Seeking the Kingdom of Heaven

I'm going to speak to you on
the subject, Seeking the Kingdom of Heaven. Seeking the Kingdom
of Heaven. Now remember, these messages
are available to you, not in printed form, but on cassette
tape. They're two messages. We've prepared
two messages at the same time, and they'll be on the same tape,
and they're available to you. I'm speaking today on Seeking
the Kingdom of Heaven. In Matthew chapter 6, verse 31
and 32, our Lord condemns anxious worry and care concerning the
material things of this world. He condemns it. He tells us this,
therefore take no thought, now this is anxious thought, take
no anxious thought, unusual care and worry, saying what shall
I eat? What shall I drink? Wherewithal
shall I be clothed? Your Heavenly Father knows you
have need of these things. He knows you need them, so don't
you worry about it. Don't take any anxious thought
about these things, because it's needless. Absolutely needless. If God so clothed the lily of
the field, which today is and tomorrow is cast into the oven
and burnt up, if God feeds a sparrow, which is not worth but very little,
how much more shall he clothe you? you his child? How much
more shall he feed and care for you?" He said, if you, being
evil, know how to give good things to your children, if your child
asked for bread, would you give him a stone? If he asked for
meat, would you give him a serpent? And if you, being evil, know
how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall
the Heavenly Father, who is infinitely more merciful than we are, give
good things to them that ask him? worry on the part of a believer. And I'm not talking to all people.
The sinner has much to worry about. He has much to be concerned
about. The wrath of God is upon him.
He that believeth not on the Son, the wrath of God abideth
on him. He needs to be concerned about
tomorrow, and he needs to be concerned about the next day
and every day. But not the believer. It's needless
for the believer to worry. And not only needless, but it's
useless. Our Lord said, which of you by taking thought or anxious
care can add one year to your life? One cubit to your stature
is one year to your life. Can the farmer by worrying make
it rain? Can he preserve his crops by
pacing the flow? It's in the hands of God. God's
the Lord of the harvest. He's the sower. He's the seed.
He's the Lord of the harvest. And it's useless for us to worry
about these things. And not only needless and useless,
but pagan. That's right, pagan. Our Lord
said, after all these things do the Gentiles seek. He's speaking
to the Jewish people. The Gentiles were the heathens,
they were the pagans. And our Lord is saying, if you
have anxious care and worry and thought about what you're going
to eat, drink and wear, like the Gentiles, like the heathens. That's all they're concerned
about. They're not concerned about spiritual things, they're
concerned about material things only. They have no God. They
have no providence. They have no God of purpose who
says, all things work together for good to them who love God,
who are the called according to his purpose. So the heathen
has no God, so he worries. He has no purpose, so he's concerned. He has no providential care to
take to look after him and watch over him, so he's got to be concerned.
But not you, you have a heavenly Father. Now remember this, you
can't serve two masters, Christ says that in verse 24 of Matthew
6, no man can serve two masters. Either materialism is your Lord
or Christ is your Lord, but not both, not both. You can't divide
your life into half for this world and half for You've got
to bow to one or the other, serve one or the other, be obedient
to one or the other, be concerned about one or the other. So Christ
said, don't therefore take no anxious thoughts, saying, what
shall we eat, what shall we drink, what shall we wear, wherewithal
shall we be clothed, where shall we sleep, what about tomorrow,
who's going to take care of me in my old age, will I have security,
will a storm come, will Russia take over, will the world be
destroyed? Don't worry about these things.
They're in the hands of the Heavenly Father. Now then, in verse 33,
he does tell us something to be concerned about. That's right. He tells every one of us something
to desire and to seek, and to seek with diligence and deep
sincerity and concern. He said, but seek ye first before
all things the kingdom of God and his righteousness. Now this
is worthy of concern. This is worthy of deep desire. This is worthy of sincere anxiety
to seek the kingdom of God. I'd be concerned about that.
