Matthew chapter 6 and verse 33
is where I'll take my text. This seems to be
the center of the context, the center of the message that the
Lord Jesus was speaking of here. Seek ye first the Kingdom of
God and His righteousness, all these things will be added to
you. I wonder sometimes, I don't know
if you have or not, but I wonder if I've ever sought Him. I wonder if my heart's ever been in love with Him, His gospel. Sometimes I feel so distant.
so untouched, so far away. And I'm fearful even to examine
myself sometimes, because just as sure as I do, I can't see
anything in myself that would be the mark of a believer. It
seems like all my thoughts, all my best is It gets worse and worse. The only hope I have is to look
to Christ. And I'm not just parroting that. That's just the way it is with
me. I don't know about you. But I'm thankful that I don't
stay in that frame of mind. In that heart condition, God's
been merciful to me to reveal Christ and cause me to look to
Him. If you look at me, you're looking at a sinner. I don't glory in it. That's just what I am. I'm ashamed
of it, but that's just what I am. There's a part of me inside me
that don't want to be. I don't want to see him. I want
to love him. I want to believe him. I want
to honor him. I'm going to read something I've
written down here. Some of this is quotes. Some
of it is my own thoughts. But for the sake of of the truth and the message. There's just one person that
I'll name, and that's what I've written down here in the introduction. And you might even can tell who
it is by the words it's said. The Lord Jesus Christ ought to
be loved ardently with an all-consuming love. He ought to be served with an
all-consuming zeal. Behold how He loved us. Behold how zealously He served
us. Yet there are many who, professing
to know Him, professing to trust Him, professing to love Him,
are lukewarm, apathetic, and indifferent toward Him. And it
must be acknowledged that even those who do truly know, trust,
and love him, because of the weakness of our flesh, because
of our own sinfulness and corruption of heart by nature, struggle
incessantly with a horrid tendency toward lukewarmness. Nothing can be done with a lukewarm
people. There is hope for a cold, hardened
rebel. And it is a great joy to work
with men and women whose hearts glow with love and zeal for Christ. But lukewarm religionists are
sickening, nauseating, and disgusting. Even Christ himself cannot stand
them. He says, because they aren't
lukewarm and neither hot or cold. I will spew thee out of my mouth."
Lukewarmness, apathy, and indifference toward Christ betrays the apostasy
of the heart from Christ. Concerning the Son of God and
the gospel of His grace, there is no room for neutrality. Matthew
Henry wrote, Christ expects that men should declare themselves
in earnest either for him or against him. When Joshua said, and so should we be able
to say, and I hope each of us can declare,
as for me in my house, we will serve the Lord. Indifference is an intolerable
evil. Our Lord himself says, I would
that thou were hot or cold. It is better to be utterly ignorant
of the gospel than to be a vain, carnal, indifferent, lukewarm
professor of faith. These Laodiceans professed faith
in Christ, but had no interest in promoting it. They professed
love for Christ, but had no real heart attachment to Him. They professed allegiance to
the gospel, but they had no zeal for the
gospel. They were lukewarm. I'm going
to try to bring a message this morning on priorities. This is
hard, because I find myself wanting I talked to a person this week,
or they talked to me in conversation. They were like myself, getting
older. I see them about once a year. And the husband said, family
is all I have on this earth. He said, that's all I have. Is
that all you have? My life's given totally and absolutely
to family. And then as I remarked in the
Bible class, another person told me this. He said, I can worship
God as well in a tree stand as I can in a church house. And I thought about that and
thought about that, thought about it all the way home. These people verbalized what
they really believed and thought and adhered to. But how many
have that same heart, but they're too proud to acknowledge it? We say we love Christ, we love
His gospel, but I've got a question for us. Do we? The Lord said, seek ye first
the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be
added to you. In Luke 14, 26, he said, if any man come to me
and hate not or forsake not his father and mother and wife and
children, and brethren and sisters, yea, in his own life also, he
cannot be my disciple. And whosoever does not bear his
cross, And come after me, cannot be my disciple. I know we all
have sicknesses, we all have family problems, we all have
financial problems sometimes. I know that's common to everybody. And that's not what he's making
reference to. But to bear his cross, of refusing the flesh,
refusing our own righteousness, denying ourself, in every sense,
desiring to, having a heart to do it, and a heart for Christ.
He cannot be my disciple. So likewise, whosoever be of
you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple. That's not Matthew
Henry's word. That's not Don Faulkner's word
or Henry Mahan's word or my word, that's Christ's word. What is priorities? We often
hear we need to get our priorities right. It's what is of greatest importance.
