Pastor Byron E. Martin
American Rescue Workers Community Church in Capitol Heights, MD 20743
Beatitudes: (blessedness), a word not found in the English Bible, but meaning either 1) The joys of heaven, or 2) a declaration of blessedness. The Gospels contain isolated beatitudes by Christ (Matthew 11:6, 13:16, John 20:29) but the word is most commonly used of those in Matthew 5: 3-11 and Luke 6: 20-22, which set forth the qualities that should characterize His disciples.
Last week I preached from Jesus’ famous Sermon on the Mount. We touched on two of his preaching points;
1. Do good to please God. Don’t do your good deeds in front of men for you already have your reward. But do them in secret and God will reward you.
2. Love your enemies, even to go the second mile. No longer will we seek vengeance -a tooth for a tooth.
Today we are looking into two more of Jesus’ words.
1. Do not worry.
2. Know us by our fruits.
Do Not Worry
The beginning of anxiety is the end of faith, and the beginning of true faith is the end of anxiety. George Muller Massena, one of Napoleon's generals, suddenly appeared with 18,000 soldiers before an Austrian town which had no means of defending itself. The town council met, certain that capitulation was the only answer.
The old dean of the church reminded the council that it was Easter, and begged them to hold services as usual and to leave the trouble in God's hands. They followed his advice.
The dean went to the church and rang the bells to announce the service. The French soldiers heard the church bells ring and concluded that the Austrian army had come to rescue the town. They broke camp, and before the bells had ceased ringing, vanished.
What did Jesus say about worry?
Matthew 6: 25-34 (read)
27; Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? One cubit is about 18”, by the way. If worrying could make you taller… you all know I would worry from morning to night and even in my sleep.
31-32; Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘what shall we eat? Or what shall we Drink or What shall we wear? For all these things the Gentiles seek. …. Jesus isn’t saying we shouldn’t provide these things that we need but that we shouldn’t worry about these things. If we do our part, God will take care of our needs.
Do you know what I couldn’t provide for my family for the first 2 years? A television. I kid you not. Couldn’t afford it. Never gave it much thought. We were happy without it. And even without asking, a friend, Tom Gullotta, found out we didn’t have one and worked on a loaded TV system (it was huge) and gave it to us -free. God blessed us even when we didn’t ask.
32b; For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. When we were young, toddlers, we had a parent or two parents that took care of our very basic needs. Milk. Food. Clothes. Sleep. Diaper change.
I don’t know about you but when I couldn’t do for myself, there was always somebody there who did for me. God is like that. He allows us to take care of those things that we can but is there to see that we never go without. Usually, the blessing comes from the leading of the Holy Spirit to someone to reach out to you. God uses his people to help his people. Sometimes he even uses someone who is not his people to help his people.
There was a story of an older woman who loved the Lord and always prayed to Him when she was in need. She had an angry neighbor who was an atheist and hated her because she was always praising God and he hated Christians.
One day, her window was open and he heard her praying. He quietly walked to the window to hear what she was praying. She told God that she had no money and had no more groceries. She said she was laying it in God’s hands and wasn’t going to worry about it because she knew God would bring her groceries.
The neighbor smiled as he thought of a way he could finally prove to her there was no God.
That very same day the Athiest took eight bags of groceries, loaded them onto the old lady’s porch, knocked on the door and quickly hid around the corner of the house.
When she came to the door she saw the groceries and right there bowed her head and gave God thanks for bringing her the groceries that she so desperately needed.
Right then the neighbor came around the corner and said;
Aha! There is no God! You are thanking God for bringing you these groceries but I am the one who bought them and put them on your porch. Your Christianity and belief in a God is a joke.
At that, she bowed her head again and said “God, you are so great and love me so much that you even used one of Satan’s children to take care of my needs. I thank you even more. Amen.”
33; But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. Jesus said to prioritize your life. Your number one priority is not to seek these other things first. But instead, seek God first. When we have become children of God, He will take care of us. Sometimes, taking care of us is giving us the strength to do the work it takes to get what we need.
This program is designed to focus on your relationship with God. Yes, you need to eventually get a job, work clothes for that job, find a place to live, provide for your food, transportation, …etc.
But first, you need to prioritize your relationship with God. You can sit here and look at all the things that you think are wrong with this Men’s Christian Rehabilitation Program and give every excuse you can come up with why this isn’t working for you.