Because blessed is the man whose king and God is the Lord. Blessed is the man who with Thomas
can say sincerely and truthfully, my Lord and my God. Christ is
my God. Materialism is not my God. Popularity
is not my God. This world is not my God. Self
is not my God, Christ is my God. And blessed is that man who is
clothed with the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Seek ye first. First before all things. I mean
before family care. I mean before personal care.
I mean before physical health. I mean before all things. That's
what Christ is saying, seek ye first. First, the kingdom of
God. and his righteousness." Now,
that's something to be concerned about. Your concern for material
things is condemned. Your concern for spiritual matters
is commanded. Your concern for the things of
this world is condemned. Your concern for the world to
come is commanded. And not only commanded, but accompanied
with a promise. He says, you seek first the kingdom
of God and his righteousness. And these things that you have
previously been concerned about, what shall I eat, what shall
I drink, wherewithal shall I be clothed, these will be added
to you in God's own time. You may not have the abundance
that you think you deserve or you'd like to have, but it will
be added in God's good time. Eternal health, eternal wealth,
eternal joy, eternal care, eternal glory. That's the main thing
anyway. It's not how I fare in this life,
but how I fare in eternity. That's what's really important,
isn't it? So you seek first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness,
and all these things will be added to you. Now, in Matthew
13, verse 44, our Lord illustrates this seeking of the kingdom of
heaven. Now, he has condemned materialism. He has condemned what is so prevalent
today, and it's all around you. Greed, grasping, going forth
for all of the things of this world. We're never satisfied,
are we? We always want a little more
of the things of this world. Not just necessities, but luxuries
and all of these things. Christ condemns that. He tells
us to give our care and concern and diligence to seek the kingdom
of God and his righteousness I know a little bit about what
Paul was talking about in Philippians 3 when he said, Oh, that I may
win Christ. What shall it profit a man, our
Lord said, if he gain the whole world and lose his soul? Here
Christ say to him in that day, Depart from me, I never knew
you. Oh, that I may win Christ and be found in him. Oh, that
I may know him and the power of his resurrected life. If a
man has Christ, he has everything. He has wisdom and righteousness
and sanctification and redemption. He has acceptance with God. He
has forgiveness of sin. He has eternal life. He's a joint
heir with Jesus Christ. He's an heir of God. All things
are yours, Christ said. All things are yours. Whether
in life or death, they're all yours. Now, our Lord illustrates
this seeking of the kingdom of God. And I want to be quite plain. And in being plain, I believe
that I'm dealing honestly with myself and with you from God's
Word. This thing of seeking the Kingdom
of God is a lot more than having a nominal interest in religion.
Now this is what we are plagued with on every hand today, a nominal
interest in religion. People dress up and go to church
on Sunday, and that's about the end of it until next Sunday morning.
Many dress up and go to church on Easter, Mother's Day, Christmas. Lent, some special Memorial Day
service, some special resurrection service. They just have a nominal
interest in religion. They're not really possessed
with it. They're not really, they don't want to be fanatical,
you know, and radical. And after all, they say, I'm
not really religious. I'm no saint, you know. They
have just a nominal interest in religion. That's not what
we're talking about. That's not seeking the kingdom of God. And
this thing of seeking the kingdom of God is not just getting fixed
up for heaven. And as they say, he made his
peace with God. Everything's all right, you know.
He's ready to die. That's not seeking the kingdom
of God. That's not what our Lord's talking
about at all. You're going to see that in a moment. And then this
thing of seeking the kingdom of God is not just erasing the
fear of death. Well, I'm not afraid to die.
Most people aren't, because most people have some kind of refuge,
false or otherwise. I'm not afraid of the judgment.
I just want justice. Well, I don't think you do, really.
