Abolishing Anxiety, Part 9

It's great to have you with us today as we study God's Word together It's going to be a great time as we open up the Word of the Lord and see what He has for us And we want to take a moment just to pray and ask the Lord for real wisdom You know, as a church, the elders and the leadership of our church have gathered together every week by way of Zoom And so we could talk to one another about our church, the state of our church, what's happening with the people

Many of you have received phone calls from us because we're trying to keep in touch with you, trying to figure out what's going on in your life We're praying for you weekly, daily, and asking God to do great things in your personal life, your family life Some of you have called us and given us information about how we can better pray for you And that's what we want to do And we also want to ask that you pray for us as your leaders We're trying to make wise choices We want to make a wise decision about when it is we are to open the church again

You know, we don't want to lean on our own understanding We want to trust the Lord We want to ask Him to show us what direction to go We're not interested in making some kind of political statement, making some kind of demands on our city, our governor That's not what we want to do We truly want to honor the Lord We know what the Bible says in 1 Timothy chapter 2 First of all, then I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity

We want to be like Peter said in 1 Peter chapter 2, that we are to keep our behavior excellent among the Gentiles, among those on the outside, that they might see our good deeds and glorify our God on the day of visitation That's our desire We want to be a testimony to the community And yet at the same time, we know that we want to get together and worship the Lord together and partake of the Lord's table together and celebrate as a body together

So there's this tension as to when to do what we need to do, what we should be doing, praying that God would give us wisdom, trying to submit to the authority over us, but at the same time realizing that God is our ultimate authority And so we are talking through these issues and asking you to pray with us about them We truly want to honor the Lord That's all that matters We're not trying to be this kind of church or that kind of church We're just trying to be what God wants us to be, that we might honor Him

And so as we go through this time of great uncertainty, we are asking the Lord to give us wisdom as to when we should open the doors of our church once again To have you come and be with us And so as we go to prayer this morning, that's an item that we need to pray for We're asking you to pray with us about that as we continue to pray for you and your family during this time, asking God to do a great work And once again, I just want to thank you for those of you who have faithfully given You know, the Lord has supplied all of our needs and He's taken care of us every single week

And that's because of you and your heart and your desire to honor the Lord And boy, that's just a great thing So thank you so much for your faithfulness to the Lord That's what really matters You're a steward of all that He's given to you and you're honoring Him And that's what's important And so as we go to prayer, let's remember those things and ask God to do a great and mighty work So if you're able, join me in your knees as we approach the throne of grace Father God, we thank you for this great and glorious day as we gather once again with our family around our couch, around our table

Maybe it's our kitchen table, dining room table Maybe it's in our bedroom. I don't know where everybody is today, but if they've tuned in, they're listening They're looking for what it is you have for them on this day We pray for the families of our church that you do a mighty work in their hearts and lives That this would be a time that they would grow closer to you and closer to one another And that over the last eight weeks that we've been in this situation, that you would continue, Lord, to stretch us and mold us into the kind of people you want us to be

Where we are asking for wisdom for our church, for the leadership of our church, to make choices based on what your word says We don't want to make a political statement We want to make a biblical statement We want to live by the authority of your word, the precepts that are there And we are trying to honor you in all that we say and do That's what we want to have happen We want the outside world to look at us and understand that there is a Christ who reigns supreme in us As your word says, we want to live at peace with all men as far as it depends upon us

So we pray, Lord, for the leaders of our city and county and our state, asking you to work in the governor and the mayor and those who are among the city council We just pray, Lord, that you would work in their hearts We know that their heart is in your hand We realize that And you can turn it any way you desire We'd ask, Lord, or you turn it in a way favorable to the churches that preach your word Lord, we see ourselves as essential, not non-essential We realize that the church and the gospel is the only thing that people truly need, because we are concerned about the souls of man

So we pray, Lord, that you would do a mighty work and open the doors quickly Give us wisdom as to when to open our doors, that, Lord, we might truly glorify your name and honor you, the King of kings and Lord of lords We thank you for this day, the opportunity to open your word, to learn from you what you have for us in Jesus' name, amen. I am so excited about the topic we are discussing, abolishing anxiety It's so relevant, so practical to what it is we're going through as a church and as a country, really around the world