The state of having most importance or urgency. What is most urgent
to us and most important to us, to our very life and to our heart.
Somebody or something important. Someone or something that is
ranked highly in terms of importance or urgency. That's what a priority
is. That which we esteem to be of
greatest importance to us, will merit in her own mind, in her
own heart, will merit our allegiance and commitment. That's our priority. This will be the focus and center
of our desire. This will be the focus and center
of our life. This will govern our actions
to a great degree. That which is priority will be
evident in the giving of our heart to it. This will be the thing which
we cling to, even to the forsaking of all else, if necessary. That is what priority is. And I'd rather find out December
the 27th, 2009, what my priorities are than to spend the rest of
my life being deceived in myself. We read in the scriptures of
folks' priorities. The Lord makes them known to
us. Those to whom He is their priority and those to whom he
is not their priority. You remember the rich young ruler? The Lord told him, he came to
the Lord and he said, what must I do to inherit eternal life?
He touched his heart. He touched his priority. And he finally told him, he said,
sell everything you've got and give it to the poor. Give it
all up. And he went away sorrowful because
he had much goods. And there was a Pharisee that
went up to the temple to pray. He's always self-righteousness.
He couldn't give it up. That was his priority. And there
was Martha, cumbered about many things. But Mary, she wanted that good
part. She just let everything else
go because Christ was her priority. And there was a rich man. The
Lord blessed his ground, blessed everything he touched, seemingly,
but to him it was a curse. And he sat back and he said,
I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll tarry down my barns, and I'll
build a grater where to bestow my goods." And the Lord said,
Thou fool, this night your soul will be required of you. That
was his priority. And then there was those that
was invited to the supper. The Lord said, The supper is
prepared. It's on the table. It's a feast,
and it's good. Come, invitation, wouldn't come. Went out in the highways and
the hedges, said, come, the supper's ready. They wouldn't come. And they would all, all with
one consent, begin to make excuse. We're going to find out what
their priorities are. One fellow bought some oxen,
paid for them, and then he went out to try them. Another bought
some land. He had to go out and look it
over. Hadn't even seen the land. Another man married a woman.
He said, I've got to take care of her first. She comes first. All we've got in this world is
our family. Got to take care of them first. I'm not promoting
or suggesting we neglect our responsibilities in this world.
But the Lord said, Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness,
and all these things will be added to you. This is the natural
will of those who refuse to be denied their
heart's desire. It's natural. That's what I'm
saying. Our priorities can never be changed by ourselves. Have
you tried it? They can never be changed by
ourselves. Our actions, maybe for a while, but never our desires. Any self-change, outward change,
will become habit, not desired priority. And even then, the
end goal will be the same. Man's natural priorities are
committed to himself in the fulfilling of the lust of the flesh, the
lust of the eye, and the pride of life. For several years, and I'm not
going to be so foolish as to try to tell you what I've done
in religion or what I've done even since I've been a believer
in the way of faithfulness, but I worked about 45 miles from
home. I'd get up at 3 o'clock in the
morning. The plant started at 6. I'd get up and drive. I had to
be there at five to do an inventory before the plant started. And I'd done this for years.
And I didn't really realize it until I quit. This was the last
job I worked on before I came here. I never missed a day. I was never late. And I'd get up in the morning
at 3 o'clock and I'd dread. I mean, I would dread driving
and going to work. But I did it. I did it. I was faithful. You say, well,
you're bragging. I'm just telling you, I was faithful.
I never missed. Never was late. I left early one day to go to
a funeral and I got rolled up for it. That's commitment. That was important to me. That was a responsibility. I had a need to do that. I was committed to myself. I
was committed to that paycheck. I was committed to the people
I worked for. Some of you know what I mean.
Bobby, you've driven for years, miles, and probably most of you
have. You don't want to be late. You
want to be there. And I'm not coming down on you all for being
late coming in, which I think you all will be here on time,
but that's not the point here. What I'm saying is we can be
committed. and commit ourselves to natural
things, even unpleasant things, to the extreme, and deny ourselves
sleep and food and whatever it takes to accomplish that thing
we're committed to. But when it comes to Christ and
His gospel and the heart being in it, the heart being for it,
we can't do it. It takes a work of God's grace. Man's natural priorities are,
I know what they are, because I'm a natural man. Man's natural priorities are
comfort. Is that right? Convenience. Is that not so? Entertainment. and profit, and for these he will forfeit
all else, if necessary, for comfort, convenience, entertainment, and
profit, the sought satisfaction of his insatiable cravings and
always wanting more." Now I could say that's not me,
but I ain't going to lie to you. That's this natural man. What did the Lord say in our
text? He said the center of this, I read verses 19 through the
remainder of the chapter, and the center of it, the context
of it was this. He summed up in verse 33. He
said, Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness,
but we'll neglect that And we'll seek everything else to satisfy
the cravings and the desires of this flesh. Always wanting
more. Always needing more. And impossible
to satisfy. Always willing to curb our spiritual
appetite for the fulfillment of the fleshly appetite. In Luke
12, 30, he said, For all these things do the nations of the
earth seek after. And your father knoweth that
you have need of these things. You have need of shelter and
clothing and food and a car and a house. Yeah, you have need
of these things. He said, don't worry about that. I'll get you up and get you to
work. I'll take care of these things. You take care of this. Seek first
the kingdom of God and his righteousness. Do you understand what he's saying?
