WHAT DO YOU REALLY WANT?
Matthew 5:6
S: Holiness
C: Desire for God
Th: Live the Difference
Pr: THE DESIRE FOR GOD SHOULD DOMINATE US.
?: Inductive
KW: Factors
TS: We will find in our study of Matthew 5:6 three factors that describe what it is to be a Christian.
The _____ factor is…
I. PASSION
II. SANCTIFICATION
III. REPLETION
PA: How is the change to be observed?
• We should desire God above all else.
Version: ESV
RMBC 31 October 04 AM
INTRODUCTION:
What do you have an appetite for?
ILL Notebook: Food (Chocolate is a vegetable)
As many of you know, I have an appetite for chocolate, so I have some important tips for you when it comes to this delicious subject…
Did you know that chocolate is a vegetable?
Chocolate is derived from cacao beans.
Bean = vegetable.
Further, sugar is derived from either sugar CANE or sugar BEETS.
Both are plants, which places them in the vegetable category.
Thus, chocolate is a vegetable.
Along with that…
Chocolate candy bars also contain milk, which is dairy.
So candy bars are a health food.
Chocolate-covered raisins, cherries, orange slices and strawberries all count as fruit, so eat as many as you want.
And here is a diet tip…
Eat a chocolate bar before each meal.
It’ll take the edge off your appetite, and you’ll eat less.
And finally…
Put "eat chocolate" at the top of your list of things to do today.
That way, at least you’ll get one thing done.
We all have appetites.
And if we care to admit it, many of us hunger for junk food.
We like our Big Macs, potato chips and Twinkies.
It makes my mouth water just thinking about them.
But what is of even more concern is that we have an appetite for junk food of the mind and soul.
In fact, I think it is fair to say that we have an obsession with man-made menus.
We have a fascination for sexual adventures, movie productions and fanciful vacations.
We love our sports events and hobbies.
But the problem with the pleasures of this world is that they are like cotton candy.
They look good.
They seem inviting.
But when you eat it, it’s nothing but air.
And we end up giving the best of ourselves to matters that, ultimately, don’t matter.
TRANSITION:
So, is this a problem you are having?
The theme we have had for 2004 is “live the difference.”
We have been continually challenged to live lives that are characterized by holiness and righteousness, and thus are able to make a difference in the communities to which we have been called to live in.
So, here is the question…
1. Are you able to “live the difference” as a Christian?
The trouble that we often have as Christians is that we settle for ordinary.
We don’t really desire to live anything that is extraordinary.
Instead, we find ourselves willing to live with a semblance of holiness.
We are willing to live faith by the numbers and discipleship by the book.
We do it.
But we do it out of duty.
We don’t do it because we “want to,” but because we “have to.”
But if this the way we choose, we are missing the blessing that God has for us.
You see…
2. God has designed us for a life characterized by blessing (Matthew 5:1-12).
Do not be mistaken.
We are not designed for unhappiness.
The Christian is not meant to be miserable (although there are some believers that act that way).
We are designed for joy.
We are designed for true rest and contentment.
Let’s once again consider the text known as the Beatitudes…
[1] Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him. [2 ] And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying:
[3] "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
[4] "Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
[5] "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
[6] "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
[7] "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
[8] "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
[9] "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
[10] "Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
[11] "Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. [12] Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
In our study last week, we considered verses 3 – 5.
When we studied…
"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
…we learned that…
3. We must set aside self (3).
Jesus tells us that we must come to a realistic understanding of ourselves, including our true condition.
When we have the nature of our relationship with God in perspective, it is then we are making progress.
As human beings, we are marred by sin as we stand before a holy and righteous God.
And to complicate it, we have no solution the problem, except to recognize our sin.
When Jesus said…
"Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”
…He was saying that…
4. We must be realistic about our sin (4).
Until we possess a deep grief about our sin, we are not going to have any peace.
Until we have a profound remorse, we will not know God’s comfort that comes through the Holy Spirit.
Then finally, we heard Jesus say…
"Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.”
This means that…
5. We must use our strength to submit (5).
Meekness is power under control.
It is strength that is submitted to a greater power.
The Christian, then, submits to the rule of God in his life.
The Christian knows that his/her need is as much a need for a Lord, as well as a Savior.
Jesus cannot be one or the other for the Christian.
He is both our Savior and Lord.
Now as we move on…
6. We will find in our study of Matthew 5:6 three factors that describe what it is to be a Christian.
In The Message, verse 6 reads…
“You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat. “
OUR STUDY:
I. The first factor is PASSION.
Let’s understand that…
1. A starving person is single-minded.
As Christians of the West, we don’t understand this concept.
We live lives of comfort.
But when Jesus spoke these words to this audience, they knew exactly what He was saying.
Jesus was speaking to people that understood hunger and thirst.
Only a very few were prosperous during that day.
The words that Jesus uses are very descriptive.
The word for hunger means to ardently crave food.
The word for thirst means to painfully feel the need for water.
When you have this kind of hunger and thirst, you are justifiably preoccupied.
You have a single passion for only one thing matters…a filled stomach.
When you are really hungry or thirsty, you really want to be satisfied.
And as it applies to our topic today, it helps us to understand that…
2. Passion is not duty.
We misunderstand what Jesus is saying if we think of this as solely something as a “have to.”
No one thinks of eating and drinking as a duty.
We may “have to” eat, but we mainly do it because we “want to.”
ILL Elizabeth Smart
You may remember that Elizabeth Smart was reunited with her family in the Spring of 2003, after being abducted from her home in Utah in June 2002, held captive for nine months. It was great news when she was found.
