Keeping it real…
Matthew 22:34-38
“But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and the first commandment.
This is a short passage of Scripture that I’m sure we’ve all heard hundreds of times, but to me it is so powerful. So much is wrapped up in these 5 short verses. In these verses Jesus is summing up for us what is truly important. Jesus tells us that the “great and first commandment”, the most important commandment is this, to “love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” Basically to love God with all that we are, to love God totally and completely.
Don’t we all wonder sometimes, “What does God want from me? What is my purpose in life?” At least I hope as a Christian you ask yourself these things. Well Jesus tells us right here what our main purpose in life is. TO LOVE GOD! I’m not sure if that sounds hard to you guys, or easy. It should be easy to love God shouldn’t it? But it isn’t always. Almost everything in this world seems to be pulling us away from Him. First of all, sin takes us away from God. Secondly our lives take us away from God. It is so easy to get caught up in our jobs, money issues, our families, our health, our hobbies, even our television shows, and a biggie for me personally is surfing the internet, that we lose sight of who God is. We lose sight of what is really important. We lose sight of what is real. Now I’m not saying that loving our families or working hard isn’t good. It is. It is all a part of how we glorify God, and how we serve Him. But we can never let those things become more important, or take the place of our loving and serving God.
I’ll be honest; this is one of the hardest things for me to do as a Christian. To stay focused on God, to love God the way that I am commanded to. I let my sin, my worries about my job, my finances, or family issues get in the way. Why do I do it? Because I lose sight of what is truly important. I lose sight of what is real.
Matthew 6:19-21
“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Again, this is another passage that we have all heard hundreds of times. Most of the time we hear this passage and we think that it only relates to money, or things, and not putting our trust in those “earthly treasures” That is true. But again, it is illustrating a point. What is real isn’t what we see here on earth. What is real, what is truly important are the things of God.
The things on this earth, our money, our things, everything on this planet, apart from our relationship with God is temporary. And only those things that we do that are related to God and in service to Him are eternal. This seems like a “no-brainer” I’m sure to all of you, but there are a lot of implications in what I just said.
We may love our friends, spouses, and our children, and that is good. But if we aren’t loving them, and trying to love them with the love of Christ, and trying to show them His love, and to draw them closer to Him, then it is a selfish love, that is all about us, and it is just an earthly love. Anything that is selfish, and all about us, does not glorify God.
Take for instance what I said earlier about me surfing the internet. Most times I am browsing theology web-sites, or discussion boards, and trying to learn more about God. Now that is a good thing, but many times I find myself doing it for selfish reasons. Trying to learn more about God, so that I can draw closer to Him is a good thing. But many times I am trying to learn more so that I can impress people by what I know, or so that I can prove a point or win an argument with someone whom I’m having a debate with in one of my discussion boards. That focus on myself does not glorify God, because that earthly satisfaction, is temporary and self focused and is not for God, and therefore not eternal. I’ve actually had to stop visiting those discussion boards for that very reason.
The same goes for our jobs. We may work hard, which is good, and is commanded by God, but what are our reasons? Is it so that we can get paid to pay our bills, or our mortgage? Is it so that we can impress the boss, or so that he won’t yell at us? Is it so that we can get a promotion, and get respect from our peers? Or is it because you are trying to be a good witness for Christ, and you are seeking to glorify Him. Too many times it is because we don’t want to get yelled at or fired. But what does the Bible say? Matthew 10:28, “…do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” Again we see here the illustration of what is real, what is eternal, what is important. Not what we see here and now, but those things that are heavenly. What is real, what is truly important, is God, and loving Him, and serving Him with all that we are, with all that we have.
This may be slightly off topic, but I think it pertains to what we are talking about. I have a very good friend to whom I witnessed to for quite a while a few years back. After many conversations, several Bible studies, and much prayer, she told me she was ready to receive Christ as her Savior. It was an awesome thing, she was on fire for God. She couldn’t stop reading her Bible, every day she had more questions for me. She was really focused on God and it showed in her life. Obviously there we’re some bumps, some issues as she began her Christian walk, but I think we’ve all experienced those.
Over the past year, for a variety of reasons, mainly life circumstances, we haven’t been able to talk as much. A lot has happened in her life, and sadly it seems as though she has lost her focus on God. She is doing a lot, that does not glorify Him. She has replaced her love of God, with earthly things and pleasures. That in itself is a horrible thing, but she has also tried to distance herself from me. She knows that there are things that she is doing that I don’t approve of. She knows the things she’s doing is wrong. A mutual friend of ours has even told me she believes this is why she doesn’t stay in touch, or is very hard for me to get up with sometimes. She told me that she is afraid of what I might say to her. With my friend we have two issues. First as I said she’s taken her focus off of God, and allowed sin and earthly pleasures to take His place in her life. But I find it interesting, that she won’t talk to me, or tries to distance herself from me, because she is afraid of what I might say, but she isn’t afraid of God, and what He thinks about the things she is doing.