A believer can maybe understand a little bit of what he's saying. In Proverbs 27, 20, hell and
destruction are never full. Hell has opened her mouth without
measure to meet thee at thy coming, and it's never full. So the eyes of men are never
satisfied. Never satisfied. A couple of years ago, Robert
and I had a little blue boat. Remember that boat we'd drive
down to your house? Most of you never seen it. But it was a nice
boat. Had a little 40-horsepower motor
on it. Well, as the fellow pulled his boat out of the water, it
was a prettier boat. It was a bigger boat. And I'm going to make a point
here, and I'm going to use myself as an illustration. I wanted that boat. I didn't
want mine no more, I wanted his. Didn't need it no more, I need
another nose on my face. But I wanted it. It's pretty,
it runs faster. When I fished out of it, I got
it. I sold mine and bought that one. Had to put some money with
it, but I got it. I wasn't satisfied with mine.
Brother-in-law didn't catch me no more fish. Still couldn't catch any fish
much. But anyway, I had the boat. And you know what I'm thinking
about doing now? Selling the thing. I ain't got time to fish. I don't know how many days God
has left to give me here on this earth. God helped me to seek the Kingdom
of God and His righteousness first. And I'm not promoting not having
anything to enjoy. God gave us these things to enjoy. But it's where the heart is.
You understand what I'm saying? I don't need these things. I need Him. I need to learn to
preach the gospel, Debbie. I need to learn to tell you of
Christ. I need Him. This is the law of sin and death.
If indeed our priorities ever change, It'll be a supernatural
work of God's irresistible grace. Because we can't change them.
You can't change your heart. You can't do it. Try it. I dare
you to try it. You can't love what you hate
and you can't hate what you love. It'll be evident to ourselves
as well as others in the duration, in the long run. Having said that, now that's
not my message, that's introduction. Let us examine our priorities
in the light of one who had his priorities right. And if it don't
bring us around, we're hopeless. There's one man
that I know of that had everything just right. When the Lord Jesus Christ was
12 years old, and this didn't just begin when he was 12 years
old, but this is when he said this, his parents were seeking him. They were looking for him. They'd
lost sight of him. They were looking for him. And
they found him. And he said, how is it that you
sought me? Don't you know I've got to be about my father's business?
No, they didn't know. They did and they didn't. And
that's the way we are. We do, but we don't. Don't you
know that I must be about my father's business? His desire
was right. He wanted to do his father's
business. We've got a business as believers,
you know that? We've got to work. We've got a profession. On this
earth, our days are numbered and we've got an allotted time
to do it. Redeem the time, that's what
the Lord said, because the days are equal. Today is the only
day that we can honor Him and glorify Him and bow to Him and
worship Him, is today. Today, it's all we've got. Harden
not your hearts, as in the day of provocation in the wilderness.
In John 12, 27, he said, Now is my soul troubled. What shall
I say? His soul was troubled. Troubled
because of sin. That's why his soul was troubled. He was about to take upon him
and in him my sin. He said, Now is my soul troubled.
What shall I say? Father, save me from this hour. He said, Well, this is Why I
came to this hour? I can't say that. I can't turn
back. This is my priority. This is
why I came into the world. This is why I'm here. I've got
to live Tommy Robbins' life for him and die his death for him.
I've got to justify him, work out his righteousness, put away
his sin. Got to honor my Father. Got to do it all. I've got to
do it. This is my hour. This is my time. And believer,
this is our hour and this is our time. We've got to do it. John 18, 37. Pilate said to him,
Are you a king? And Jesus answered and said,
You say I'm a king. To this end was I born, and for
this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto
the truth." Why are we, if we are believers, why are we believers? Why are we Christians? To what
end and to what hour and why are we on this earth? Huh? To believe Him, to follow
Him, to worship Him, to seek after Him. to honor Him, to promote
His gospel and His glory, to comfort one another, to love
one another, to love Him as a body does love its head. Every place on this earth that
you find the truth Find the Lord Jesus Christ, the truth and a
work, God doing work. You'll find a group of people.