You might want justice for men, but the justice of God is quite
severe, who spared not his own son, who was a sinner by imputation
and not by guilt. And they say, well, I'm not afraid
of hell. Most people aren't. They've never seen it, and they
don't fear what they haven't seen. But this thing of seeking the
kingdom of God is a whole lot more than just erasing the fear
of death, judgment, and hell, and it's a whole lot more than
reformation of life. That's right, it's a whole lot more than keeping
a few laws and and straightening up your life and joining a church
and making a decision for Jesus. Let's let Christ, let's let our
Lord illustrate what it is to seek the kingdom of God. He says,
you seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness. All these
things will be added to you. Well, what is it? Well, look
at verse 44. Let's let the Savior outline the hours. He has three
points. He says, first of all, this kingdom
of heaven that you are to seek. is like a treasure, a treasure
hid in a field, the which, when a man hath found it, and for
the joy thereof, he goeth and selleth all that he hath, and
buys that field." Now, that's what the kingdom of heaven is.
It's like a treasure hid in a field that a man finds, and for the
joy in his heart and soul over finding that treasure, he goes
and sells everything he has, and buys that thing. Interpret
that, preacher. All right, will you listen to
me? First of all, the treasure, what is it? The treasure is the
gospel. It's the gospel. And what a treasure
it is. Paul said, I'm not ashamed of
the gospel. It is the power of God unto salvation. to the Jew first and also to
the Greek. What a treasure that is the power,
the dynamite of God himself to the salvation of both Jew and
Gentile. What a treasure is this gospel
that enables a holy God to be just and to justify the ungodly. What a treasure is this gospel
that lifts the beggars from the dunghill and elevates him to
a priesthood and kingship, and makes him a prince, to sit among
the princes, a beggar on the dunghill. This gospel, what a
treasure it is, it gives sight to the blind, hearing to the
deaf, speech to the dumb, legs to the lame, life to the dead,
freedom to the captive. That's what Christ said he came
to do. This gospel is the power of God to do that. What a treasure
it is! What a treasure it is! It covers
all our sins, the great sins and what we call the little sins,
of which there's no such thing. All sins casted into the depths
of the sea, casted behind the back of God, blocked it out of
the memory of God, separates it from us as far as the east
is from the west. What a treasure! That's the treasure
that the man finds hidden in a field. Well, preacher, what
does it mean, the gospel is a treasure hidden in a field? Well, the
field may be applied to several things. You know, the gospel
is a mystery. Everybody doesn't understand
the gospel that thinks they do. Everybody doesn't preach the
gospel that thinks they do. Everybody is not an authority
on the gospel that thinks he is. The scripture said, if our
gospel be hidden, that's right, 2 Corinthians chapter 4, verse
3, it is hid to them who are lost, in whom the God of this
world hath blinded their minds, lest the light of the glorious
gospel of Christ should shine in, they should be saved. Matthew
13, 35, listen to Christ, I will utter things which have been
kept secret from the foundation of the world. And then over in
Matthew 13, 17, he said, and righteous men have desired
to see those things which you see and have not seen them, and
to hear those things which you hear and have not heard them?
Blessed are your eyes, they see." Look back at verse 16. And they
said, why are you preaching in parables to the multitude? He
said, but they have eyes and they can't see, and ears and
they don't hear, and hearts and they don't understand. That's
why I preach in parables. The gospel is here. It has to
be revealed. The reason it's foolishness to
them that perish, they don't understand it. It's foolishness
because they can't comprehend it. They don't understand it.
They've never been given spiritual ears and eyes and hearts to comprehend
and to discern that which God has written about his Son, sin,
eternal life, salvation. Where is the gospel hid? Well,
it's hid in the promises of God. Way back down in the Garden of
Eden when Adam and Eve fell, God came to the serpent and I'll
put enmity between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her
seed." Woman's seed? When you read that the first
time, didn't you put a question mark over woman's seed? Woman
don't have a seed. Man's seed, but woman's seed?
That's the virgin-born Son of God. That's the first prophecy
of Christ's coming. He's right in there, right in
that promise. That's Christ in there. And he says that woman's
seed is going to destroy your power and crush your head. And
you're going to bruise his heel, that's his human nature. Crucify
him, make him bleed and die. But when Christ died, though
his human nature, his lower nature was suffered, but the power, the
government of Satan was destroyed. His head was cut. Look over,
if you will, at Isaiah 53. He was wounded for our transgression,
bruised for our iniquity. That's Christ. He, the open eunuch,
was reading that scripture, Misera 53, and it said, Philip began
at the same scripture and preached Jesus to it. It's right there.
