In this sermon, the speaker addresses the issue of Christians not living according to the teachings of Christ. He emphasizes the importance of seeking first the Kingdom of God and living in accordance with Christ's instructions. The speaker highlights the problem of living above one's means and spending foolishly, which leads to financial worries and stress. He contrasts this with the example of the Macedonians, who despite their poverty, gave generously. The sermon also touches on the moral decay and perversity in society, as well as the negative consequences of greed and debt. The speaker encourages listeners to store up treasures in heaven rather than on earth, as earthly possessions are uncertain and can be easily lost.

Well, Thursday came around and I looked at Romans 10. And I read and I read and I listened to some things and I read and I read and I cross-referenced and I did a whole study. I read an entire book on the righteousness of Christ. Just no liberty. And Friday came. And I looked and I read and I prayed. I began to get somewhat more desperate with the Lord. Nothing. I got up Saturday. I thought, Lord, I can't do this. These are Your people. You want them to be fed. And I thought to myself, well, maybe the Lord doesn't want me to go there. So I started thinking, is there anything that I really feel burdened for right now? And I thought, yeah, there is something and it has to do with faith. And I typed faith into my Bible software and the very first verse that came up, I said, that's it. That's it right there. That's what God wants me to deal with. It came out of Matthew 6. So I'd like you to turn there. Matthew 6, of course, lands a square in the middle of what is commonly known as the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon on the Mount. Now listen, there are folks going about today that want to tell us that the Sermon on the Mount is not for today. If any of you guys are into listening to J. Vernon McGee, don't listen to him. These hyper-dispensational... and I realize sometimes he can say things and he is good in some areas. But, look, the guy is a hyper-dispensational and he doesn't believe that the Sermon on the Mount, which is Matthew 5, 6, and 7, it's the longest recorded sermon of our Lord Jesus Christ in the Scriptures. And he says it's not for today. It's for the Kingdom Age. Folks, we're in the Kingdom Age. One of the problems with their eschatology lies right there. Jesus Christ is on the throne. He is reigning. You can read that in 1 Corinthians 15, by the way. And He will reign until He turns this whole Kingdom over to His Father. That's what Scripture says. Why is it that some people don't want to take the Sermon on the Mount and apply it to today? Where's the trouble? I'll tell you where it is. To some people, it has too much of a legal ring in an age of grace. They say there's too much law here. It's got to be for another age. Look, Jesus Christ is not dismissing what we've been looking at in Romans right there at the end of 9 and what we'll be looking at at the beginning of 10. What? A righteousness that's attained by faith. He's not denying that. But what the Sermon on the Mount is all about and the righteousness that is proclaimed in the Sermon on the Mount, it is not an imputed righteousness. It is not an attained righteousness. It is not a righteousness that's worked out by Jesus Christ that is then put to our account. That is not what Christ is dealing with. What He's dealing with in the Sermon on the Mount is the practical righteousness that you better have. Because where somebody is legally determined to be righteous, in other words, justified on the merits of Jesus Christ, wherever that happens, there is new birth. Which means there's a new heart. Which means you're indwelt by the Spirit of God. Which means you're a new creation in Christ. Which means old things have passed away. And if they haven't, you've not been born again. And if you haven't been born again, you don't have faith. And if there's no faith, you're not justified. You don't have Christ's righteousness unless there is that promise of God that is found in Romans 8, 29, and 30 being worked out in your life. And what is it? He predestinated that He would conform every one of us into the image of Jesus Christ. Every one of us. If you're foreknown, you've been predestinated. If you've been called, you've been predestinated to be conformed to that image. If you've been justified, you are being conformed to that image. If you have any hopes of ever being glorified, it is because that righteousness is being worked out in your life. It has its definite proofs. Jesus Christ basically for three chapters builds this righteousness. And He says, your righteousness better exceed that of the Pharisees. And what was that? It was external. He's saying you better have a heart righteousness. You know what? You better have a righteousness when people aren't looking. You better have a righteousness when it's just you and God. That's the idea of the Sermon on the Mount. Comes at us over and over and over. This is the aspect of the righteousness He's looking at. Whether it's prayer, whether it's fasting, whether it's giving of alms, don't do it like the hypocrites. How are we supposed to do it? We're supposed to do it as though we really believe there is a God who is watching, who sees us in secret. We go into the secret place. We pray. We fast. We trust that there