Love the Commandment – Seek/Guard

Announcements

As we begin this morning, I want you all to realize that God is using FCBC to bless many people in India in some very significant ways during Coronavirus. Let me read an update from the pastors we support:

We believe that our staying back due to Covid-19 lockdown, served its purpose well. God makes no mistakes! Through your giving, we extended the help to more than 220 people.

We extended our help with kind and cash, from needy at the Mission Field to the poor in the slums and orphans at Bangalore; stranded students to missionary families around Bangalore. We thank the Almighty for this
privilege. We are humbled and honored. May the name of Jehovah-Jireh be glorified. On behalf of all that received the help, we extend our heartfelt gratitude to you all. The words of appreciation and prayers of thanksgiving may not reach your ears, but the showers of blessings will surely shower upon you, as the blessed souls whisper their heartfelt gratitude from their lips every time they eat.

Introduction

We are in our summer series which is an extension of our study of Ecclesiastes.

Solomon concluded the book by tearing out the last page of his journal and handing it to us. And in so doing he gives us the results of his 60-year happiness experiment. This is his seminal work - his magnum opus.

Solomon, summarize everything you have learned in life. And here it is: "Fear God and keep the Commandments." That's gold! And so this series is us trying to apply that. Want to be happy? Keep the commandments of God. If the happiness conclusion of the wisdom GOAT is to keep God's commandments then let's get serious about that!

Now, we start with the admission that this advice is counterintuitive. We don't like commandments. Commands are like fences. Don't go here. This area over here is not allowed. I don't love the way that feels.

But, it's all a matter of perspective. If you are in a prison you hate the fence because it is an obstacle to your freedom. If you are a zoo you love the fence because it allows you to get up close and view the lion and gorilla but it protects you from them.

So if the law is like a fence, what kind of fence is it? If you view the law like a fence that needs to be secretly climbed because God's hiding chocolate from you, then you'll be miserable on two counts. First of all, you'll be miserable because you are so fixated on trying to scale the fence you won't even notice the buffet that's right behind you. But secondly, once you do successfully scale that fence you will be injured by that thing the fence was designed to protect you from.

How many people believe that to be happy they must ignore God's sexual ethic? And so in pursuit of their happiness, they climb the fence and destroy any possibility of ever experiencing the joy of God's design and they get hurt by the consequences of sin.

No, we want to learn from Solomon and love the commandments of God. We want to see those commandments as signs that point us in the direction of joy.

Seasons of the Soul

Now to remember and obey all the commands of the Bible is a daunting task since there are thousands and thousands of them. So what we are trying to do in this series is group the commands of the Bible according to dispositions of the heart or seasons of the soul as a way to remember the big idea behind all God's commandments.

So last week we introduced this chart.

Almost every command in the Bible can fit beneath one of these four headings:

- Commands to believe.
- Commands to pursue.
- Commands to cultivate.
- Commands to evaluate.

Now, what this chart is intended to illuminate a process at work in your heart subconsciously. You don't have to put an ounce of thought into this. It's automatic. This cycle of the soul is constantly at work to either create and reinforces love or deconstruct and eliminates love. So look at the upper left.

- An idea is believed. For example, "If I am beautiful, I will be happy."
- Once that is believed, then it becomes an object to be pursued. So if beauty is your goal, you buy the products and accessories and work out and diet and you pursue that goal.
- Then that joy is tasted. Perhaps you get some degree of success. You have some degree of obtainment. And you began to taste some of that fruit. Maybe you attract some level of attention and that feels good. So you keep at it. You keep working that formula. You cultivate it.
- Eventually comes a season of evaluation. Okay, now that I possess some level of fulfillment, does that satisfy in the way that was promised. What is the trajectory? What is the joy forecast in the next 6 months or 6 years? Is it worth it to continue to pursue?

So that's how the cycle works.

Review of Belief

Last week we looked at the first quadrant of belief. Now I need to spend a chunk of time reminding ourselves of the key concepts of belief because they are so critical to the next step.

We enter into this season any time a truth claim is considered. It is not enough to be confronted with truth; for it to change our love and behavior, false things must be repented of and the true thing must be believed.

To illustrate this we looked at Thomas. Here Messiah stood before him with nail-scarred hands and a pierced side. He told him to touch the scars so that he could personally handle the evidence so that there could be no doubt. And after he had done that Jesus turned to Thomas and issued a command that had the potential to change his life. He was literally standing at a fork in the road of his own story. That decision to believe or not believe was the crux of his choose-your-own-adventure book.