All the way through the Old Testament. You see Christ in every promise.
Moses said to Israel, God will raise up a prophet out of the
midst of you, out of the midst of the brethren, just like me.
You listen to him. That's Christ. In all the promises. And Christ
is here in the text. I hear preachers preaching on
the Passover, and they don't mention Christ. Preaching on
the Ark, they don't mention Christ. Preaching on the tabernacle,
they don't mention Christ. Christ is in all these things.
The tabernacle, the priesthood, the Passover, that rock that
Moses smote in the wilderness, that rock is Christ. The rock
from which they drank is Christ, the Bible says that. Christ is
our Passover, the blood on the door, that's Christ. the high
priest under the veil into the Holy of Holies. That's Christ,
the gospel is right in there. It's here also in the message
of the apostles. Men, I tell you today, God gives
the means of grace and people worship the means instead of
the objects. God sends his son into the world through a woman
and they make a god out of the woman and ignore the son. God
sends Christ Jesus into the world to die for our sins and people
worship the cross instead of the one that died on the cross.
That's right. And Christ left baptism as an
ordinance to show our identification with him and to confess him,
and men worship the water and forget all about the death, burial,
and resurrection of Christ. And he left the Lord's Supper
as a memorial feast to show forth his death till he comes, and
men seek salvation, not in him who's coming, but in the bread
and the wine. How blind we are. The gospel's
here. It's here in these things. But
watch it. It said, when a man finds it.
When a man by the power of the Holy Spirit has his spiritual
eyes open, and the Bible becomes to him more than just a history
book, the history of religion, and it becomes the history of
redemption. When instead of the history of religion, it's the
history of redemption. When the Bible becomes more than
an almanac, and becomes the word of life, the word of life. When the Bible becomes more than
a scrapbook to keep a lock of mama's hair, and a wedding picture,
and all of these different things you saved all your life, and
shame on you for using your Bible for a scrapbook. One of these
days you'll be sorry that you used it for that instead of as
a roadmap to point you to Christ, and as a compass to direct you
to the Son of God, and as the Word of God to point you to faith.
The Bible, Christ is the Bible. And when God opens a man's eyes
to see that, and his ears to hear when the preacher is preaching,
not just the preacher's words, but hear God speaking through
his words. I know there are not many of them preaching God's
word, and not many of them preaching for God's glory, but some are.
God's never been without a witness. You might have to look a long
time to find him, but you'll recognize him when you hear him.
He'll be glorifying God, not himself. He'll be glorifying
Christ, not his denomination. He'll be preaching Christ, not
himself. He'll be offering salvation and not some silly record, or
a book, or a trip to the Holy Land, or some recognition for
you, and he won't be dedicating a bunch of songs, he'll be preaching
Christ. You recognize him. And God will
open your ears to hear not just his words, but you'll hear God
speak through his words. God speak. Oh God, speak to our
hearts. And when that man's heart is
open, and he finds the gospel, he finds the gospel. You know,
one day our Lord preached and about 5,000 or 6,000 people just
walked off. They just, they weren't going
to hear that anymore. They said, that's a hard saying.
Who can hear it? They wouldn't listen to it. They
left and just the 12 disciples were standing there and the Lord
turned to the disciples and said, would you also go away? And they
said, listen, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal
life. My friends, the words of eternal
life are the words of Christ. We have nowhere else to go. We
know. We found it. We found it. We
found it in a person. We found it in his sacrifice,
in his substitutionary work. Well, what does this man do when
he finds this gospel that's here in the promises and the prophecies
and the types and the tabernacle and the gospel and the message
of the apostle? What does he do? He hides it. He holds it to himself. He brings
it close in his heart. And then he begins to make arrangements
to get rid of all those things that would prevent him from possessing
that gospel. Oh, there are a lot of things,
too. There are a lot of things that are getting in the way.