And so as we tackle the issue of anxiety and ask the Lord what it means to abolish anxiety, we know that the principles we're giving to you are rooted in God's word And because they're rooted in God's word, they reproduce a great work in you That's why we preach God's word, because as Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 2.13, it effectually works in those who believe So the principles we give you that are rooted in the truth of God's word are gonna reproduce themselves in you because the spirit of God is going to enlighten you as to what it is he wants you to do

And so as we look at Proverbs 12.25, which is our theme verse for this series, we understand that anxiety in the heart of a man weighs it down, it burdens the heart But the good word, a good word makes it glad We're giving you that good word And because it's rooted in the truth of the holy word of God, it's gonna reproduce a great work in your life

So when the Psalmist says in Psalm 94.19, when my anxious thoughts overwhelm me, when they consume me, thy consolations delight my soul. I would trust that your soul is becoming more and more delighted as it becomes more and more enlightened to the truth of God's word, that it truly excites you because the word of God effectually works in those who believe So we're giving you the principles that are outlined in Scripture, very practical, very applicable to your life on how to abolish anxiety We told you number one, you rest in God's sovereignty

Once you rest in God's sovereignty, you are to remember your responsibility Having remembered your responsibility, then number three, you are to realize your dependency Once you realize your dependency, you regard your testimony, you rejoice in his sufficiency and you reflect on your destiny All that are principles rooted in God's word that once read and studied reproduce a great work in your heart and life to abolish anxiety Today, I want to give you the next principle, and that principle is this, reorder your priority Reorder your priority You know, every one of us has an agenda

All of us have priorities in life But the problem is that those priorities center around me and my kingdom, not God and his kingdom And so I am mesmerized by what I can do for myself. I wish that I could say that every one of us are concerned and consumed with the kingdom of God But unfortunately, we become so enamored and consumed with our own little kingdom, building our own little palaces, our homes, establishing our own little chariots, our horses, building our own little army of soldiers, our children, with our own goods, our money and our job

And we become consumed with our kingdom and we forget about God's kingdom In fact, God becomes an afterthought He's not the first thing we think about He's the last thing we think about And you might be sitting there saying today, no, that's not me Maybe you're reaching out too far Well, let me give you just a small example, just a smidgen of an example that will help you understand whether you're into building your kingdom or God's kingdom Whether you first think about you or you first think about the Lord God of Israel

When you received this past week or in the previous weeks up to this point, your stimulus check from the government, what was your first thought? Was your first thought to invest into God's kingdom? Or was your first thought to invest into your kingdom? Was your first thought, wow, now we can do some things you want to do? Or was your first thought, wow, now I can give to the Lord. I can honor the Lord with the first fruits of my increase What was your first thought? That will tell you about whether or not you want to build your kingdom or you want to invest into God's kingdom

Whether or not you want to lay treasures up on earth or lay treasures up in heaven And that's just a small example because there are so many elements that take place in our life And one of the ways you abolish anxiety is to reorder your priority Your priority is to be centered on God and His kingdom first above all else Because if not, you're establishing your own kingdom, trying to build your own little world And in today's society, we are truly mesmerized by our own physicality And therefore, we are consumed with doing things for us

And so when our kingdom is disturbed or our kingdom becomes distorted or discombobulated, however you want to say it, we become very anxious and very worried about what's going to happen Instead of trusting in the Lord God of Israel Now, there's a good example of this in Scripture It's King Nebuchadnezzar back in the book of Daniel He becomes a classic illustration of one who was interested in his own kingdom Of course, he was a king, right? So he had a kingdom, the kingdom of Babylon And so he saw himself as a king and rightly so, he was a king

But he minimized God's kingdom because he was so mesmerized by his kingdom And he had a dream And in that dream, there was this vision that God had given to him, and he needed it to be interpreted So Daniel came along and Daniel would interpret the vision of the tree, and the tree being cut down, and what that meant for Nebuchadnezzar because he thought it was about his enemies, but it wasn't about his enemies at all It was about him And so Daniel gave him the bad news The vision you had, the dream you had, it's about you You and your kingdom, that's the tree That's the tree that was cut down