Jesus looked at him and said, "Thomas, believe.""

If Thomas chose to not believe, to come up with some alternate explanation of what he was witnessing, his entire life would go this direction. He would become a skeptic, an agnostic, atheist, a hater of Christians. But if he chose to believe, he would become a witness of the resurrection, an evangelist of good news, and a follower of the risen Christ.

Everything hangs on the command to believe.

And this is true for use as well. The resurrection reality cannot change anyone until it is believed. All truth claims work in this exact same way. For a truth claim to gain traction and have motive power in your life, it must be believed.

The Negative Commands

Now, remember last week we said that belief has a logical and necessary opposite twin sister. For something to be believed something else has to be repented of.

Let me explain why this concept is so important. Because it reveals why at times we believe (affirm the truthfulness of) something and never change.

For example, you can be confronted with statistics that not enough exercise or a poor diet or other lifestyle choices will result in a lower quality of life and a shorter life.

We can agree with all that true data but it won't change us.

How is it possible to agree that eating poorly will kill you and yet still choose to eat poorly? You ready for the answer? Because repentance has happened yet. Because up to this point, they believe that they are the exception. They will think to themselves, "For most people that's true, but I'm pretty sure that doesn't apply to me. It might apply, but I think it's worth the risk. Let's just see if I can escape unscathed."

Listen closely, when we believe something we simultaneously do two things: we repent of self-exemption to the rule or the belief that this rule does not apply to us, and we now believe we are under the rule, that there's no escaping the consequences. And that changes behavior.

Nobody believes they are the one exception to the law of gravity, that somehow the law of gravity will recognize their privileged position and treat them differently. No. Because they believe they are under that law, every person regardless of race, personality, gender, or religion, modifies their behavior to respect this law.

Many people approach God's law the same way, thinking these are great ideas for most people, but I'm exempt. And because they have not repented of this self-exemption the commands of God have no power over them.

You might think, I don't do this. Well, let's see. Here's a spiritual law of gravity that God gives us in 1 Timothy and even though it's just as certain as the law of gravity, very few people believe it applies to them.

For this verse to have power in your life, you must believe that you are not an exception to this rule. This means you need to affirm the truth claims of the verse.

- If I love money, that love of money has the power to pull me away from the faith. Do you conceive of yourself as under that law?
- If I love money it will pierce my heart with many pains. Do you envision yourself as bound by this spiritual law of gravity?

Very few believe they are under this rule. Try me. Oh, I can handle it. I've seen that happen to other people, but not me. I've got control. If you find yourself loving money, it's time to repent and believe. Repent of this bad love. Repent of the false belief that you are an exception to the rule. And believe that loving money will kill you.

All that review is to make this point again very strongly. Repentance/Belief is always the prerequisite to pursuit. To state it in terms of our quadrants. The pursuit quadrant always follows the truth claim believed.

So in 1 Timothy 6, after Paul gives them a truth claim to believe, well, what's next? Something to pursue.

Do you see how this works? The truth claim believed pushes us into the second quadrant. We repent of our false conceptions of what has worth. I repent of any belief that money is worth loving and I believe it will destroy me. I now believe God is worth loving. I have something new to pursue. I am now pursuing generosity, good works, and heavenly riches.

Belief always results in pursuit.

The Season of Pursuit

So let's spend a bit of time talking about this season of pursuit. The season of pursuit is all about closing the proximity gap. I can illustrate this through a problem-solving algorithm many of us have mastered.

Let's say you go for a run, hike, walk, or go to the gym. And you barely had lunch at all and so you get home and you shower and right as you finish, you realize just how hungry you are. And in that same moment, you remember that your favorite restaurant is offering a 50% burger and you have a gift card. Now you believe with all your heart that this burger will fulfill you and satisfy and silence the cravings. But here's the problem: you are at your house and the food is at the restaurant. So what do you do? You pursue it! You close the proximity gap. You get out of the chair, get in the car, drive to the restaurant, and order. You've closed the gap.

This is what it means to pursue. It means you believe that this thing would be very satisfying, but you're not close enough to enjoy it. You don't yet possess it. But because it's a worthy object, it's worth investing the effort to pursue. It's worth the sweat. The juice is worth the squeeze.