is a God who is watching us. We live in light of the watching Father in Heaven, not in light of the guy that's watching me across the aisle. We don't have too many aisles here, but the next chair. Let's read this. Matthew 6, beginning in verse 19. You know, the whole Sermon on the Mount begins with this aspect of the Beatitudes. And what is it? It's not legal realities, although there must be legal realities. And what I mean by that is legally we must have imputed to us a perfect keeping of the law, which comes from Jesus Christ. But the Beatitudes are not concerned with that. They're looking at character traits of those who belong to the kingdom. You've got mourning and meekness, purity of heart. These aspects, this is the theme that comes at us. Even as we're closing out the Sermon on the Mount, what's the Lord still dealing with? He's dealing with this. It's not everybody that says, Lord, Lord, that gets into the kingdom of Heaven. Who is it? It's the ones who are, again, here's this practical righteousness. It's the ones who are doing the will of the Father. And those who are told to depart are called what? Lawless or workers of iniquity. That's the problem. And you know what? The very end of the Sermon on the Mount, He's dealing with this. He's dealing with a wise man and a foolish man. The wise man is a man who is living life in such a way where he is hearing this Word and he's doing it versus the person who hears this Word and does not do it. You see, it's practical from beginning to end. It's the working out of the realities of a Christ-likeness. Christianity radically transforms. Here we find ourselves in the heart of this. Matthew 6.19. It's amazing how much our Lord Jesus Christ had to say about money. That is not my major intent to deal with that. I'm actually dealing with this text mostly because I'm concerned about our faith. Not so much because I'm wanting you guys to give extra offerings today. God leads you to do that during the service. Well, that's between you and Him. But the fact is, I'm hitting this because I have a concern, and I always have. We can lack a lot of things in this church. We can lack certain accommodations. We can lack certain seating in certain aisles. We can lack a lot. But if we get to the place where we lack faith, we're in trouble. We've got to have faith, because faith is pleasing to God. And where we lack that... You fill in the blank there. Matthew 6.19. Let's read. Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy. Don't lay it up. I mean, what's that mean? Yes, it means bank accounts. It means retirement accounts. It means that kind of thing. Don't lay it up. Don't stash it up. Don't hoard it here. Don't lay it up for a rainy day. Seem to be the old depression mentality. It says don't do it. Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth. Jesus Christ is saying this. Boy, it's amazing how people love to explain this text away. But this is what Christ said. This is how He lived. This is how His followers lived. And why don't you want to lay them up there? There's moths, there's rust that destroy. Thieves break in. Economies fall flat on their faces. Retirement funds that were $400,000 are now $200,000. It can be gone like that, folks. That's why you don't want to store it up here. Because it's uncertain. Every one of you that has ever given... And I'm saying, if you're a child of God, and you have given money, and laid it up in heaven for the support of the needy, the spread of the Gospel, the support of missionaries, for the widow and for the orphan, for the naked, for the hungry, you didn't lose it when the economy crashed. It's there. And it's pulling the kind of interest only God can give. You haven't lost anything. But, now that's what you're not supposed to do. But, lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven. Now look, we talked before about wisdom. Wisdom is seeking your greatest good. I mean, go along that path that is going to bring you the greatest good for the greatest amount of time. Obviously, that equates to doing things for the eternal benefit. That is the longest amount of time. This life is short. Eternity is long. Doing in this life what is going to be for your greatest good in eternity is very good. That's wise. Jesus Christ of all people, does Scripture not say that God made Him our wisdom? Listen to Him. The man has wisdom. You listen to Him. What does He say? Don't store it up here. What do most Americans do? Store it up here. He says don't do it. Why? Because this life is so short and there are so many uncertainties here. Lay it up there. But why don't people lay it up there? The reason they don't is because they don't really trust God will take care of them when they get to a place in their life where they have a need. And so instead of trusting God, they're trusting their money. They feel like they've got to have it. They've got to have that security blanket there. Rather than God being their security. Now listen, I realize you can argue and you can reason through a lot of things here. All I'm telling you is this. This verse, if you're a true Christian, better have some effect on your life. You need to be growing in how this affects your life. You need to be coming to greater and greater enlightenment on this and greater and greater actions worked out in your life that are in accord with this verse. Lay up for yourselves treasure in heaven where neither moth nor rust