You need to repent, Nebuchadnezzar You need to submit to the king of Israel and follow him Well, Nebuchadnezzar didn't do that, and a year went by. A lot like you and me, we go to church and we hear what the word of the Lord says, and we hear the warning of impending punishment or judgment upon our lives by the Lord God of Israel, and we hear it We think, wow, maybe we should change Maybe some things should change in my life But then we leave and we get involved in all kinds of activities, and next thing you know, we forget about what the word of the Lord said That was Nebuchadnezzar

He just completely forgot. A year passed God's grace was so good God gave him a whole year to repent, to turn from his sin He didn't, but he loved his kingdom He loved what he had built He says in Daniel chapter 5, verse number 30, the king reflected... I'm sorry, this is chapter 4, verse number 30 The king reflected and said, Is this not Babylon the great, which I myself have built, as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty? While the word was in the king's mouth, a voice came from heaven saying, King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is declared

Sovereignty, your kingdom has been removed from you, and you will be driven away from mankind, and your dwelling place will be with the beasts of the field You will be given grass to eat like cattle, and seven periods of time or seven years will pass over you until you recognize that the Most High is ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whomever he wishes In other words, king, you have to realize that you have what you have because of the king, the universal king, the king of glory, the one who holds all dominion over everything

And until you recognize that and humble yourself before him for the next seven years, you're gonna eat the grass of the field, gonna crawl like a beast And immediately the word concerning Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled And he was driven away from mankind and began eating grass like cattle His body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair had grown like eagles' feathers and his nails like birds' claws But at the end of that period, the end of those seven years, as was given in the vision, the prophecy to him, I, Nebuchadnezzar, raise my eyes toward heaven and my reason return to me

And I bless the Most High and praise and honor him who lives forever For his dominion is an everlasting dominion His kingdom endures from generation to generation All the inhabitants of the earth are counted as nothing, but he does according to his will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth And no one can ward off his hand or say to him, what have you done? Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, verse number 37, praise, exalt, and honor the King of heaven For all his works are true and his ways just And he is able to humble those who walk in pride Nebuchadnezzar learned the lesson

It took him a while, seven years to be exact But he learned his lesson that there was a King He was subject to his rulership, subject to his dominion And he was the one to receive all glory and all honor on praise, not Nebuchadnezzar You see, we can never go around saying, look at this business that I have built Look at the house that I have built Look at the family I have built Look at the church I have built Because it can be quickly taken from you because it's all about the Lord, the King of Israel

But we become so mesmerized with our physicality, our own personal needs, so mesmerized with our physicality, we minimize our spirituality Thus, we maximize our anxiety That's the way it goes So we need to reorder our priority We need to seek first God's kingdom, not our kingdom His righteousness, not our righteousness So that all these things could be added unto us as Matthew chapter 6, verse number 33 says So when you reorder your priority, you are reordering it in a way that you are putting God's kingdom before your kingdom because He is the King of all kings He is the Lord of all lords

He is a universal King He's the King of glory He's my King He's your King We need to embrace His rulership in our lives Having said that, let me illustrate it this way in Matthew chapter 6 If you've got your Bible, turn with me to Matthew's gospel Matthew was all about presenting the King, the royalty of the Messiah And so the Messiah comes following John the Baptist, who's the forerunner to the King And John the Baptist said these words in Matthew 3, verse number 2, For the kingdom of heaven is at hand

John the Baptist, the forerunner to the Messiah, would begin to preach about the kingdom because the King was at hand And you need to turn from your wicked ways You need to repent and follow the King Well, John the Baptist is taken into custody and thrown into prison And the Bible says in Matthew chapter 4, verse number 17, from that time, Jesus began to preach, the Messiah Began to preach and say, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand John the Baptist preached the kingdom and Jesus preached about the kingdom It was at hand

And so it says that in verse number 23, Jesus was going throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom See, the gospel, the good news is the gospel of the King who brings to us His kingdom And because that's the good news, we submit to the King of glory We submit to His rulership So He went around preaching the gospel of the kingdom But people didn't understand that They were so mesmerized by their own physicality that they would minimize their own spirituality