There are many commands in the Bible that fit under the broad heading of pursue. And similar to the season of Belief, there are negative and positive commands that are opposite sides of the same action.

The negative commands are things to guard you against getting distracted.

Guard, defend, fight, resist, refuse.

And the positive commands are encouragements for you to strain forward and continue moving. Don't stall out. Don't get stuck in the mud. Keep moving forward.

Pursue, come, seek, follow, go, arise, find, make.

Now similar to the believe/repent commands, the seek/guard commands will have no love-shaping effect on you until they are obeyed.

Seek While You Have Freedom from Your Taskmaster

Probably one of the best places to illustrate this is Jesus' parable of the seeds.

Now, the way this narrative is used by Matthew is almost always missed when the story is told. And that's because there are two layers to the parable.

Layer #1 is the parable itself. And the parable is amazing and it has meaning in and of itself and it's totally incredible on that level alone.

But then there's Layer #2. Layer #2 is how Matthew tells the story of how people reacted to the parable when told. This is a greater lesson than the parable itself. And that's what we want to focus on.

So let's set the backdrop. By this point in the narrative, Jesus has established himself beyond any reasonable doubt as a miracle worker and taken to himself names like Teacher, Lord, Son of Man. He had turned water to wine, healed demoniacs, healed lepers, fed 5000, and then fed 4000. Even if you were just a casual observer, there was no denying that this guy had some special connection to God.

So there is a belief that this guy is from God. It's so undeniable that in Matthew chapter 12, just the chapter before what we are about to read, his enemies, wanting to discredit Jesus, attribute his miracle-working ability to Satan.

- That's their best effort.
- It's extremely telling that this was their strategy.
- A much better strategy would be to say that he performed a trick and it was never real or that this guy is a fraud.

But the miracles, apparently, were so undeniable that this would not have been plausible. So their best strategy was to say that this miracle-working ability was from Satan.

So by the time we get to Matthew chapter 13, here's the point I'm trying to make: nobody could deny that Jesus is from God. All evidence points to that.

Now let's read Matthew 13. Jesus tells the parable of the sower. And again, our focus is the reaction of the people to the parable.

Now notice it says, great crowds. Now, I've been to a place they call the Sower's Cove in Israel. It's a natural amphitheater and a voice can travel quite far. You could easily assemble thousands of people here. Now, why are so many people gathering? Because Jesus is known to be a miracle worker. He's doing crazy things and everyone wants to hear what he has to say! So people are settling in for a sermon. They are expecting something quite thrilling, amazing.

Now, the parable just ends. That's it. It's over. And you can imagine the crowd just kind of sitting there perplexed. That was a really short sermon. Man, we came all the way out here for that? That's a little disappointing.

His final words, "He who has an ear, let him hear." So here is the question. How do you hear? They all heard the parable but only some of them really heard. Now I love the detective mode. How do I become a hearer? How do I know if I hear or I only think I hear? What does it mean to have plugged spiritual ears? Let's figure it out.

Now, combining the synoptic Gospels here is fun. Luke records the next interaction. Jesus just finished telling this cryptic parable and he ends with, "He who has an ear let him hear." The disciples are scratching their heads.

Now Matthew elaborates on this.

Now the language is really important. You have a person pictured here whose ears barely work. They hear sounds but the hearing is so bad, it's just muffled noise and they can't comprehend. And the ears have 'grown dull' which means they used to work but through abuse or age they now barely work. Same with their eyes. The eyes work, but they are closed. There is a barrier covering the seeing organ. They could see, but they can't see because of the eyelids that block the light. Same with their hearts. They do not perceive it.

Again, how did this person get this way? It's a bit scary because Jesus implies that most of the people who listen to this parable are like this. They are blind, dull of hearing, and they have stones for hearts. Now apparently the disciples are the exception.

Now, read the text. What is the one thing the disciples did that nobody else did?

- Everybody heard the same message.
- Everybody saw the same guy speaking in the same way.
- Everybody heard the message end.
- Everybody heard Jesus say, "He who has an ear, let him hear."
- What's the one thing the disciples did that nobody else did?

They said very profoundly, "Uh...I don't get it. Can I get a little help here? Is there an answer key to this one?" You might think that's a small matter but believe me, this, according to Jesus is the golden buzzer into heaven.

- That question represented the difference between those who had sight and those who were blind.
- That quest for an answer represented the difference between those who could hear and those who could not.
- That pursuit represented the difference between those who understood with their hearts and those who did not.