destroys, where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Now jump over to v. 24. No one can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God in money. Therefore, I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, what you will drink, or about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air. They neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? Why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore, do not be anxious, saying, what shall we eat? Or what shall we drink? Or what shall we wear? For the Gentiles seek after these things. And your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But, seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Therefore, do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Now look, in many ways, we live in uncertain times. Right before our eyes, we are seeing politicians and leaders who simply bewilder us with their amazing lack of wisdom and discernment. Some of the decisions that are being made right now in Washington or in certain states, just, I don't get it. We're personally witnessing right now a major shift in the presidential administration of our own country. You know radical policy changes are coming. And they tend to be extremely liberal and for the most part, anti-Christian. That's what we see. Don't you guys feel that? We look around. I mentioned this the other day, I think at the Bible study. Mona Leiter sent an email showing billboards that are going up in the Denver area, 11 of them, right at this holiday season. They say something like, don't believe in God? It's okay, you're not alone. Or you're not alone. Something like that. And we look around us and we see just on the surface, this godless, atheistic society. I mean, it's like now that we have the outgoing of a certain administration, it's like it's going to become a free-for-all for homosexual marriage and that type of thing. And I heard the other day that some kid committed suicide and did it right there on the camera. There were a bunch of people across the country and the world watching him do this. We've gotten to a place where we're a sick country. We live in a sick world. There is perversity on every side. I mean, we've got pedophiles. I understand pedophiles are now in the high schools because they're so young. We have filth and garbage of man that just flows in our streets. And then our country. It's spiraling out of hand with its greed and its debt. Our spending habits. And you know what? We're witnessing the devastating effects of this on every level. On the personal. In the banking institutions. Now the automobile companies. And we see this thing. Homes being foreclosed on at record rates. I mean, these are things that touch us. Gas prices. They were almost up to $4. Now they've fallen off. Who knows where they'll be tomorrow. We just feel this. Economically, there are these uncertainties. I mean, we wonder, where are things going to be? Our government is either lending or giving taxpayer money to salvage these institutions out there that are failing. Why? Basically because of greed, because of corruption, because of mismanagement. I mean, amounts. Can you guys even fathom $700 billion? When they start talking $2 trillion here or $10 trillion there? It's just mind-boggling. The kingdoms of this world reel to and fro as these mighty financial institutions collapse around us. And now we're hearing, well, you know, unemployment is on the rise and people are concerned about their jobs and people are worried. And I know some in here, this whole economic crisis is affecting us. Some of you, you're not certain whether you're going to have a job a year from now. You're not certain about where three months from now, six months from now. There's worry, there's concern, there's uncertainty in these days. We hear words like recession, depression. We hear of massive layoffs and people are afraid. Most people who have any sort of retirement fund or investment fund whatsoever, in the last year, they've seen them cut in half. People who are resting in their 401ks and IRAs, IRAs... They've seen massive amounts of this money just lost. They estimate that somewhere in the neighborhood of $2 trillion have been lost in retirement investments in the last few months. Then we have companies like General Motors and Ford. I mean, these are supposed to be the icons of American success and stability. Now these things are teetering on the very verge of bankruptcy. And I mean, this is out there. You bring it right home into the families and there's just shy of a trillion dollars of credit card debt among Americans. Unbelievable. Which the financial analysts are saying is likely to bring the next major blow to our economy. Right now, it's the housing that is failing. But they anticipate that because of lost jobs, because of hardening times, that more and more people aren't going to be able to make their credit card payments. That's going to bring a whole other flurry. Like we've seen with the housing market. More and more people unable to pay their debts. More and more strains on an already shaky financial system in this country. More recession. And you know what I hear? I hear, Papa knows this. He was telling us the other day. What I keep hearing is that whenever the economy collapses, whenever financial worries consume us, entertainment is typically the outlet. 