly? I'm ungodly. I need to be justified. How can God do that? It's in
the work of Christ. Every answer is in Him. He's
the answer to every question. Look at 2 Corinthians chapter
11. 2 Corinthians chapter 11. We were at 1 Corinthians before. He says here, in verse 1 of 2
Corinthians 11, Paul is pleading with the Corinthians and he says,
Would to God you would bear with me in a little in my folly, and
indeed bear with me, for I am jealous over you with godly jealousy. For I have espoused you to one
husband. One. You see the word one? That
means one. I make a point of that because
what did Jesus say? If your eye be single, that means you have
one object in your vision. You see one thing. For I have espoused you to one
husband, that I may present you a chaste virgin to Christ. For
I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through
his subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity
that is in Christ." The word simplicity means the same thing.
The singleness, the onlyness that's in Christ. What did Satan
do in the garden? Remember? Because God commanded
that you can't eat of every tree of the garden? No, Eve said,
we may eat freely of every tree of the garden, but of the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil, we may not eat. And he
says, God knows that when you eat of that tree, you'll be wise
as he is. And so there was this discourse
between Satan and Eve. And what did Eve do? She looked
at the tree and she said, it looks good for food and it's
desirable to look at. It's pleasant to the eyes and
it will make me wise. And so she took it and she ate
it. And in eating that, what was she doing? She was departing
from the one tree that she had, that would have given life, to
eat something else. She had a non-single eye. She was looking to something
other than Christ. She departed from the tree of
life and decided to receive benefit from the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil. And without getting into the
whole meaning of that, understand this. That basically, there's
only one thing God has given to us. It's the preaching of
the gospel. And anytime we add... Anytime
we think in ourselves, I need something in addition to what
Christ has done to make me presentable to God. We've departed. We've
got a single eye like a chameleon. Their eyes are independent of
one another. We can look every which way and see different things.
That's not the point. God wants us to look to Christ
only. It's like a wife who looks to other men. with affection
and desire, or a man who looks to other woman. Their heart is
divided. There's duplicity there. That's the opposite of having
a single eye. And so God is exhorting, the
Lord Jesus Christ is exhorting us in Matthew chapter 6. If your
eye sees the kingdom of God and Christ's righteousness, if that's
all your hope, then your whole body is full of light. You see
that? You understand that? I think that maybe a little elaboration
on this point will perhaps help. And so this is what I was thinking
as I was looking through this matter of the eye and the light. As I think about this, it's good
to take the gospel. It's important, it's essential
that you take the gospel. And you look not only for what
the truth of it is, but also how it applies to you in your
need. Because when you do that, you
know what it is? It's actually coming and drinking
and eating. If you have no need, you'll never
partake of it. But here's the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Lord Jesus Christ is all that I see. He's all that I see. I'm sorry, I'm trying to get
my pages separated here. He's my light. He's my light. He's the only way I know God.
He's the only way I know truth. He's the only way I know that
God saves. There is no other way but Him. He's my life. I live by Him. I live on Him.
And I live in Him. Because He lives, Jesus says,
you shall live also. He's my life. Here's the thing. Every believer
on the Lord Jesus Christ knows this. That when Christ rose from
the dead, God accepted and received Him. Received all that He did. and received a just payment for
sin, and a fulfillment for righteousness, and God was glorified in him.
And when he received him from the dead, God received all those
who were in him with him. He is my life. Because I live,
Jesus says, you shall live also. There's not one person excluded
in that statement for whom Christ died. All of them. shall live
without fail." They will have. Isn't that the will of God? Look
at John chapter 6. Just a couple of verses. I didn't
mean to detour you too far from this, but look at John 6. He says in John chapter 6, verse
37. I'll just read three or four
verses. Verse 37, "...all that the Father
giveth me shall come to me." You see the order, first they're
given, and because they're Christ's, they shall come. And him that
cometh to me, you might say, well I don't know if I was given
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Him that cometh to me, I will
in no wise cast out. If you come, then you're His. And God will not cast you out,
nor will the Lord Jesus. For I came down from heaven,
not to do mine own will, independent of my Father, but the will of
Him that sent me. And this is the will, this is
the Father's will which hath sent me. What is it? That of
all which he hath given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise
it up again at the last day. Christ is all my salvation. I am a sinner. The only way I
can be saved is if God gave me to Christ, Christ died for me,
and God the Father draws me, and the Spirit of God gives me
faith in Him as all my salvation. And then he goes on, he says,
but notice in verse 39, what is God's will? That all He has
given to His Son, just like Jacob, gave Benjamin to Judah as surety. All that God the Father gave
to His Son. He gave to Christ His people.
He chose them in eternity. He gave them to His Son. The
Lord Jesus Christ took them, accepted them as His own, and
redeemed them. He says, I should lose nothing,
but should raise it up again at the last day. He connects
the beginning to the end. There's no difference between
these and these. He says in John 17.10, "...all
mine are thine, and thine are mine, and I'm glorified in them
all without exception." And so this is what I mean when I say,
He's my life. He's my life. He's everything.