Well, how do we know that? Well, the Bible tells us in verse number 24, that news about Him spread throughout all Syria because He was healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness among the people As He preached the gospel of the kingdom, He fulfilled the credentials of the King, as outlined in the Old Testament And all those who were ill, those suffering with various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, paralytics, and He healed them Large crowds followed Him You see, it was all about their physical needs That's all they could see We just want to be better

We want to be healed And the Lord knew that And so He sits down in Matthew chapter 5, and He presents to us the gospel of the kingdom The King preaches about the kingdom of heaven and talks about what it means to live like a child of the King Because all these people who were sick and diseased and blind and lame and needed healing, He healed them all But He knew that having healed them today would not stop them from dying tomorrow They're still going to die And they need to be concerned about their spiritual life, their soul

Where will it go? So He sits down among this large group of people there on the northern slopes of the Sea of Galilee and begins to present the gospel of the kingdom Because He wants them to understand who He is and what He's come to do So He says these words, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven He begins by introducing the kingdom of heaven Those who are broken and those who realize they have nothing to give to the King and those who mourn over the sin And He goes through Matthew chapter 5

And I wish I had time to go through it with you because He goes through the fifth chapter there explaining these are the people of the kingdom These are the characteristics of those in the kingdom And these are the ones who are the salt and light of the world And then He says, Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you're never going to enter my kingdom Because you see, the scribes and Pharisees were into building their own kingdom They were mesmerized by their own physicality, their own physical needs, their own appeal to the world It was all about them, see

So you go on to say in Matthew chapter 5, You have heard that it was said by the ancients of old, but I say to you They would go on and say one discourse after another This is what you've been taught This is what you've heard about people who want to build their kingdom But I want to tell you about my kingdom and how it is the people of my kingdom understand the true law of God And then He goes into Matthew 6 and it talks about, you know, how it is these people, these people who are into building their own kingdom This is how they pray This is how they give This is how they fast

They want to be seen and recognized by all people, you see, because they're into their own needs They want to build their kingdom They want to be seen when they pray, heard when they give They want to be seen when they fast It's all about how you see them But the people of my kingdom, they don't tell anybody when they fast They don't tell anybody when they pray They enter the closet and pray in secret People in my kingdom, they don't blow the trumpet when they give

They don't even let their left hand know what their right hand's doing because it's all about them and their king, not about their own little kingdom They want to honor me And then he goes on to talk about in Matthew 6, about laying up treasures in heaven versus laying up treasures on earth And then talks about in verse number 24 of Matthew 6, how you can't serve two masters You can't do that You're either going to serve one and hate the other or love one and despise the other You cannot serve two masters And then he says these words in Matthew chapter 6, verse number 25, for this reason

What reason? For the very reason that you can't serve two masters You can't He talks about in five different times in Matthew 6 verses 25 to 34, do not be anxious, do not worry The German word means to strangle, to choke And the Greek word talks about being divided in mind And when your mind is divided, when you're divided as to what master you serve, either the master of materialism or the master of the universe, whether I put treasures in heaven or treasures on earth, when you are divided in mind about that, it chokes out your mental capacity and you become anxious and worried

And the Lord says, you can't serve two masters, only serve one For that reason, let me tell you about my Father in heaven Let me tell you about my kingdom Do not be worried about your life as to what you will eat or what you will drink, nor for your body as to what you will put on Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? We would like to think it is, right? It's more than what you eat It's more than what you wear Look at the birds of the air that they do not sow nor reap or gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them

Are you not worth much more than they? And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life? And why are you worried about clothing? Observe the lilies of the field They do not toil nor do they spin

Yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these, but if God so clothes the grass, the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will he not much more clothe you, you of little faith? Those of you who do not trust me, who don't believe in me or who give your life to me, he says very simply these words, do not worry then saying, what will we eat or what will we drink or what will we wear for clothing? For the Gentiles, the pagans, the unbelievers, they eagerly seek all these things

For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things, but seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you Seek first my kingdom He says, look, don't be worried about your food Don't be worried about your future And don't be worried about your fashion He talks about the basics in life That's your food He talks about the breadth of your life That's your future And then he talks about the beauty in life And that's your fashion Because those who are mesmerized by their own physicality are into their food, their future, and their fashion