25% of this country was unemployed at the peak of the depression in 1933. One out of every four. While many more were just barely scraping by. Despite the excruciating economic hardship that was faced by nearly all families at that time in this country. 60 to 70 million Americans still packed into the theaters each week. Not into the churches. Into the theaters. The ones that didn't jump off the tall buildings. Were trying to drown their distress, their miseries, their worries, their anxieties, their problems in this great big ocean of make-believe. That's it. We just numb ourselves with fiction and fantasy. And you know what? The thing is today, we look around on the religious landscape. Try to see if anyone out there seems to have any answers. Any hope. Any rock-solid foundations in these times of trouble. And you know what the sad fact is? You know what you basically find out there? Churches wallowing in shallow doctrine. They don't know their Bibles. And you know what we find? Professing Christians and churches wallowing in the same kind of debt the rest of the world is. It's true. How many professing Christians are struggling just to keep their heads above water? In that murky credit card swamp. Many pastors, many professing Christians, they're right in the crowd. Right in the midst of it. Losing their own stockpiles that they've laid up in this world. When the Master said, don't do it. Yet, there they are. Losing right along with the rest of the world. Many professing Christians worried about making the next house payment. Why? I'll tell you why. Because they've lived above their means. Because they've spent foolishly. Because they've bought all the toys with the lost neighbors down the street. Got to have the toys for the kids. Got to have the games for the kids. Got to have the computers and the iPods and the cameras and all this stuff. When the times were good, misspending. Not using our resources the way Christ told us to use them. Wasteful spending habits. Eating out. Movies. Cable TV. Extravagant computers. Instead of giving. Look, what do we have in the Scriptures? These Macedonians. They were in poverty. They have their poverty. Paul looks at these folks and says, in their desperate situation, they gave. And he says, you know what? They gave more than they should have been able to give. And you know what else? They gave to the Lord first off. You know what? The Christian is not in this world to live up to the rest of the standards and live like the rest of the world. And just because some times may come along where there's some economic prosperity, that does not put us in a situation where we can just ignore our Lord's words. Store up treasure in heaven. He's calling us to seek something first. Not last. Not with the overflow. But to seek it first. Look, you know what happens? You get professing Christians. You take the vacations and you take the trips and you go here and you go there and you spend on this and you spend on that. And things get difficult all of a sudden. All of a sudden, maybe a job becomes in jeopardy. Or some kind of thing unexpected comes up. And you get these things and all of a sudden, oh no! But you see, it's very difficult to go to the Lord with boldness. With that assurance that He's going to take care of me through this. Christ is saying don't be anxious. Don't be anxious. Don't be anxious. And I'll tell you what, it's very helpful to the anxiety when you've been faithful and you've given. You know you've helped the widow. You know you've helped the orphan. You know that at times... I mean, have you ever given sacrificially out of love? You have determined even when things were really well, we're going to shave off what we eat. We're not going to go out because we're going to give extra to missions. We're going to give to this. I'll tell you what, when you give like that and when you live like that, when the hard times come, anxiety doesn't just trap you in its claws. Why? Because there's a confidence. My God is going to take care of me. I've tried and I've sought to be faithful. And if you don't believe there aren't conditions tied with this, then you're not reading the Scriptures right. There are many conditions tied to God's faithfulness in giving us our needs. Do you not read in v. 33? We seek first the Kingdom. We seek first righteousness. And then all these things are added to us. But our problem is, we've fallen very largely as American Christians into these traps. And now all of a sudden, things are shaking and job situations are unsecure. And we can find ourselves trapped by the same anxieties that Christ says, you know what, they're heathenish. That's what the world does. The world worries about all those things. The world is praying about all those things all the time. That's what the heathen do. That's what the Gentiles who know not God, that's how they live. Whenever something comes along and there's a trying time financially, they're the ones that are worried. They're the ones that are afraid. They're the ones that their prayers are consumed with what? Oh, God, give me a job. Oh, God, give me money for this. Give me money for that. But that's not what Scripture says. That's not what we are to consume ourselves with. Listen, if your prayers are in a vein where all you find yourself praying about is yourself and your financial needs, I'll tell you what, your life is not squaring with Matthew 6.33. Not at all. Because that is not the first thing that you're supposed to pursue