My friend is no different than a lot of us. I know I’ve done the same thing in my life. Let’s all ask ourselves real quick. Is there anything we are doing in our lives that we wouldn’t want to come to church and tell everyone about? Is there something we’ve done in the past week that we would be ashamed to admit? If you guys answer no, then you’re doing better than me. I’m sometimes amazed at my own sinfulness. We are all sinners, I know, and I’m really referring to habitual sin. Things that we know are wrong, but yet we keep doing anyway. Why are we ashamed to admit it to each other, but yet we boldly do it before God? Because we’ve forgotten what is real. We’ve forgotten who really matters, and what is truly important. We fear men, more than we fear God, and that is a problem.
Last week Will and I went to a conference in Durham, and among others we heard John Piper speak, and afterwards there was a Q&A session. During this session, someone asked him, his advice for helping a young pastor get over his fear of man issues. He said that he must replace his fear of man, with a fear of God. I believe he said that he must tremble before God. But I don’t believe that just applies to pastors. I believe it applies to all of us who call ourselves Christian. If our focus is on God, and on the things of God, and what is truly real then we will fear God more than man.
Let me ask all of us another question, this church we are trying to plant (Crossmark Church). What are our goals, what are the reasons that we want to plant this church. Is it because we want a cool church? Is it because we all like each other and want to hang out a couple of times during the week? Is it because we think we’re going to be more important, or respected, or even make some money by doing what we’re doing? Or is it because we love God, and want to show others who He is, and to help them love Him too? Is it because we want to draw closer to Him ourselves, learn more about who He is, and love Him even more tomorrow than we do today? If these aren’t our goals, then we might as well pack it up now, and go home, because those are the only things that are important. Loving God, serving Him, and showing Him to others is what is truly important. That’s what is real.
Right now we might be thinking, “Trying to stay focused on God sounds really stressful, I don’t think I can do it.” You are right, it is hard. And apart from the Spirit of God we cannot do it. I’ve told you this before, but I want to tell you again, please go home and read Romans Chapter 8. As Christians we must live according to the Spirit, it is the only way we can truly love God, and glorify Him. For now let me just give you a couple of verses. Romans 8:6-8, “To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.”
If you are trying to please yourself, and are only focused on the things of this world, you are separating yourself from God, but if you are focused on the things of God, the things that are real, then and only then are you truly alive, and in verse 6 of Romans 8, Paul tells us that our minds will have peace.
God doesn’t need me to vouch for Him, but I can say from personal experience this is a very true statement. When I have gone through seasons where I was feeling distant from God, when I wasn’t focusing on Him, and serving Him, but instead was focused on what I wanted, and what I thought I needed, I had no peace whatsoever. Basically I was loving myself instead of loving God. But as soon as I started to focus on God, that peace that only God can give was back. I had real peace of mind.
In Colossians 3:2-4, Paul says, “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” Here in Colossians Chapter 3 verse 4 Paul talks about the eternal reward, as far as our future glory, but read through the rest of Chapter 3. He tells us what we must do, and even talks about the harmony that our lives can have, and even the “peace of Christ” that we can have. So you see there is not only the eternal reward, and the eternal benefits, but there is also a benefit to our lives here and now. We just need to be focused on God, the things that are real, the things that will truly last.
I’ve talked today about some of the things that separate us from God, and things that take our focus off of Him. I even spoke a bit about sin, and how that separates us from God. When I spoke about sin before, I spoke of it in terms of how the fact that we are sinning separates us from God, and takes our focus off of Him. But there is another way that sin separates us from God as well. Sometimes when we look at ourselves, and our sinfulness, we become ashamed of our sin. And that is a good thing; don’t think I’m saying that it’s not. It is the first step towards us asking Him for and receiving forgiveness. But sometimes we are so focused on our sin, that we run from God, or won’t even approach Him to ask for that forgiveness. I’m not sure why, but maybe we think that God could never forgive sinners like us. But that is not how we ought to look at it. You see even then, we’ve got the focus all wrong. You see, that is why Jesus died. He took your sins, my sins upon Himself, so that you and I could be forgiven.
Yes you should acknowledge your sin, and it should be something you think about, but your focus shouldn’t be on your sin, it should be on the one who died so that you could be forgiven of that sin. The One who died so that those sins could be taken away. If you’ve put your faith in Him, then you have been saved. Romans 10:11 says that, “Everyone who believes in Him will not be put to shame.” Isn’t that a wonderful thought? If you have believed in Jesus and what He’s done by dieing on the cross for you. Don’t be ashamed, so mired in your own sinfulness that you can’t glory in the fact that you’ve been given new life. Turn away from that sin, focus on living for God, and focus mostly on who He is. He is all that truly matters. He is the only thing in this world that is really real.
I’m going to end here with a word from the Prophet Isaiah, In Chapter 26, verse 3 of His book he says, “You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you. Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord God is an everlasting rock.”
Amen…