They're into building their kingdom around those things And whenever you're mesmerized by your own physicality, you will minimize your spirituality and you will maximize your anxiety So make sure you seek first my kingdom, my righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you William Ward, an author, said this about worry So good He says, worry is faith in the negative, trust in the unpleasant, assurance of disaster, and belief in defeat Worry is wasting today's time to clutter up tomorrow's opportunities with yesterday's troubles That's just so good It's right

That's exactly what worrying is But you see, we are so into our own agenda We wake up every day and we prioritize our day We prioritize our life And for the most part, God and his kingdom is an afterthought instead of the first thought So he is first on my agenda He's first on my mind. I want to seek first Protos

In order of priority, he is the first. I want to seek first the kingdom of God, Basilia, which means the rulership or the reign of Christ. I am seeking first his reign in my life, his rulership in my life. I am subject to him as the king. I want to submit to his lordship, his righteousness. I'm going to seek first his righteousness That's why Solomon said in Proverbs 15, 9, pursue righteousness The Lord loves all those who pursue righteousness Paul told Timothy in 1 Timothy 6, 1 Timothy 11, Timothy, flee the love of money, but pursue righteousness Pursue righteousness Hunt it down

That's the direction you should be going The righteousness that God grants you through the gift given to you through the kingdom of God And so we begin to understand that when we reorder our priority, it's centered around pursuing God's kingdom first, above all else And yet so many times we struggle with that, don't we? We need to pursue his kingdom He says, oh, you of little faith, you haven't trusted me You haven't trusted in my provision You haven't trusted in my power You haven't trusted in my providence You haven't trusted in my promises You haven't trusted in me, my person

You haven't trusted me, oh, you of little faith Don't you know that your heavenly father knows what you need? He knows you need to eat He knows you need to wear clothes He certainly doesn't want you to worry about how long you're going to live Because all that's an appointed time All your days are numbered before there was even yet one of them Everybody always dies by appointment on time Trust the one who gives you life Don't worry about how long you're going to live Worry about whether or not you're gonna live in eternity with me Seek first my kingdom, my righteousness

Put me as the priority of your life Submit to my rulership Pursue my kingdom Are you pursuing God's kingdom? Or are you still pursuing your own kingdom? Your own little world, your own little agenda Where it's all about you and what you want See, that was Israel It was all about them and what they wanted In John chapter six, they wanted to make Christ king because he fed some 5,000 people, close to 25,000 people And so in John six, it says they wanted to take him, make him king by force because it was all about their own physicality

It was about their own physical needs, their own material appetite That's what it was about It was about their agenda. I mean, if we had this guy as our king, we'll never lack for food He is powerful enough to give us food Let's make him our king But he knew that that's what it wasn't about And so he wanted them to embrace him as their king Even when at the very end of his life, in the last week of his life, when he came right into Jerusalem on the backside of a donkey, a fulfillment of Zechariah chapter nine, verse number nine, where the daughters of Jerusalem will rejoice

And they did because your king is coming to you on a donkey And he did It's almost as if they knew Zechariah nine, nine So what did they do? They took off their garments and they laid them down at the feet of Jesus And he would walk over them because that's what it means to submit to him as the king You're willing to give all that you have to the king So you take off your garments, you lay them down He walks over them because you are submitting to his authority They did that when he rode into Jerusalem But it wasn't their heart's desire because they thought that he would overthrow Rome

They thought he would set up his kingdom He would overrule all He would feed them whenever they wanted to be fed He'd heal all those who wanted to be healed They praised him It says in Luke 19, for his miracles, not for his message They love the miracles of the king They just didn't like the message of the king because the message of the king demanded you submit to his authority And while they paid homage to him externally, they did not want to pay homage to him internally

So by the end of that last week of his life, instead of laying their garments before him and submitting to his rulership as king, they cried, crucify him We will not have this king rule over us Why? Because he didn't do what I wanted him to do He didn't fulfill my agenda They were still building their own kingdom And that's the way a lot of us are We get angry at God We get mad at God because God's not doing for me what I want done for me in my kingdom. I'm still building my kingdom My job is my kingdom My home is my kingdom My athletic prowess is my kingdom Everything about me is mine

