Matthew chapter 16. The title
of this sermon is, Satisfied with Christ. If you remember
that, then you'll remember, I think it'll help you understand these
verses together. Satisfied with Christ. Starting
at verse 16. Moreover, when you fast, be not
as the hypocrites of a sad countenance, that means a sad face, for they
disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast. Verily I say unto you, they have
their reward. I'll pause there. When I was working, I worked
with a man who one day I noticed he had a black smudge on his
forehead. I said, you got a black smudge
on your forehead. He said, oh, that's Ash Wednesday. Oh, what's
that? So I had to find out about it
the hard way. Not hard for him. I didn't corner him and make
him feel small about it. I just said, interesting. So
Ash Wednesday is a ceremony performed primarily by Catholics, but also,
surprisingly when I looked it up, it's performed by Methodists,
some Methodists, some Presbyterians, some Lutherans, some Reformed,
and some Anabaptist churches. They sprinkle ashes or they put
marks on their head to indicate their penance, their sorrow for
sin, and also their compensation in suffering. so that their sins
will be forgiven because God will see something about them.
It's a horrible thing. It's a horrible thing. And that's
what Jesus is saying here. When you fast, don't disfigure
your faces. Don't appear to men to suffer
for whatever it is you're fasting. Because if you do that, you have
your reward. From men, not from God. You'll
get no reward from God. Verse 17. But thou, when thou
fastest, anoint thine head And wash thy face, that thou appear
not unto men to fast, but unto thy father which is in secret.
And thy father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly."
I want to talk a little bit about what true fast is and what false
fasting is. But I'll save that till later.
Verse 19. Now see if you can get in these
verses to the end of the chapter the following outline. I'm going
to give you the outline and then we'll read through it. One treasure. That's what we're going to read
in verse 19 and 21. 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. One treasure. Hold that thought. The next point
in the outline is one light. He says it this way, "...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!"
One light. And then, one master. 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." One master. You can't have two. That's what Jesus is saying.
And the Lord Jesus Christ knows every man's heart from beginning
of creation to the end of time. He says you can't do it. You
might think you do, but you can't. If you have one If you have a
master, you can really only have one. And then, the next point
is one father. Verse 25. 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? Raiment is a word for clothing.
Behold, the fowls, that's the birds, the birds of the air,
for they sow not, they don't plant seeds, neither do they
reap, they don't have a harvesting equipment, go out and pick it
up. Nor do they gather into barns, they don't store up food, yet
your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better
than they? So this is an obvious comparison
of the importance of people to birds. What's more important?
people. That's what it says. Are not
ye much better than they? The Creator has told us the birds
are less than people. And because they're less, and
because God takes care of the birds, then you can use that
as an argument from the less to the greater. If God takes
care of the birds, He'll take care of you. And who is this? It's our Father. Verse 27. Which of you, by taking thought,
can add one cubit to his stature? You can't make yourself taller.
And you can't change the moments of your life either. You can't
extend your life by one moment by taking thought. Verse 28,
And why take ye thought for clothing, 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.
God made the flowers to teach us a lesson. That lesson is God
the Father clothes those things which have no ability to spin
or to grow. I mean they don't toil, they
don't work, and they don't take, like we would, take thread and
make clothes out of it and create clothes for themselves. They
just sit there and God decorates them with beauty beyond the beauty
of the richest king on earth. And then he says this, 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? 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, one Father. And then,
the next verse is, we're going to read, is one pursuit. But
seek ye first the kingdom of God, and one righteousness, 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." So I hope you can see at least the outline,
one treasure, one light, one master, one father, and one righteousness,
one pursuit, the last verse. Now, in looking at these verses,
verse 33, I believe, is the verse that explains all the rest. And
this is a very important verse, and so I'd like to almost take
these things in the reverse order. And that will determine how much
time we have to get back to the fasting part. If we don't get
to that, we might not cover it today. Seek ye first the kingdom
of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be
added unto you. Now, there's another verse that's
very much like this in Romans. Chapter 14, verse 17, listen to this. It
says, "...for the kingdom of God is not meat and drink." Isn't
that what Jesus was just talking about? Meat and drink and clothing
and all these things. The kingdom of God is not meat
and drink. It's not tangible things. Another
place Jesus said, "...the kingdom of God doesn't come by observation."