after. You're supposed to be seeking the Kingdom of God. And if we do that with our life, day in, day out, year in, year out, we have this amazing promise. All these things will be given unto you. All what things? What are these things? Folks, you know what's amazing to me? I had to take up an offering here. I didn't have to, but I wanted to. Several weeks back, for a missionary that we support. Tommy Fonce. Tommy expressed to me, you know what, when the economic hard times come, the Christians stop giving to missions. That's what he said. Now why is that? Why is it? I'll tell you why it is. It's because many people that profess to be a follower of the Christ who's speaking in Matthew 6 are not living the way Christ tells them to live in Matthew 6. If people are seeking first the Kingdom of God, guess what? Missionaries aren't the first ones to get struck off the list. Lloyd-Jones tells a story. I think it's well worth repeating. He tells of a farmer who one day went happily and with great joy in his heart to report to his wife and family that their best cow had given birth to twin calves. One red and one white. And he said, you know, I've suddenly had a feeling and impulse that we must dedicate one of these calves to the Lord. We'll bring them up together and when the time comes, we'll sell one and keep the proceeds and we'll sell the other and give the proceeds to the Lord's work. His wife asked him which he was going to dedicate to the Lord. Ah, there's no need to bother about that right now, he replied. We'll treat them both in the same way and when the time comes, we'll do as I say. And off he went. And in a few months, the man entered his kitchen looking very miserable and unhappy. When his wife asked him what was troubling him, he answered, I have bad news to give you. The Lord's calf is dead. But she said, you hadn't decided which one was to be the Lord's calf. Oh yes, he said. I had always decided it was to be the white one. And it is the white one that has died. The Lord's calf is dead. I'll tell you what, we might laugh at the story, but God forbid that we should be laughing at ourselves in that story. Is it always the Lord's calf that dies when times with money become difficult? You see, folks, this is a matter of faith. Seek first the Kingdom of God. Now what is that? What's the Kingdom of God? Think about a kingdom. A kingdom is where there is a king. Right? Kingdom? King? A kingdom is a place where the king rules. Now, there are a number of things that we find about the Kingdom of God in Scripture. Christ came preaching, and He said, the Kingdom of God is at hand. He told Pilate, my kingdom is not of this world. It's a spiritual kingdom. I think one of the things that has always helped me in defining this is right in the Lord's prayer. Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name, and here it is, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done. The kingdom is basically and essentially about that realm where the will of God is done. When people enter the kingdom, what do they do? They repent of sin. They turn from it. They submit to Christ. They come to Him in faith. That's what it is to enter the kingdom. It's about resigning oneself. Isn't that not why Christ said? It's those who do the will of the Father that are going to enter that kingdom. That's what the kingdom is about. It is a realm that is about submission to the will of God. When we talk about that, when we talk about the Kingdom of God, we are talking about the things that have to do with that realm of submission to Him. The preaching of the Gospel of the kingdom. We are talking about the spread of that kingdom. And how does that kingdom spread? It spreads as more men and women are brought into that kingdom by faith, by repentance, by the preaching of the Gospel of Christ, the Gospel of the kingdom. And men and women submit to that King and therefore are brought into that kingdom. That is what we are to give ourselves to first and foremost. And His righteousness. Now, I would again make the case that here in the Sermon on the Mount, this term righteousness has primarily to do with that practical outworking of godliness and Christlikeness in our own lives. All you've got to do is glance back to the beginning of that chapter. Look at verse 1. Beware of practicing. You see the word practice? Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people. That's the idea of righteousness carried throughout the Sermon on the Mount. It's got to do with practice. How you live. And so, we're consumed first and foremost with the Kingdom of God. With the spread of that kingdom. With the upholding of that kingdom. With the King of that kingdom. We're consumed with that first. And His righteousness, which is that righteous standard that He has laid out there for us to live after, strive after, the law of God, the commandments of Christ. Let me tell you something. Jesus says to us repeatedly through these verses, do not be anxious. Verse 25. Verse 27. Which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? Verse 28, why are you anxious? Verse 31, therefore do not be anxious. Verse 34, do not be anxious about tomorrow. Look, you know what the Lord is doing here? He's not saying this. Well, you just need to think positively. And if you do that, then somehow magically your problems won't be there anymore. It's not this kind of thing where this is the mantra, you know, peace, peace, peace, and