When you think of Elizabeth taken from her home, forced to live on the road as a homeless person, don’t you think that she must have been longing to get back to her family? She must have hungered to be home.
You know she wasn’t thinking, “I need to get home so I can do my chores, and clean my room.” She was hungry for home. She certainly had a passion to be home. It’s where she was loved. It’s where she belonged.
This is the kind of passion God wants us to have.
He wants us to desire Him, not solely because we “have to,” but because we “want to.”
We hunger for Him because He is where we belong.
II. The second factor is SANCTIFICATION.
Do you long for righteousness?
Do you long for holiness?
You see…
1. When we set ourselves aside, we will long for what God is and has.
We make a mistake if we pursue after happiness for the sake of ourselves.
For whenever we put happiness before righteousness, we are doomed for misery.
We have the order all wrong.
What we are to seek after is what God is.
We are to hunger and thirst after the genuine goodness that He is.
We are to desire to be saturated by His character.
We are to desire His righteousness, because ours is faulty, incomplete, and ineffective.
This means that…
2. Desiring righteousness means we want to be right with God.
We are to desire to be conformed to God’s rule.
And when we are, we are well on the road to be in right relationship with Him.
We discover that when the Holy Spirit is in us, we can be free from its sin and its power.
We find that we belong to something much bigger than ourselves or our circumstances.
We have new opportunity to live the difference.
We can be holy.
ILL Sanctification (light shine through)
A child heard that Christians were saints. On one occasion she was taken to a cathedral. She sat watching the sunshine through the windows. She asked her mother, "What are these people on the window?”
“They are saints," was the answer.
Then the child said, "Now I know what saints are. They are people who let the light shine through.”
So, is the light shining through you?
Is God’s very character being seen in and through you?
This brings us to…
III. The third factor is REPLETION.
As we have seen, our part is to seek.
God’s part is to satisfy.
He fills us up to satisfaction.
There is satisfaction found in God’s righteousness.
You see…
1. When a person abandons saving himself, he is filled.
When we give up confidence in own goodness…
When we seek to replace self with God…
When we seek to replace sin with righteousness…
We are satisfied.
We are saved!
And…
2. When a person seeks to be Christlike, he is satisfied.
You see, the hunger and thirst does not end.
There is continuing hunger and thirst, because we don’t arrive spiritually.
We are to keep growing.
Paul would later express it well in Philippians 3:10
…that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death…
This is the process of sanctification.
We are filled over and over.
You see…
3. God wants us to be healthy.
Our faith is like Lay’s potato chips.
You can’t eat just one.
You keep wanting more.
Grace is added to grace.
Our relationship with the Lord is the real thing, leading from glory to glory.
And so…
God is our priority in every way.
APPLICATION:
ILL Johnny Green
Once a young man kneeled before a beautiful young woman beside a placid lake. “Darling,” he said, “I want you to know that I love you more than life. I want you to marry me. I am not a wealthy man. I don’t have a yacht, a Rolls Royce or lots of money like Johnny Green, but I do love you with all my heart.”
The young woman paused for a moment and said, “Darling, I love you with all my heart too. But before I say ‘yes,’ tell me a little more about Johnny Green.”
I wonder if we don’t do the same thing with the Lord.
We say we love Him, but we still have competing interests elsewhere.
But if we are going to get this right…
If we are going to “live the difference”…
1. THE DESIRE FOR GOD SHOULD DOMINATE US.
Is Jesus the consuming passion of your life?
This needs to be the place where we are going as Christians.
We need to be set ablaze for God, ready to live or die, to see His mission accomplished in the world.
But as western Christians, we have lost this kind of faith.
We have saturated our lives with things that don’t matter.
But…
2. We are on the right path when we are not dependent on the external.
We have to get this through our thick skulls.
There is good reason why our lives are filled with discontentment.
Things don’t satisfy!
But blessing and happiness do not need to be so elusive.
We can be filled.
We can know what it is to experience God meeting our needs.
So, let us go the right direction and be on the right path.
For…
3. We are on the right path when we crave basic spiritual food.
Do you desire the Word of God?
Listen to the prophet Jeremiah’s testimony (15:16)…
Your words were found, and I ate them, and your words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart…
There is so much to feed on.
Just don’t leave it for Sunday morning.
Continually, feed on His word and be satisfied.
And then know this…
4. We are on the right path when God’s will is what we desire and nothing else.
Make no conditions with God.
You see…
We don’t ask for Christ and economic success…
We don’t ask for Christ and personal satisfaction…
We don’t ask for Christ and popularity…
We are to just want Christ…and only Christ.
BENEDICTION: [Counselors are ]
Be passionate…and hunger and thirst for God.
Be righteous…don’t settle for self-righteousness, but rather, the righteousness that God is.
Be filled…seek after God and be filled over and over and over again.
Now to him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy—to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.
RESOURCES:
Barclay, William. The Gospel of Matthew
Lloyd-Jones, D. Martyn. Studies on the Sermon on the Mount
MacArthur, John. The MacArthur New Testament Commentary, Matthew 1-7
SermonCentral
The Message of the King, Blessed Are the Hungry, Coy Wylie
Blessed Hunger Pangs, Rob Woodrum
You Gotta Want It, Denn Guptill
Becoming a Person of Passion, Joel Smith
Blessed Hunger, Jerry Vargo
Hunger for God, Stewart Beveridge
Desire: It’ll Make You or Break You, David Yarbrough
How’s Your Appetite? Kirk DeVine
Blessed Are Those Who Hunger and Thirst for Righteousness, John Piper