There's no possibility that I can be saved unless He does it all. And I believe in the Gospel. He has done it all. Now, one
other thing here, and there's many things we could get to here,
but I want to cover this one. He's not only my life, my truth,
He's my mediator, my advocate, my intercessor, He's everything. But I want you to think about
this, because this one often troubles me, and perhaps it's
troubled you. How will you stand before the
Lord Jesus Christ and give an account of yourself to Him? How
will you do that? I remember I was telling Glennis,
she came over the other day, A man came to my door and he
was asking me, or telling me things, not asking me things,
and I asked him that question. I said, how will you stand before
God? How will you give an account
of yourself to Him? What are you going to say? Let's
just start with one thing. Start with something you've done.
Let's just analyze just one thing in your life. Like the courtroom
would analyze the crime a criminal has committed. Let's just take
that one thing and look at that. How are you going to answer for
that before God? And he said, well, I guess I'll
have to hope that God considers the good I've done and outweighs
the bad that I've done. And I knew that that's exactly
what he believed, but to hear him say that was refreshingly
honest on the one hand, but sadly, it couldn't have been sadder
on the other hand, and I told him at the time, I said, with
that, if that's what you believe, and I believe that's what you
believe, because out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth will
speak in the day of judgment. What is your confidence? What
is your one confidence? How are you going to answer before
the Lord of Glory with His all-seeing eye who divides the soul and
spirit and lays bare the thoughts and intents of the heart? How
are you going to answer? You are not going to have an
answer unless your answer is this. Lord, if you do not answer
for me, if what you've done on Calvary, taking my sins and fulfilling
my righteousness, is not all that God accepts from me, if
that's not enough, then I have no answer. I have no account
I can give. You see, we have one eye, one
light in our body. We look to Christ only. We don't
look here and there. We don't think, well, how many
times have you heard, well, you know, this person, I know that in the
past they made a decision for Jesus and so on and so on. And
we begin to stack up. We build a case. We try to build
a case around the experience of their life. There's only one
thing we have to plea. There's only one. What did God
accept? Did he accept something I've
done? Did he accept an experience, perhaps even a mystical experience? Or a decision, or a commitment,
or a dedication, a gift, anything that I've done? None of it. Paul says, I considered it all
loss for Christ. All of it loss for Christ. That
I might win Him. That I might be found in Him,
not having my own righteousness. There's no hope, there's no plea
except what God thinks of His Son. The gospel of Christ is
just that. What did God think? What does
God think of what Christ has done? That's a single I. That's the answer. That's the
only thing that gives me peace in my conscience. The only thing
that gives me confidence before God. Look at first, this is the
last verse. I know I'm tiring you, but I'll
just give you this last one here. We have to wrap this up. Our
final thought here in 1 John 5, actually chapter 4, verse
17. 1 John 4, verse 17. Herein is our love made perfect,
that we may have Boldness in the day of judgment. Now, I don't know about you,
but boldness is the last thing I think of when I contemplate
the day of judgment. Don't you? If I could just creep
in. You're not going to creep in.
You're not going to get in by the skin of your teeth. If you
come, if you enter glory, you know how you're going to enter?
Perfect, without spot. holy, unblameable, unreprovable,
in the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the only
way you'll get there. And there will be nothing lacking.
Christ will say unto you, well done, thou good and faithful
servant. Because he will consider all
that God gave him to do. And just like in creation, he'll
look at all that he's done, and he'll say, it's very good. He's
satisfied with His own work and I will be satisfied when I awaken
His likeness. Anyway, boldness in the day of
judgment. Why? Because as He is, how is He? He's righteous, He's holy, He's
accepted by God, He's sitting on heaven's throne. So are we
in this world. Do you see that? My boldness
is that I'm in Him. Well, someone called me on the
phone when I was maybe 20 years old and they said, you just think
you're perfect. I said, actually, actually I
am perfect in Christ. And I wasn't trying to be rude,
but that's the truth. This is what I believe. This
is what the gospel teaches. If the gospel doesn't teach this,
then I am completely in the dark. My eye is on one thing, and if
the one thing I view is not true, then I am blind. I am completely
in the dark. But I don't have a backup plan.
I have no reserves. I don't have a 401k setting aside
somewhere in terms of righteousness that I can look to. I don't have
anything else. I am void of righteousness. I'm
full of sin in myself. None righteous, no not one. None
that understandeth. None that seek after God. All
gone out of the way. Together become unprofitable.
Their mouth is full of bitterness and cursing and all these things.
That describes me. But thank God, he says in 1 Timothy
1.15, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. There I can find a description
of myself. That gives me hope. Let's pray. Father, we thank you that you've
given us one thing to look at. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. One
desire in our heart to be found in Him. and one confidence, his
righteousness. Thank you, Lord, that in this
we can give you all the glory. And we find the Lord Jesus Christ
to be so attractive, so beautiful to our eyes, that he's met every
need when we were the enemies of God, when we were in our minds
and by wicked works under the wrath of God. Yet he stepped
forward and took our case and bore it all and provided a full
answer so that you received him from the dead. Death could not
hold him because sin had been done away with, wrath had been
appeased. And here we stand, Lord, looking
to him in this day, at this hour, and we pray, Lord, give us this
grace to abandon all hope in everything that we are and look
to Christ only. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.