It may be two or three or six or ten or fifty, but you'll find
a group, a nucleus of people that He has committed. He's committed
them and they've committed unto Him themselves. He's committed
Himself to them and He's committed them to Him. And their life Their
life, the center of their life, what they live for, what they
seek, is the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. They're willing
to do, they're willing to go, they're willing to stay, they're
willing to give, they're willing to deny themselves, they're willing
to give it all up. He's made them that way. It's
a work of God's grace for His glory. And he said, everyone that's
of the truth hears my voice. He said, my meat, my life, is
to do the will of Him that sent me and to finish His work. That
was his priority. I told you he was going to tell
you one man that had his priorities right. And we say, well, I know
I can't do it. I know you can't do it either,
and I know I can't either. Boy, don't you want to? Don't you seek to? Don't you struggle to? He said,
strive to enter in at the straight gate. Strive, seek the kingdom
of God and His righteousness. If I don't labor to preach the
gospel, I'm not priesthood. If I don't have a burden to preach
the gospel, I'm not priesthood. If I don't have a love for it,
I'm not priesthood. And I can't have a love for it,
I can't labor for it, I can't seek to do it unless He gives
me that desire and that love and that labor. It's His. The meat for every believer is
to do the will of Him that called us. In Hebrews 12, 2, We look unto Jesus, the author
and finisher of our faith. What did He do? For the joy that
was set before Him endured the cross, despising
the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne
of God. What did He do? The Lord Jesus Christ, He endured. He endured. As a man, he endured. He denied himself. He said, foxes
have holes, the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of
Man had nowhere to lay His head. God gives His people an urgency.
I believe that. And I believe it grows. This
thing of backsliding and getting out of the will of God, that's
hogwash. I know we're indifferent sometimes.
I understand that. But as the Lord, the longer we
know Him and the more He is with us and He teaches us by experience,
by the hearing of the gospel, the more He calls His people
to desire Him. We look unto Jesus the author
and finisher of our faith. For the joy set before Him endured
the cross, despising the shame. Look with me in 1 Thessalonians
chapter 1. 1 Thessalonians 1. Paul and Silvanus, or Paul and
Silas, and Timothy unto the church the Thessalonians, which is in
God, the Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace be unto you
and peace from God, our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. We
give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of you
in our prayers, remembering without ceasing your work of faith and
labor of love and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ,
in the sight of God and our Father. Knowing, brethren, beloved, your
election of God. For our gospel came not of you
in word only, not just in doctrine, not just in theory or in thought
or in form, but also it came in power, a life-transforming
power. It came with love and assurance
and the Holy Ghost and much assurance, as you know what manner of men
we were among you for your sake. And you became followers of us.
Why did they follow Him? God sent him to them, and he
preached Christ to them, and he gave them a desire to hear
the message that they preached. And having received the word
in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost, so that ye
were examples to all that are in Macedonia and Achaia. For
from you sounded out the Word of the Lord, not only in Macedonia
and Achaia, but also in every place. Your faith to God will
be spread abroad, so that we need not to speak anything." You see? He gave them a priority. And
because of that priority and their faithfulness, he made them
faithful. They were known for it. They were known for their
love for Christ and love for his gospel because of their faithfulness.
Not just because they believed the doctrine, but because they
were examples. Examples. We're somebody's example. Somebody's example. And I want to give you some examples,
scriptural examples. Turn with the book of Hebrews. Hebrews chapter 11. God gives his people faith. He gives his people faith to
do that work he's called them to. And faith is always active. Faith
is never dead. If it is, it's not faith. It's
never asleep. If it is, it's not faith. Faith
is always active. And without faith, it's impossible
to please Him. So He gives it to us, and He's pleased with
it. And this faith moves. And it moves us toward that thing
that He's made near and dear to us. This is His work. He gives His people faith. He
makes it effectual. He makes it work. He makes it
work. In Hebrews 11, verse 1, now faith
is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not
seen. For by it the elders obtained a good report. And I'm not going
to read this whole chapter. I just want to skip down through
it. Look at verse 3. Through faith we understand.