This simple act of pursuit is the golden buzzer into heaven. Am I overstating? Look again at this verse:

Do you see the emphasis that Jesus places on pursuit? You believe I am God? Then pursue me. He intentionally leaves mystery so that they will pursue him. He intentionally makes it unclear so that they press in and ask questions. It's that pursuit that he rewards.

I want you to see how obvious this is in the Scriptures. And we only have time for two places.

In fact, it's right to say that God makes seeking a condition to experience his glory and goodness. God makes pursuing him a condition upon which you will ever know, really know, who he is.

I want you to let that sink in, do you believe God exists? Great. That means you obeyed the commands in quadrant one. You did what Thomas did. You believed. And you said what Thomas said, "My Lord and my God."

But do you see that there are conditions that still remain, there are commands that must still be obeyed?

He who draws near must respond to the commands of quadrant one, believe that he exists, but who does he reward? Those who obey the commands of quadrant two, those who diligently seek him.

And if you read your Bibles carefully, you will see that this paradigm exists everywhere. God rewards those who seek. One of the places you don't have to read carefully at all is Proverbs chapter 2. You'd literally have to be blind to not see this.

Since we just finished Ecclesiastes this is a great place to turn. This is Solomon also. Listen to the way Solomon describes the pursuit in Proverbs 2. The entirety of the first 5 verses of this section is a string of conditionals. It's structured as an if-then.

Now I think it's helpful to think of this chart in terms of a flow diagram. I don't want to lose anyone here, but it's highly important to highlight the logic and really let the logic compel you. A flow chart is a way to visually illustrate the logical choices we make. Again, imagine this is a choose your own adventure.

Now, what is this saying? The diamond shape box represents a choice. And that choice determines a certain path and consequently a certain destiny. And what is the choice? Will I receive God's words? This is quadrant one stuff. This is the believe command. Will I believe what God tells me is true?

Now if the answer is no, then you will never know God. After all, that's what Hebrews 11:6 says. He draws near to God must believe that he exists which means if you don't believe he exists you can't ever draw near. So again, that's quadrant one stuff.

But now, the entirety of the rest of this paragraph is quadrant two stuff. It's the section commanding us to pursue.

Just because you receive the words of God does not mean you will know him. You now have the possibility of knowing him because you did the first step, but more conditions remain. That can be illustrated this way.

If at any point you jump off the rails and stop pursuing then the reward is not yours. And look at the way the conditions continue to build.

And the final two conditions are describing the intensity.

How do you seek for silver? Go up to Idaho City. Look at the miles and miles of stone they dug up in pursuit of just the smallest amount of treasure. So much work to find the treasure. That's the idea.

And if you do all these things then the prize is yours.

Now the danger of doing it like this is that you will walk away thinking, man that sounds impossible. No, don't think that. The point of Proverbs 2 is not to show you how many conditions stand between you and God. Solomon is trying to show you what kind of reward could be yours if you pursued God with all your might.

Put both of these passages together. To whom does the kingdom of God belong? To those who say, "Uh...can I get an answer key?" To those who have a spiritual curiosity.

God will reward you as you seek him. True. Proverbs 2 makes the point, the more diligently you seek the more significantly you will be rewarded.

God wants us to diligently, earnestly seek him. If you rake you get leaves, and if you dig you get gold. This is all over the Bible. It's everywhere. These pursuit commands are commands not to say, "Yeah, that's good for people to do. I agree that the world would be a better place if people did this. My kids would really benefit from doing this." No. Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be added unto you. That's a command for you to obey.

The Danger of Not Seeking

Now I don't want to end on a negative note, but I'm going to end with a slight warning. What happens if we don't seek? Let's recall the bitter end of non-seekers.

Remember the people in the cove. They all believed in Jesus. Who is that Jesus of Nazareth guy? Oh, he's some crazy miracle worker. Definitely from God.

Jesus tells the parable of the seeds and they go home saying, "Mysterious stuff man." Then they shrug and go back to their life. What is Jesus' assessment of these shruggers?

We didn't read Jesus' judgment of these folks.

Now let me ask you, are you that guy? Are you more like the disciples or more like the crowds? And here's what's scary. The crowds thought they were hearers, but they were deaf. They thought they saw but they were blind. They thought they understood, but the meaning was lost on them. And what little understanding they had was being taken away from them.