But if you just start with your relationship with God first, everything else will be added to you. God is ready to provide for your needs if you will first recognize your broken relationship with God and fix that first. Worrying won’t get you a car, fix your relationships, or get you a good job. And when you worry, you are showing God you do not have faith that He will take care of your needs.
34b; Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
Can I get an ‘amen’ on that? Today has enough cares that we don’t have to go looking for things to worry about. Deal with today and let God handle your tomorrows.
You Will Know Them by Their Fruits
Read Matthew 7: 15-20
I love this message Jesus gave. It is Character Discernment 101. If ever there was a proverb of common sense, it would be this; Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. (Matthew 7:17-18)
The story is told of a father of five children who came home with just one toy. He summoned his children and asked which of them should be given the present. “Who is the most obedient one here to your mother? Who never talks back to Mom and does everything that Mom says to do?” He inquired. There were a few seconds of silence, and then all of the children said in one accord: “You play with it Daddy!”
Today is Father’s Day and as men we have to take a good look at our character in the mirror and see if we are good fruit or bad fruit. What do we have to offer our families?
One more illustration for dads. Sorry. Can’t help myself.
The children begged for a hamster, and after the usual fervent vows that they alone would care for it, they got one. They named it Danny. Two months later, when Mom found herself responsible for cleaning and feeding the creature, she located a prospective new home for it. The children took the news of Danny’s imminent departure quite well, though one of them remarked, “He’s been around here a long time–we’ll miss him.”
“Yes,” Mom replied, “But he’s too much work for one person, and since I’m that one person, I say he goes.”
Another child offered, “Well, maybe if he wouldn’t eat so much and wouldn’t be so messy, we could keep him.”
But Mom was firm. “It’s time to take Danny to his new home now,” she insisted. “Go and get his cage.”
With one voice and in tearful outrage the children shouted, “Danny? We thought you said Daddy!”
– Ken Board
Ladies, beware of men that will say things to ‘woo’ you. Look at their lifestyle. Look at their status with God. Look at the things they say when not to you and the things they do. And the longer you look, the better picture of who they actually are will be revealed to you. Some of you ladies pick bad fruit and think that you can create good fruit from it.
Nobody ever made great jam by using rotten fruit. Amen?
In verse 15, Jesus talks about false prophets being wolves in sheep’s clothing. They act as one thing but are actually something else. And not just wolves. Ravenous wolves. They will devour those they can trick or ‘pull the wool over their eyes’.
I know I always mention this but some preachers and teachers are like those slimy car salesmen that ask you to sit in a hot car you can’t take your eyes off of (even though you know you can’t afford it and its not for you). Then when you finally do sit in it and put your hands on the wheel -they tell you how good you look in it. And they always tell you that.
I think yea, won’t I look good with the backseat full of my clothes, a lamp, some pictures and a half dozen pairs of shoes that I had to pick up off the sidewalk while I am driving away from my house for the last time because my wife has had it with my nonsense!
Therefore by their fruits you will know them. (Matt. 7:20)
And this measurement is not only to be used for those preaching the Word or for searching for a spouse, but also for people you are friends with, people that you deal with, people you rely on. It is important that we recognize that good character is important in every area of our lives. And we should make decisions based on the character of those we have dealings with.
In Conclusion
What did we learn from Jesus’ words?
1. Do not worry. Give it to God and live by faith not by worrying.
2. You will know them by their fruits. Recognize who people really are -not who they say they are or pretend to be. And how will we be known if it is by our fruits?
God doesn’t want us to worry because He has prepared a way out for us. All of us have sinned and fall short of being ‘good enough’ for heaven. If there was no way, we would have a great reason to worry.
But His love for us was so great and our sins against Him were so great that nothing less than a perfect sacrifice would suffice to cleanse us and make us acceptable.
John 3:16 says; For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
This also comes with a warning. That comes in John 3:18. I beg you, for your sake, not to mock this next statement;
He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
And verse 19 -for those who would rather live in sin then be cleansed of their sins;
And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
Jesus is the light. You have to decide for yourself on this day if you would rather live in darkness -which condemns you, or are you ready to seek forgiveness for sins committed against God, others and ourselves?
What do you choose today? Only the sacrifice of the blood of Jesus will cleanse us of all sin.
If you do not choose Jesus, you have chosen to be condemned by God. What will you do now?