You can't see it. He says, the Kingdom of God is
within you. He says, but here in this verse,
for the Kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness
and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. Now when you read that
list, righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, First
of all, you see that these are things God provides. Righteousness. I want to think about this, because
that's what the Lord Jesus said. He says, "...seek ye first the
kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be
added unto you." Righteousness. It says in Romans chapter 10
verse 3 that the Jews were ignorant of God's righteousness. Jesus
said, seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. Not yours, His righteousness. The Jews were ignorant of God's
righteousness. We have to understand what God's
righteousness is Or we cannot have it. We have to seek it. And what does it mean to seek?
Well it means to look for something either that you've lost or that
you have never had and you want. Or something that you have a
little bit of but you want more. You see? You're seeking for it.
You're looking for it. You might see signs, people seeking
for a job, seeking employment. What does it mean? You're trying
to find a job. They're trying to obtain something,
aren't they? Something they don't have or
they want. They want a better job. Or we might seek for a new
car. So we look for one. We look at
all the cars we want. We see if we can afford them
and we pick one out and all these things. We're seeking for that.
Jesus says, seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. Put that as the banner of everything
you're looking for. His righteousness. Because if
you do that, all these other things will be added unto you.
So we have to understand what righteousness is, because the
Jews, who had the law of God, which was a law, a righteous
law, an everlasting law, a law that was true, they had the law,
and yet they didn't understand the righteousness of the law. They didn't understand the righteousness
of God. the righteousness which God accepts, the righteousness
which God provides. So the first thing we need to
understand is what is this righteousness? Now in Romans 5.17, just a few
pages back from Romans 15, it says this, it says that for by
one man's offense, that's Adam, Adam sinned, remember he was
the first man, God created Adam, and he treated all men. As in
one man, Adam, and he said, by one man's offense, by one man's
sin, death reigned by one. Death reigned like a king over
all men by one man's sin. Much more, they which receive
abundance of grace And of the gift of righteousness shall reign
in life by one, Jesus Christ." So righteousness is not only
something that we need to understand, but righteousness is something
that God has to give us. Because we don't have any. Look
at Romans chapter 3. He says in Romans 3 and verse
10, as it is written, there is none righteous. No, not one. You can hear the preacher. He says, there's none righteous.
And someone in the back raises their hand. Whoa, whoa, whoa,
whoa. He says, no, not one. Put your hand down. Not one.
And so God tells us there's none righteous. And then in verse
19 of Romans 3, he says, we know that whatever the law says, it
says to them that are under the law that every mouth may be stopped
and all the world may become guilty before God. So we need,
we don't have righteousness. We need to understand what it
is. And it is also a gift God has to give us. And here's the
other thing we learn is in verse 20 of Romans 3, by the deeds
of the law, by our own personal obedience, we can't have righteousness. We can't earn righteousness.
God has to give it to us. And so he says in verse 21 of
Romans 3, Now, in light of the fact that all men are guilty,
and none by personal obedience can produce a righteousness that
God accepts, now, The righteousness of God is revealed. What an amazing
thing! All throughout history, God has
been created. He created Adam and Eve and all
people born to them. How many hundreds of generations
have there been since God created the world? Untold millions of
people. One time I tried to estimate
how many people have been born into the world since the beginning
of creation. I don't know. A large number.
Over a hundred billion people. And all throughout time, God
has been proclaiming and declaring to them what God requires. And
the Word of God comes to them as fallen men. Human nature. Fallen in sin. Guilty. Unable
to keep the Law of God. Not subject to it in any way.
And unable to be so. Because our nature is to sin. Our mind is enmity against God.