somehow we say it long enough, we actually come to believe it. That's not what He's getting at. When He says consider the birds, what's He wanting us to think here? You know what He's wanting you to look at? He's wanting you to see the black bird out there hopping around, the mockingbird, the blue jay. When you see them, these little sparrows hop around on the sidewalks. They're not out there biting their nails. Oh no, where's my next meal coming from? Where am I going to get my job from? Where is this going to happen? Where is that going to happen? Why don't they do that? Because the Lord feeds them. And His whole point is this, look, if you're a child of God, you're His child. He's your Father. If you've been bought by the blood of Christ, God so loved you that He sent His own Son into the world to die for you, and you're going to think that He's going to take care of birds and He's not going to take care of you. You know the reason that we don't get all bent out of shape and upset and all anxious and worried? It's not just because we need to have these positive feelings and there are problems that go away. What He's saying is look, there is a real reason why you don't have to worry. There's a real Person. He is a divine being. He is your heavenly Father. He is the One who controls all things. He owns all the money. He owns the cattle on a thousand hills. He owns all the food. He knows your life. It's not as though He's ignorant. It's not as though you're ever going to get in a place where you're going to have a need He doesn't know about. That's why you don't get all bent out of shape. And that's why you can give yourself first and foremost to the things of the Kingdom. Set your mind on things above. Get yourself set and geared towards righteousness. And all these things will be added unto you. You don't have to make them the primary purpose of your prayers. The primary worry aspect of your life. You don't have to be thinking about money all the time. Give it. Give it. Give it. Like Piper says, tithing, if that's where you're at, it's legalistic, folks. And I think Piper is right. It's simply a middle class American way of robbing God. Because we have so much, and we are able to give so much, and yet, we love to indulge ourselves in our toys, in our stuff, and then when things get hard, you know what? You don't have the ability to come and pray with real boldness and gusto before God, because you haven't been faithful. But when you have been, how powerful that is to say, Lord, You know I have given the money away. I have. Time and again, I have. Lord, help. This isn't just a money thing. It's a job thing. It pertains to lots of different aspects of your life. Folks, I want to stress this again. Verse 32. Anxiety for money and for financial situations is, as the old King James says, the heathen do it. Our ESVs say the Gentiles do it. It's heathenish. It's paganish. It's like the lost world lives. You know what? The lost world prays. But do you know how they pray? Very selfishly. And 99% of the time about money. Or things that relate to money. That's it. Or relate to convenience. Or relate to pleasure in their lives. Is that how you pray? You know what? I never find the Apostle Paul asking the churches to pray about his financial situation. You know what he kept asking them to pray for? Pray for the free course of the Gospel. His prayers that they might be saved. That people might come to Christ. Not, Lord, give me more money. Not, Lord, meet this. It's okay to pray that our daily bread be met. Give us this day our daily bread. But it certainly isn't the first thing that it's asked for. What's the first thing? His Kingdom. That's it. Seek first the Kingdom. Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done. What does Christ tell us to pray for? Pray for labors. Pray for kingdom matters. Pray for the things that have to do with Christ. Let's just end this and make it really practical. Listen, seek first the Kingdom of God. You know what that means? That means when I'm thinking, okay, should I go help and visit an old man in a nursing home? And it's like 70 miles away and gas is $4 a gallon. I realize it isn't right now. But you start thinking, should I go visit this old Christian man in a nursing home? Or should I conserve on the gas? When you seek first the Kingdom, guess what you do? You go visit him. And all these things will be added unto you. Guess what? I came to Texas. Anybody have an idea why I came here? To join Community Baptist Church. I did not come here because there was a job. You know what? I just received an email about a week ago. A man, he's moving here. I don't know, he'll probably move here and end up joining the church and then you guys will all give him a hard time. But he said he's got this church where he lives. He loves it. He's been looking all over the Internet and all over everywhere trying to find a church in San Antonio because this is where he's moving. And he said it basically like this, I'm all freaked out because I don't think I'm going to be able to find a church as good as the one I'm coming from. And I emailed him back. And I said, has it ever crossed your mind then not to leave? Not leave? Well, I've got a job in San Antonio. He's got a job. What's dictating his decisions? Is it money? Or is it kingdom? You know what? There was a season down at Community Baptist Church, the church that we came out of, when most of the