It may cost him his possessions. He may be employed in a job that
will not let him continue in that employment and glorify God,
and he'll have to go. He may be running around with
people that that do not know the Savior and do not love the
Savior. And when he comes to know the Savior, he'll have to
part with them. They'll part with him, too, but
he'll have to part with them, because what fellowship does
darkness have with light? Two can't walk together except
they be agreed. They may meet on the street and
speak. They may pass their paths and they cross and greet one
another, but they can't walk together. And he may be in a
church that doesn't preach the gospel, and he'll have to get
out. They have to get out. And there are just so many things.
Christ said, if you love mother and father, husband, wife, brother,
sister, even your own wife more than me, you're not worthy. You're
not fit to be my disciple. So this man, he finds this treasure,
the gospel, and he finds it hidden in all these things, in the Word.
And he makes arrangements to get rid of it. He's got to have
that gospel. He's found the way of life. He's
found life. He's found truth. And the truth
sets men free. And he's willing to part with
everything, everything, to possess that gospel. That's seeking the
kingdom of God. Notice verse 45. Our Lord said
again, The kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man seeking
goodly pearls, who, when he had found the one pearl of great
price, went out and sold all that he had and bought it. What
is that pearl? That one pearl of great price
is the Lord Jesus Christ. That's right. This merchant man
is seeking. He's seeking. He's aroused to
seek the kingdom of God. He's aroused to seek the way
of life. He knows his need. He'll never be satisfied with
imitation pearls. No, men who know the truth are
not satisfied with imitation or counterfeit pearls. They want
the real thing. And he finds the one great pearl
of great price, and that's Christ the Lord. To the artist, he's
the altogether lovely one. To the architect, he's the chief
cornerstone. To the baker, he's the bread
of life. To the banker, he's the unsearchable riches. To the
botanist, he's the lily of the valley. To the builder, he's
the sure foundation. To the bride, he's the bridegroom.
To the captive, he's the great emancipator. To the doctor, he's
the great physician. To the farmer, he's the sower
and the seed and the lord of the harvest. To the lawyer, he's
the righteous judge. to the philosopher, he's the
wisdom of God, to the sinner, he's the Savior, to the soldier,
he's the captain of our salvation, to the preacher, he's the word
of life, to the student, he's the truth. Christ is all. He
of God is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption. And this man, this merchant,
seeking goodly pearls, he finds it all in one. All in one. Everything he's seeking is in
one. Seeking sanctification, it's in Christ. Seeking wisdom,
it's in Christ. Seeking righteousness, it's in
Christ. Seeking redemption, it's in Christ. Seeking eternal life,
it's in Christ. Seeking God, he's in Christ.
Seeking heaven, that's in Christ. He found it all. He was seeking
goodly pearls. Found it all in one. And what
did he do? Made arrangements to buy them.
And he sold out. He sold everything he had. Everything
that got in his way of owning, possessing that pearl had to
go. And that's what Christ is saying
to us. And he came back and he bought it. What is the buying?
It's committing to Christ. That's what Paul said, I've committed
it to him. I've sold out, I've burned my
bridges, I cast myself on Christ, sink or swim, I go to him. Now
last of all, verse 47, he said, the kingdom of God, like a treasure,
a pearl, now a net. And the sailors cast the net
out in the water. And the net is full of fishes,
full of fish, and they bring them ashore. And they open the
net, some are bad and some are good, and they throw the bad
out and keep the good. And he says that net is the preaching
of the gospel, just what I'm doing right now. And you throw
it out, you preach the gospel, and you draw it in. The church,
the visible church, and some follow Christ for some reasons
and some for other reasons, but some because they love him, because
they believe on him. And the others are thrown out,
and the true believer is kept. If you want this message and
the one I preached last week, you write to me. They're both
on the same cassette tape, available to you for $3. Seeking the Kingdom
of God. Until next week at this same
time, this is Henry Mahan bidding you a very pleasant, good day.

Seeking the Kingdom of Heaven

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Seeking the Kingdom of Heaven

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