Why does God give us His Word if we can't keep it? Why does
He preach to rebels who will not obey Him? Why does He preach
to people who are dead in sin? Because God wants us to know
that even in light of our complete failure and rebellion and death
in sin, He's proclaiming something His righteousness. You see, we
are bankrupt with respect to righteousness. We have none and
we can't produce it. It's a gift from God and we have
to understand what it is. So what is the righteousness
of God? Because Jesus said, seek first the kingdom of God and
His righteousness and all these things shall be added to you.
Now the righteousness of God is clear in Scripture. It is
this. I'll give it to you simply and
then I'll take you to a few verses to substantiate that. I don't
know about you, but I have to have the Word of God. explaining
to me what God means. Because if I understand what
God is saying from His Word, then I can stand upon it as true. And I can be unmoved and unshakable
in it. And have confidence and I can
wait on the Lord. I can trust Him to do what He
has given in grace, in promise that He will do. What is the
righteousness of God? Well, first of all, it's not
our righteousness. It's God's righteousness. It's
not something we can produce. We're void of righteousness.
And it's a gift of God. But here's what it is. Look at
Romans 3. He says in verse 22, in verse 21, he says, Without the law, that means without
our keeping the law, is manifested, being witnessed by the law and
the prophets, even the righteousness of God. Which is by faith of
Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe. So the
righteousness of God, he's saying, is something that we receive
by faith. It's a gift, but we are given
the faith to see what it is, understand it, and embrace it. And in embracing it, that righteousness
is ours by experience. We understand it, we receive
it, and we stand upon it. That's the experience of the
righteousness. But what is the righteousness? Well, he says,
all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Here we
go. Verse 24, being justified freely. Justified means the judge has
examined the evidence and concluded and drawn a decision and given
the sentence. And the sentence in this case
is just, absolutely righteous. How? Freely. Look, being justified
freely, without cause in us, without cause in anything God
would ever find in us looking forward or backward or at present.
By His grace. By His grace. On what ground? The redemption that is in Christ
Jesus. You see that? What is the redemption
that is in Christ Jesus? That's when the Lord Jesus Christ
poured out His soul as a ransom price in order to pay for our
freedom, our liberty, our forgiveness of sins. That's what it is. It's right here. It's explained.
And then he goes on and he explains it further. Whom God, Christ,
has set forth. The Lord Jesus Christ was set
forth by the Father to be a propitiation. That means that God has made
Christ the satisfaction to justice. That's what propitiation means.
A justice satisfying sacrifice made to God. not to men, but
to God, in order to appease God's wrath. And God's wrath having
been appeased, God received from Christ a fulfillment of His law
and a satisfaction to His justice. And that's the righteousness
of God. It's the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ unto death. That and that only is what is
given to believers and they receive it by faith. Looking to Christ,
the object of their faith. God doesn't look at our faith
and trade righteousness for our faith. Faith is given to us to
perceive, and lay hold, and trust, and depend on the Lord Jesus
Christ as all our righteousness. That's what the Jews did not
understand. And that's what we need to understand. Just a couple of verses. Romans
5.19. As by one man's disobedience
many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many
be made righteous." Do you see that? What is our righteousness? The obedience of one. Do you understand that? Look
at Romans 8 chapter 8 verse 3. For what the law could not do,
Do you know the law was unable to do some things? It's God's
Word, but the law had an impotency. The law could only help a righteous
man. Because the law demanded perfection,
continuous obedience from the heart without fail, And I said
it already, but perfectly, all the time. And to that man, life
would be given. But none can meet that. No man can be justified by the
law. And so the law couldn't help
sinners. That's the big defect in the
law. It can't help a sinner. All the law can do for sinners
is pronounce them guilty and come alongside of them and beat
them as they are in bondage and slaves. Always trying to keep
what God says. Hoping that somehow by their
obedience they will meet the standard. And they always fall
short and they cover up. their disobedience with hypocrisy
and with self-deception and lies thinking that somehow they'll
ultimately be able to get there and they never get there and