And if God's not meeting my agenda on my timetable, then forget about it And so you need to reorder your priority Seek first his kingdom, his righteousness We are pursuing his kingdom If you're pursuing his kingdom, you're going to proclaim his kingdom That's your priority It's all about the king of his kingdom You're going to pursue him because he is the one that you bow before in submission And now you proclaim him as king Jesus said in Luke's gospel, in Luke chapter four, verse number 43, I must preach the kingdom of God Why? Because I'm the king

And in order to get into the kingdom of God, it comes through me There's one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. I must preach the kingdom of God to other cities also For I was sent for this purpose Listen, if you're going to reorder your priority, your purposes are going to be God's purposes. I was sent for this purpose What's that? To proclaim the gospel of the kingdom If you're pursuing the kingdom of God, you're going to proclaim the kingdom of God That's how it is That's how you reorder your priority

It goes on to say in Luke chapter eight, verse number one, soon afterwards, he began going around from one city and village to another, proclaiming and preaching the kingdom of God Same thing In fact, in Matthew's gospel, he talks about the kingdom of heaven 32 times because he came to present himself as king and his kingdom He talked about it so much, so much They asked him about the kingdom Remember that in Luke chapter 17, verse number 20 Now, having been questioned by the Pharisees as to when the kingdom of God was coming You see, they still didn't recognize him as the king

They still didn't see his kingdom So they began to question him And I don't think they were really searching for answers. I don't think they were really wanting to know what he had to say They were trying to entrap him and almost sarcastically asking questions about the kingdom You say you're king Tell us about the kingdom of God What are the events surrounding the kingdom? But you see, the kingdom is not about an event The kingdom is about an encounter with the living God They didn't see that, see, because he, as the king, stood right before them So he says these words

The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed Nor will they say, look, here it is Or there it is For behold, the kingdom of God is in your midst The kingdom of God is standing right in front of you And when you stand right in front of me, you are observing the king who's presenting to you his kingdom See, they didn't understand the internal spiritual kingdom of the king They didn't understand that the king wanted to live in them, Christ in you, the hope of glory They didn't get that And that's the gospel of the kingdom The king wants you to embrace him as Lord and savior

The king wants you to submit to his rulership because the king wants to reside in you We know that the Lord God of Israel is a universal king. I mean, Nebuchadnezzar recognized that in Daniel chapter four Took him a while, but he did He is a universal king And you need to acknowledge Christ as that king who has universal reign over the entire world And one day, not only is he a universal king, one day he'll be a literal king There'll be a literal kingdom upon the earth because he's gonna fulfill Abrahamic promise

He's gonna fulfill Davidic promise because he is a son of David and he will sit on the throne of his father David in the city of Jerusalem on Mount Zion And he will rule as Revelation 20 says for a thousand years There is a promise given to Israel that will be fulfilled We don't believe that the church has replaced Israel We believe that the promises given to Israel will be fulfilled in the return of the king So we know that there's a universal kingdom We know there's going to be a literal kingdom, but there's also a spiritual kingdom There's that internal kingdom

Once you acknowledge Christ is king universally and appropriate and accept him as your king internally and spiritually, then you anticipate his kingdom literally Because he's going to come one day and rule and reign on this earth That's why he gave the parables surrounding the kingdom, the parables of the kingdom in Matthew chapter 13 And as he gave those parables, he talked about the fact that the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed The kingdom of heaven is like leaven Well, it's gonna start really small It's gonna start on the inside of the heart of man

It's gonna expand into the full glory of God's kingdom is on earth But they didn't understand that because they were so into building their own kingdoms That's why man doesn't give his life to Christ He loves his life He loves his sins so much He loves his own kingdom and doesn't want to relinquish the reigns To the ultimate king We don't want to do that And those of us who have given our life to Christ, the reason we have anxiety as we do is because we're still mesmerized by our own physicality, our own physical appetites, whether they be food, whether they be our fashion or our future