people in that church were there. You know why? Not because they transferred to San Antonio because of a job. Because they came there for the church! Craig did that. I did that. John Seitzman did that. And many others we could list. Amy and Sierra came here because of the church. You know what, you don't let jobs and you don't let money dictate your lives. You let the kingdom dictate it. And then it comes down to that as far as working on the Lord's Day. You don't take jobs because you need money when they interfere with the meeting together of the brethren. Listen, spiritual decisions have to trump. We've got to live by faith. Charles Leiter, he told me when he was down here this last time, he said he had a job. He told them up front, I will not work on Sundays. Well, you know how it is. You get into a job and they test it. One time, we got with somebody sick. Well, they did that to Charles. And you know what he did? He walked off the job. They told him, you won't work on Sundays? You're going to get fired. He said, okay, that's it. And he walked off. Fire me. The next day, they hired him back on. And he never had to work Sundays. Folks, I'm not talking off in left field here. I'm talking about reality. Do we trust our Father in Heaven? Has He not given us reason to trust Him? When has He failed us? Listen, every time I come before this church and on a Wednesday night, I'm praising God because I got paid. Listen, when I left engineering, it wasn't because we had stockpiles in the bank. And it wasn't because the church was in a place. Do you know, for about the first year to two years after I stepped out of engineering, I am typically a tight budgeting person. I did not budget. You know why? Because it didn't make any sense to budget because what was coming in never matched the base needs. But I didn't leave that job because I felt like money was the driving factor. I left it because I was seeking the Kingdom of God. And every time I stand before this church and I tell you, I got paid, I got paid, I got paid, and I have every single time, it's a miracle, folks. It's that text in action. All these things are added. And I'm not telling you to seek all these things just so you can get those things primarily. We already read there. You can't serve God in mammon. The whole idea here is your heart, your mind, your soul is given to the service of God. The love of Him. Your decisions are molded in shape. You primarily are doing things in life because of the interest and the relationship that they have to the Kingdom and to your righteousness. Look, I am not going to let money ever dictate where I go to church. I'm going to go where I believe that there is a good church. I believe this is one. I don't believe it's the only one. And I'm not saying that sometimes God doesn't move people away to other places. I'm just saying this. You've got to be dictated first and foremost by the Kingdom of God and by His righteousness. And if you're moving off... How many times have I heard people go into the military, they take jobs, they end up moving off somewhere where there's no church or no good church. What in the world is driving them? Not the Kingdom of God. Look, we need to do what's right. We need to seek righteousness. And even though money matters and job matters, it may sometimes feel like they're pressing in on us. They may feel like we get uncertain. Listen, can you believe this promise or not? But it's a conditional one. It doesn't say if you just flop around and live like the heathen and worry every time financial things come and just let them dictate your life that all these things are going to be added unto you. It says if you seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, then they will be. I'm telling you it's a promise that our God will not fall back on. And I love to tell you how faithful He has been to my family and to this church. Time and time and time again. And I believe a great aspect of that is not giving the primary place to money, but to Him. Let Him direct. Let Him guide. Let His Kingdom be the pace setter, the direction setter. And if we get there, we don't have to worry. We can be like the birds. I know, and I'm not saying I've never worried. I have. But I'm not saying that's good. It's not good. Because you know, just like the birds, they look over and there's the worm. It's been that way for us too. We've gotten in some tight places, but God has always been there at crunch time. Every time. Every time. Seek first the Kingdom of God, brethren, and His righteousness. Seek it first. Let it shape you. Let it mold you. Let it drive you. Let it be that governing principle in your lives. Don't be like the heathen. You're the faithful father. You say, but do you really realize I've walked away from a job before. I've walked away from one in Michigan to come to this church. I've walked away from one here to pastor this church. I've done it. I've been there. I've been where Charles Leiter is. I've walked away. Some of you have too. Listen, that is a life of faith that God will honor. That is the standard that Jesus Christ is laying down for us. So what if the worst depression we've ever known in this country's history comes upon us? Do you think because of the economic situation and the economic times that God's promises all of a sudden falter? Do you think He's not above that? You don't think He's in that? He is. Trust Him. Trust Him. You're dismissed.