they keep falling back and taking another run at it and never reaching
their goal and they're always feeling guilty and condemned
and fearful and is bondage. The law can't help sinners. It
holds out the standard, but never gives any arms or legs or wings
to get there. What the Law could not do, in
that it was weak through the flesh. Our sinful, human, fallen
nature. God sending His own Son. This is why it's called the righteousness
of God. God provided it and the Lord
Jesus Christ is the one who fulfilled it. He is God. Sending His own
Son in the likeness of sinful flesh. When you looked at the
Lord Jesus Christ, He was born of a woman. He had all the infirmities
of a sinful man. He got tired. He was eating and
drinking. He lived on food. And he cried,
he had tears, he bled, he died. He was a man, just like in the
likeness of sinful flesh. And so he came, God sent his
son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and because of sin, and
for the removal of sin, God condemned sin in his flesh. That's what
I said. What is the righteousness of
God? It's the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ unto death. The death of a substitute, suffering
in the place of sinners, God laying our sins on Christ. And
with our sins on Christ, God pouring out the full punishment
our sins deserved. And Christ voluntarily offered
Himself to God. Bearing those sins, the guilt
of them, the shame of them, the filth of them, and the punishment
of them. That we might be redeemed, set
free, forgiven, accepted by God. And guess what? He did all this,
verse 4, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled
in us. How is it fulfilled in us? when
God, by His Spirit, gives us a sight of Christ and shows Him
as the curse-bearing substitute for His people, and He causes
us to abandon all hopes in all that we are or can be, owning
our sin, coming to Him for a free and full forgiveness in Christ
and by Christ alone, and laying all of our hope resting in Him,
Confidently coming to God as sinners for mercy and grace because
of what Christ has done and what He has done alone. We look to
Christ and what He has done alone. And that's all. And He says that
when we do that, then the righteousness of God is fulfilled in us. The righteousness of the law
is fulfilled in us. Now look at a couple more verses.
Look at Romans 10 verse 4. For Christ is the end of the
law for righteousness. It means that he's the fulfillment
of the law, the consummation of it. He has accomplished all
the law requires, everything God intended, the goal of the
law, the aim of the law. Christ has fulfilled it. He says
he's the end of the law for what? For righteousness. To who? To
everyone that believeth. And where does this faith come
from? It's a gift of God. It's a gift of God. You can't
produce it. It comes by hearing. And hearing
comes by the gospel preached. And that's why we need to hear
the gospel preached. And look at a couple more verses. One more at least. Look at Galatians
chapter 2. Galatians 2 verse 21. Remember,
what is the righteousness of God? It's the obedience of the
Lord Jesus Christ unto death as a substitute. Being the propitiation,
the satisfaction and removal of our sins and the wrath of
God in his suffering unto death. Verse 21 of Galatians 2. I do
not frustrate the grace of God. 4. Listen, if righteousness comes
by the law, in other words by your own personal obedience,
if righteousness comes that way, look at the next words, then
Christ is dead in vain. He died for nothing. If the Lord
Jesus Christ died, then there was something needed. God would
not afflict and deliver his son up to death if it wasn't imperative,
if it wasn't important and required by God's justice. But he's saying
here that if righteousness come by the law, by our own personal
obedience, Then Christ died in vain. Therefore, Christ's death
is the production or what produces the righteousness that comes
to us by God. It's the righteousness of God
that fulfills the righteousness of the law. And one more verse,
and this will be the last on this. Philippians 2 verse 5 through
8. He says, let this mind be in
you. Philippians 2 verse 5, let this
mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. Listen to who
the Lord Jesus Christ is. He is God himself. He says, who
being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with
God. but made himself of no reputation. He emptied himself and made himself
of no reputation. And he took upon him the form
of a servant. This is... This is inexpressibly
amazing and wonderful. That the Lord, the God of glory,
would come and make Himself of no reputation and become a servant
to serve in order to save those who were the enemies in their
minds and by wicked works. And He says, "...and He was made
in the likeness of men." And being found in fashion as a man,
he humbled himself. How much lower can you go? Well
it says in Psalm 22, I'm a worm and no man. So he humbled himself
and he became obedient unto death, even the death of the crossed.