And so because we're still mesmerized by our physicality, we minimize our spirituality, thus maximizing our anxiety So we need to reorder our priority and pursue God's kingdom, proclaim his kingdom, pray, pray for his kingdom He taught them how to pray Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven

If you're pursuing God in his kingdom and you're proclaiming God in his kingdom because that's your priority, now you're going to pray for God in his kingdom to come to earth because you want his rulership here as it is there, where it's perfectly submitted to everyone who lives in heaven And you pray for God's kingdom to come to earth You pray for God's will to be done on earth as it is in heaven You're praying for the kingdom

And if you're praying for the kingdom, listen, if you are pursuing the king and his kingdom and you are proclaiming the gospel of the king and his kingdom and you are praying for the king to come to earth, you then need to portray the king in his kingdom You need to live like a child of the king And that's what Matthew 5, 6, and 7 is all about, living like a child of the king You want to portray your master You want to serve your master You want to live the life of Christ That's because his righteousness is in you You want to live the righteous life, the holy life

You want to match your daily practice with your permanent position You are righteous in Christ Therefore, now I want to live a righteous life before others. I want to let my light shine so bright that others will see my father in heaven and glorify him You want to live like a child of the king Why is it we pursue the kingdom? Why is it we proclaim the kingdom? Why is it we pray for the kingdom? Why is it we portray the kingdom? Why is it we do that? Why is that our priority? Why do we have to reorder our priority? It's because the kingdom is priceless It's the most valuable commodity on earth

And Christ said that in the parables of the kingdom in Matthew chapter 13, when he said these words, the kingdom of heaven is like a hidden treasure in the field which a man found and hid again And from joy over it, he goes and sells all that he has to buy the field Christ says, I want to tell you how valuable the kingdom is

When you recognize who Christ is and what Christ has done, who is the king, who's offered you the opportunity to live in his kingdom, when you recognize that you are so filled with joy, you're so overwhelmed with who he is and his kingdom, you are willing to sell all that you have that you might purchase that kingdom, that treasure And then he says this, again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking fine pearls And upon finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and he bought it, sold it all, everything

Because of the inestimable value of the kingdom, it's priceless It's so valuable because of its magnificence You're willing to give it all away to obtain what Christ himself offers And then what Christ said all throughout his ministry, he says it this way in Mark chapter eight, he says, if anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it But whoever loses his life for my sake will save it

For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul? For what would a man give in exchange for his soul? That's the transaction in the parable of the treasure, in the parable of the pearl What will a man give in exchange for his soul? Because you see, if you want to keep your life, you're going to lose it

But if you're willing to give your life away because you see me as king universally over all the world and that I want to be your king internally, spiritually, will you embrace him as your king? Because of the value of the kingdom, what shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world, but loses his own soul? For what would a man give in exchange for his soul? There's a transaction that takes place in salvation You exchange your sin and yourself for the savior of the world That's what you do You give your life away Away because the kingdom is so priceless It is so valuable

It is so great. I pursue the kingdom. I pursue it with all that I have because I love the king. I love him so much. I want to proclaim his kingdom. I want to pray about his kingdom. I want to portray his kingdom because I'm a child of the king. I'm going to live like a child of the king That's what it means to reorder your priority When you begin to do that, let me tell you something, you abolish anxiety because no longer are you concerned about you You're only concerned about the king and his kingdom

And when that happens, your eyes are off of you and onto Christ, off your circumstances and onto the Lord who controls all circumstances because you truly trust in him That's my prayer for you and for me as we seek to abolish anxiety Let me pray with you Father, thank you for today Lord, you are so good to us Thank you for your word that speaks truth. I pray, Lord, that if there would be anybody there who is still trying to build their own kingdom, that, Lord, you would show them it's all for nothing

They need to seek first you and your kingdom and your righteousness, that you'll take care of all their needs, but you need to be preeminent in their lives. I pray, Lord, that you would do that in a mighty way for the glory of your kingdom We pray in Jesus' glorious name Amen Thank you so much for being a part of this time today We trust that your heart's been blessed. I want you to have the best week ever in spite of the quarantine, in spite of being on house lockdown, however you want to call it. I want you to have the best week ever because you are into God's kingdom and not your own

Have a great week Thank you.