By faith, we have an understanding. God gives us faith. By it, we
understand. Verse 4, by faith, Abel offered
unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain. In verse 5, by faith,
Enoch was translated that he should not see death. In verse
7, by faith, Noah, being warned of God, built an ark. Verse 8,
by faith, Abraham, when he was called to go, he went out and
he left. Through faith, in verse 11, also
Sarah herself received strength to conceive seed. She gave birth. And all these died in faith. They lived in faith, they died
in faith. This was their life, to do what
God had called them to do. This was their priority. to please
God. Without faith, it's impossible
to please Him, and we can't please Him ourselves. But He gives faith,
and that faith is effectual. That faith He gives works. It's
real. It causes us to believe and to
act upon that principle that He puts in our heart. And we
look at ourselves and we wonder if we have any faith. Like I
said at the outset, we just despair and we look at ourselves. But
we must look at the Scriptures. And faith always has an evidence. James said, I'll show you my
faith by my works. You say you have faith, but you
don't have any works, you don't have faith. Those that have faith
have works. And it's from a right motive. It's a motive that God gives.
It's love. It's love. The Old Testament saints, which
we read of, the New Testament saints, they had a priority. They had a priority. And that
priority was the glory of God. And then those that God has raised
up in more recent generations, I was thinking those that God
has was pleased to make Him and the gospel their priority. How
thankful we ought to be to God for them. And if we have opportunity,
we ought to thank them for God's sake. We know that the flesh
profits nothing, but God works in men. Now listen, I'm going to call
some names, and I usually don't do this, but I'm going to. The
men that God has raised up, that He's made faithful, they were
depraved, sorry, no good, scoundrels like me. But God was pleased
to raise them up and use them and make Him their priority. Luther, if God hadn't used Luther
the way He did, raised him up and made the gospel His priority,
we wouldn't be here. And it wasn't Luther that done
it, it was God that done it. Do you understand what I'm saying?
If God's going to save a people, He's going to use a people to
bring those people to Himself. And He's going to raise up preachers
to preach the gospel. And we can, you know, we the
Calvinists, we can just sit back and say, well, God's going to
save who He's going to save and that ain't going to do nothing. That's all right.
You do that. I'm glad that He is going to
save who He's going to save, but He's going to use somebody.
He's going to give them a desire and a love for Him and His gospel
and cause them to be faithful and committed. I heard John Calvin,
John Gill, Charles Spurgeon, and around these men was people
just like you and me that sat on pews and heard them preach
the gospel. One sinner telling another sinner,
of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's exactly who these men
were, Luther and Calvin, Gil and Spurgeon and others. They
were just sinners saved by the grace of God and He raised them
up and made them committed to the gospel. What about the men that wrote
the book? Huh? What about the men that God inspired
to write the book? What about those that Paul preached
to? What about Paul that God raised up? He used him. He said,
I count everything but done that I may preach Christ, that I may
preach Him to you, and I may be found in Him, that we may
be found in Him. And then more recently, earth's
rock burned. Brother Henry told me at one
time, he said I could count all the preachers, he knew the preachers
of the gospel, I could count them on one hand. There's Rob Barnard, Arthur Pink,
Henry Mahan, Don Fortner. God used these men to preach
the gospel to you and me and made them committed. And now
you have around these men and did during their ministry folks
just like me and you. These men, sinners that God saved
by His grace, made the gospel their priority and made those
around them the gospel their priority too. Those whom He has called to be
faithful and commit to the gospel which they preached. And when He had called the people
unto Him with disciples, He said unto them, Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, take up
his cross, and follow me. No more is expected out of a
Martin Luther or John Gill or any other preacher. No more is
expected out of them than there is out of me and you. And what
I mean by that is this. Christ and His gospel first. Christ is all. Seek ye first
the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be
added to you. If there were crowns in heaven
given to believers, there will be a crown of righteousness,
but it's not like we might think. But these men that I've mentioned,
their crowns will not be more glorious than the weakest member
of Christ's body. There won't be somebody having
a gold yo-yo and somebody else be kicking a tin can in heaven.
There won't be a cabin over in the corner of glory around somebody
else living in a mansion. It's those that He's called by
His grace, revealed Christ to, and made Christ all to them. Seek ye first the kingdom of
God. I want to do that. I want to do that. And I want you to. But my wanting
to is not going to make it happen. It's going to take the grace
of God. And I look and I see what I think to be evidence of
that in others. But I don't know. It's a hard thing. But I know this, where there is life. There's
going to be evidence. Now that might be a counterfeit that we can't see and we don't
know about, but I know where there is life. There'll be an
eating and a drinking and a moving. There'll be some action because
faith, we walk by faith, we live by faith, we run by faith. And
Christ will be at the priority of our hearts. Let's bury it.