That's what he did. He was obedient. How? Unto death, even the death of
the cross. That's the righteousness of God.
That's the righteousness we need to understand. That's the righteousness
we cannot come to God without. That's the righteousness that
is of faith alone. God gives it to us, we receive
it by faith. Christ established when He died
on the cross and cried, it is finished. He fulfilled Daniel
9.24 which says, He shall establish an everlasting righteousness. Everlasting righteousness. You
know what the reward of righteousness is? What is the reward of righteousness? The man that doeth them shall
live by them. The reward of righteousness is
life. What's the reward of an everlasting
righteousness? everlasting life. Jesus says
in Matthew 6.33, Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. His righteousness. How do we
seek His righteousness? Not by what we do, but by receiving
it through faith. We come to God in prayer to receive
from Him what we don't have, what we can't produce, what Christ
has worked out, and we look to Christ only. We look to Christ
only. We see, like it says in Hebrews
chapter 4, Therefore, labor, labor therefore to enter into
that rest. We don't labor with our hands. We don't labor in
self-affliction. We labor in order to lay hold
on what God has said is true. to embrace it, to receive it
as our own. We labor and ask God for it. If it's a gift, and God has it,
and we can't produce it, ask. Jesus told the woman at the well,
if you knew the gift of God, you would have asked, and He
would have given you living water. So that's the first thing we
see here. This is the banner. This is the heading over these
verses in Matthew 6. Seek the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is righteousness,
which is the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ, and that obedience
is ours. It's ours. God gives it to us,
and then he gives us faith to know that it's ours, to receive
it. And having that righteousness, Having that righteousness, we
have peace with God. And having peace with God, we
have joy. And all these things are given
to us by the ministry of the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of God.
That's what it says in Romans 14, 17. But here now, let's back
up. We have in these verses one treasure. One treasure, he says, lay not
up for yourselves treasures upon earth where moth and rust is
corrupt and where thieves break through and steal, but lay up
for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust is
corrupt and where thieves do not break through nor steal.
For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. A treasure, a treasure, what
is a treasure? What's a treasure? I bet if I
asked a five-year-old, I bet they could tell me what a treasure
is. A treasure is something that you can't live without. A treasure
is something you're willing to spend all your life pursuing. Jesus says, wherever your treasure
is, that's where your heart will be. And what is your heart? Your
heart is what you love. Where your love is, I mean where
your treasure is, that's where your love, that's where your
devotion, that's where your affections are going to be. What you love
is your treasure. Now, here's the thing. Jesus
is saying, don't lay up treasures on earth, but lay up treasures
in heaven. For where your treasure is, there
will your heart be also. We have one treasure. What is
that treasure? Remember, I've already given
you the answer. What are we supposed to seek?
He says, first of all, don't lay up treasures on earth. Well,
we think, well, our treasure, our treasure, let's see, I got
to go count my money in my bank account. That's my treasure.
No, that's not my treasure. How about my car? No. How about
my house? No. How about my wife? No. No,
she's not my treasure either. According to what Jesus is saying
here, we're to seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness
and everything else will be added to us. In Matthew 13, look at
this, Matthew 13. There was a merchant man. Jesus says the kingdom of heaven
is like a merchant man. Verse 45. The kingdom of heaven
is like a merchant man seeking goodly pearls. A pearl is a very
expensive thing. And here's a merchant of pearls.
And it says, when he had found one pearl of great price, he
went and he sold all that he had and he bought it. That was
his treasure. The pearl of great price. And
he was willing to part with everything that he might have that one pearl.
