We saw yesterday how Jesus said one goal mattered more than even day to day concerns like food and clothing: his kingdom. He said, “seek first the kingdom of God and all these things will be added to you.” What does that mean?
First of all, it doesn’t mean seek only God’s kingdom as some spiritual distant concept and ignore the realities of day to day life. Jesus doesn’t meant we should never eat or sleep, or that those things are inherently bad. He says quite clearly, when we seek first the kingdom, “then all these will be added to you.” He knows we need them, and wants to be the one to give them to us, but in their proper perspective.
For example, consider food. We need food to live, and good food is an enjoyable part of living. But that good thing can be made into an ultimate thing, and when that happens, it becomes a very bad thing. When we elevate food to become more than it was meant to be, and it becomes our source of comfort, emotional stability, we are in both physical and spiritual danger.
Instead, Jesus challenges us to seek kingdom of God. God is the creator sustainer of the whole world, including its food sources. He created, called it good, and wants us to enjoy the world’s sustenance so we can do our daily work and enjoy his provision. When we find our true satisfaction in God, then we can enjoy good things for what they are…we don’t have to overdo it, and we don’t have to hate it. This applies to food, and any number of other good things God created.
In the Christianity 101 course, we sometimes illustrate this with a wagon wheel. The hub is special – it’s particularly strong, and has a unique shape to do its job. The spokes are meant to be all connected with, and delivering power from the hub to the rim.
If we try to remove the hub and replace it with a spoke, you know what happens, it all falls apart. It’s the same with our lives. We were made to have God at the center of our lives, providing meaning and purpose to the whole. Unfortunately the human race tried to remove God from the center long ago, and have been trying to shove spokes in ever since, whether it be money, career, sexuality, power, or any other good thing God created that can be abused. This is a good definition of sin: When we take good things, try to make them our ultimate good, and that’s ultimately really bad for us.
Question: Make a list of good things in our world that can be abused.
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“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’ (Matthew 7:21-23 ESV)
We'll look at two misunderstandings of Christian faith.
One is that Christian faith is all about words you need to say. The other one says it's all about deeds you do.
We'll look at words today.
Jesus says people will come to him and say, "Lord, Lord"
Those are good words. Lord denotes respect and honour for Jesus.
There is a connection to God's name in the Old Testament. They even say it twice – this is no lazy acknowledgement.
But the motivation for saying these words is wrong. They are using good words like a password to get through the gates to heaven.
We've had several hacking attempts on Redeem the Commute, where computers try to guess our password with enough attempts. Guessing the password may get you in, but it doesn’t mean you belong in the admin section of our site! Guessing the passcode to a celebrity's home doesn't mean you know them.
Some act as if knowing the correct password gets you into heaven. Some think there is a particular prayer you have to pray, and that’s all that matters.
That's a misunderstanding because it makes it seem as if a magic, superstitious incantation is all God needs from us. That would mean we can do what we want – we could believe that we’ve already bought our ticket to heaven, so who cares what we do until then! But this is not true.
It would also mean Christians could manipulate people to make them say words out of fear that they don’t understand or follow through on.
It would also lead to some ridiculous deathbed confessions…where we could try to get people to say those words before they die, or people could delay saying them as long as possible until they were at death's door.
Now, it's indispensable to say Jesus is Lord. To avoid those words is to say I don’t want to live in his kingdom, heaven, where he’s Lord. Verbally confessing Jesus is critical. But that's not all there is to following Jesus.
Tomorrow, we'll see another perversion of Christian faith. Then on Thursday, we'll see what Jesus taught it was really all about.
Question: If Christian faith was just about saying the right words, how would this contradict what Jesus said earlier in the Sermon on the Mount, or elsewhere?