They used to hear but now they can no longer hear. They used to see but now they can no longer see. How did that happen? Jesus' answer: your failure to seek shut your eyes and stopped your ears.

Let me show you how this happens in our cycle. And I'm going to reference our Grand Canyon analogy from a couple of weeks ago. Remember this analogy.

Every year, millions and millions of people visit the Grand Canyon. And they peer over the edge, snap a selfie or two, and zoom off. And if you ask one of these drive-by tourists if they have seen the Grand Canyon, they will respond with confidence, “Absolutely. You should definitely go, it’s worth a peek. I’d maybe budget 30 minutes or so. It’s cool, but there’s really not much to do.”

Their lack of interest is a function of their failure to invest the energy to descend into the depths, to seek the treasure, to pursue the beauty. They know there is probably more to see if they were to hike to the bottom, but man, that sounds like a lot of work. They think they know what it's like. They imagine it in their head and their mental conception of what it's like is just not worth the energy.

Now if we use that as an analogy of how many people approach the living God, I think we can illustrate how failure to obey the commands to seek end up hardening the heart. Watch.

1. Belief: Oh, I believe that the Grand Canyon is amazing. I believe Jesus is amazing.
2. Pursue: And so let's go see it. But all you do is stand on the rim. You don't pursue it. They tell me that the good stuff is down deep, but I'm kind of tired. I have a lot going on. I have lots of demands and a busy schedule. I'm kind of exhausted. So you don't pursue it.
3. Cultivation: And because you don't pursue, what is your experience? Minimal effort = minimal reward. You never actually experience the hidden treasure. Rake and you get leaves, dig and you get gold. And because you haven't experienced the treasure.
4. Evaluation: And you think, you know people really talked this up. I'm not so sure it's all it's cracked up to be. I'm not sure this whole Jesus guy is all that great.
5. And then that feeds back into your belief. Do you believe Jesus Christ is worthy of your pursuit? I'm not so sure I'll visit next year, I might try something new.

And then guess what happens? When you are sitting around bored and you are really wanting something to do and someone says to you, "Hey you should really check out the Grand Canyon. It's amazing!" Ah, been there done that. I'm moving on.

Do you see how now this person hears, but cannot hear? How their failure to seek causes them now to see but cannot see? They can understand the words, but they can't understand the words. How did they get that way? Because they didn't obey the command to seek Jesus. They thought they did.

Failure to pursue God results in a hardening of the heart. But blessed are your eyes for they see? What did they do differently? They sought the Lord.

Application

Now we would be totally amiss if we ended this sermon in a normal way. We must seek the Lord right now. Because the arrows are now all pointed at us. What are we going to do? We have just heard the word of God like the people in the cove. How should we respond?

So here's what we are going to do. We are going to sing a song in response to prepare our hearts and then we are going to have a time of prayer. We are going to sing another song and I'll lead you in a time of prayer and then we are just going to let the service end on that note. We'll have a soft close to the service and we'll allow some space for God to meet you in your pursuit of him.

I'm going to pray now and then we'll sing that first song.

We didn't have time today to get into it much, but remember, seek is the positive command. Guard is the negative command. We need to guard against things that would distract us in our pursuit of Christ.

Answer that question in your mind. So I want you guys on Livestream at home to do this as well.

- Maybe it's something to do with social media, entertainment, or technology.
- Maybe it's a relationship.
- Maybe it's an anxious thought.
- Maybe it's something to do with money or your job.
- Maybe it's a situation you don't like.
- Maybe it's a hobby or sport.

Then I want you to turn to the person next to them, share that answer, and have them pray for you. If you aren't comfortable sharing, then just bow your head and pray. I'd love to hear this room just filled with the prayers of God's people seeking the Lord together.

What is your version of, "Uh...I don't get it."? What is your version of seeking God as if he were hidden treasure? Pursuing God as if he was precious gold? Maybe you've just been raking leaves. Maybe it's time to get serious with the Lord.

- Is it prayer?
- Bible reading?
- Book reading?
- Listening to sermons?
- Getting involved in a Life Group?
- Serving at church?
- Giving in some way or using your gifts in some way?

What is that way in which you need to seek God practically, this week? Answer this question and then we will pray. And there isn't a close here to the service. We don't need to go get kids from Sunday School. So just have a soft close to the service and when you're ready to leave, just make your way out to the foyer and stick around and continue your conversation with others.