Believers are the merchant men. And they find Christ in the Word
of God. And finding Christ and His righteousness,
you know what they do? They count everything else in
their life, all their works, all their accumulated labors,
all that their labors can get to them in life. They count it
all but dung that they might have Christ. That's what Paul
said in Philippians 3, wasn't it? He says, I was this, I was
that, I was everything else. Before the law I was blameless,
but I counted all loss that I might have Christ. That's what the
merchant man is. And the Lord Jesus Christ also
is like a merchant man. Because he loved his church and
he gave himself for it. There's a reciprocal mutual friendship,
isn't there? When you have a friend, have
you ever had a friend? I mean a really good friend. Why are they your friend? Well,
because you love them. But isn't it two-sided? Doesn't
your friend also love you? And isn't that what makes your
friendship dear? I love my friend, and my friend
loves me. I can tell my friend anything,
and my friend tells me all of their heart. That's what it is. Look at James
chapter 1, or actually chapter 2, James chapter 2. It says something
there that we should see. James 2, verse 23. Well, I'll
read verse 20. James 2, verse 20. Was not Abraham our father justified
by works when he had offered Isaac his son up upon the altar?
Seest thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works
his faith was made perfect?" What it means here is that he
was justified before men because by his works it was evident that
he had true faith in God, true faith in Christ. But unless you
have works, of course, how will you have any proof that you have
true faith? And the scripture was fulfilled
which said, Abraham believed God and it was imputed unto him
for righteousness. That's what we were just reading
about. God's righteousness is imputed to us. It's given to us freely. It's
charged to us. It's considered ours because
we're in Christ. And he was called the friend
of God. He loved God and God loved him.
But now look over at chapter 4. Chapter 4 of James, he says,
you adulterers, actually let me go up. Verse 1 of James 4.1,
from whence come wars and fighting among you? Don't they come from
this, from hence, even of your lusts that war in your members? You lust and have not. You kill and desire to have and
cannot obtain. You fight and war, yet you have
not because you ask not. And when you ask, you receive
not because you ask amiss, that you may consume it upon your
lusts, you adulterers and adulteresses. Know ye not that the friendship
of the world is enmity with God? Whosoever therefore will be a
friend of the world is the enemy of God. Do you see that? So you
can either be a friend of God or you can be a friend of the
world. There's only two possibilities. You can't be both. You can't
be, well I'm a friend to God when I come to church and all
the rest of the time I'm a friend of the world. Actually it works
differently. Remember what, Abraham was a
friend of God, right? Remember what Lot did? Lot was Abraham's nephew, and he
had so many sheep that they had to separate. Abraham tells Lot, he says, pick
whichever land you want. Lot looks out there, and he sees
all the green grass for his sheep, and he sees the city of Sodom,
and it's well watered. He says, that's what I want.
And so he goes there and he pitches his tent towards Sodom. And he
lived there and eventually he found himself inside of Sodom.
And God had to come and save him out of Sodom, didn't he?
Sodom and Gomorrah, that was the world. Abraham was still
living as a stranger. Lot had become a friend of the
world. Because he was in the world and
he liked the things in the world. And yet the Lord had saved him
and troubled him. Troubled him day by day with
this in his soul. And God had to save him. There's
many examples of being worldly. There was a Well, I could go
through a long list of them, and we'll get to that probably
next week. But the bottom line is this. Wherever your treasure
is, that's where your heart will be. Make sure that your treasure
is Christ. If you have Christ, you know
what you have? Everything. Look at 1 Corinthians
chapter 3. If you have the Lord Jesus Christ,
you have everything. And if you have everything, what
do you need but Him? Isn't that what He said? If you
seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, all these
things will be added to you. If you have Christ, it's enough.
1 Corinthians 3 verse 21. Verse 21. Let no man glory in
men, for all things are yours. Whether Paul, or Apollos, or
Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present,
or things to come, all are yours. And you are Christ. And Christ
is God's. You're possessed by the Lord
Jesus Christ. You're His inheritance. And Christ is God's. And you
have everything. God's given you everything in
Christ. In Genesis 25, Esau came to his
brother Jacob, and Jacob had prepared a gift for Esau because
he was afraid of Esau. And Esau sees all that Jacob
had prepared for him. He says, What's all this? And
Jacob says, It's a gift for you. And Esau says, Man, I have enough.
Just keep it. And Jacob says, No, you take
it. Because I have all things. If we have the Lord Jesus Christ,
We have not just enough, we have all things. I like what a preacher
once said. He says, is Christ really enough? Don't you ever have that doubt?
Is it really enough? Is the fact that Jesus died enough? And the preacher said, Christ
is enough if he's all you have. If all you have is Christ, then
Christ is enough. Because you have all things.
But if you have something plus Christ, then you think you need
something in addition to Him, and you don't really have Christ,
and therefore you don't have anything. So we have one treasure. And I think what I'll have to
do here is I'm going to have to cut it short. Next week we'll cover
the fasting and we'll cover this thing about if your eye, the
light of the body is the eye, and what I call that is one light,
a single eye. We'll cover that next time. So
hold your place there and read those things. It says in Ecclesiastes,
he says, all the labor of man All the labor of man is for his
mouth. Have you ever noticed that? All
we do, in a physical sense, you can see it, right? I go out in
the morning, I plow the field, I work, I plant the seed, finally
at the end of the harvest, I reap what I've planted and worked
and labored all summer for, and then I spend the rest of the
few months canning all that I got, And then in the winter time,
I keep opening it up slowly and eating it. And finally in the
spring, I'm running out of food and I go out and I plant it again.
All the labor of man is for his mouth, right? But there's a parable
in that. All the labor of man is for his
mouth. It means that everything man works for is for himself. So he can consume it upon his
own lusts. I had children and I was always
surprised when I saw little kids. Have you ever seen a baby? A
baby who couldn't even talk, couldn't even crawl, sitting
on his mother's lap, having a room full of toys. You would think
that baby would have everything it needs. And there's a baby
sitting on his mother's lap, a room full of toys. oohing and
cooing around it and trying to get it to smile and commenting
on how cute it is and everything like this. And here's another
little baby sitting there beside it. And the first baby looks
with his room full of toys, content on its mother's lap. And this
other baby was given a piece of paper from a wrapping present. or just a wad of something. And
that baby lets go of this expensive toy, forgets that he's on his
mother's lap, and starts screaming and bellowing for that one wad
of paper on the other mother's lap, or just wherever this baby's
at. That's what we are. All the labor of man is for his
mouth. All we want is to give me, give
me, give me. Everything we do. And yet Solomon
says, the eye is never satisfied with seeing. That's what we are. Until God gives us what we need
to stop us from coveting. How can we stop coveting? Don't
you wish sometime that you would just stop coveting when the Lord
said, don't covet. Because that's the root of all
evil, isn't it? The love of money. The love of
things. The love of pursuit. The love
of trying to get what you don't have. It doesn't matter what
it is. Just because I don't have it, I covet it. It says the love
of money is the root of all evil. All evil. And don't you wish
you could just stop sometimes and not covet? How is it that
we can stop coveting? What can make us stop coveting?
Only if we have... Nothing else. If there's nothing
else that we need, if we have everything that we want, and
there's nothing else that we can get, then we'll stop coveting,
right? If there's nothing else to get,
we don't covet anything. We have it all. And that's what
God does when He saves us. He gives us a view that everything
we need before God, all that God requires of us to accept
us, to be loved by Him, to be received by Him. Everything in
life is working out for our good. We're predestinated, without
a possibility of failure, to be conformed into the image of
His own dear Son, and to be presented faultless before the throne of
glory, given eternal life. And the Lord himself prays for
us and has gone to heaven to prepare mansions for us. We know
the living God. We've been given all things in
Christ. What should we covet for? You
see, that's the only way we'll stop coveting. Let's pray that
the Lord would do that for us. Dear Lord, we pray that you would
give us what we seek for. The righteousness of the Lord
Jesus Christ. His kingdom to know you. to have
the peace in knowing our sins are forgiven. And we are perfect
before God because of Christ's one offering. And we pray, Lord,
that you would give us this joy in our heart, not discontent,
but contentment with godliness, knowing that we have all things
in Christ. And with Jacob and all your people say, the Lord
is my portion. The Lord is my portion. He's
everything that I have, everything that I need, and all that I want. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.