October 12 – Jesus Speaks on Material Things – Matthew 6
Chapters 5-7 is a foundational sermon preached by Jesus on social justice. Today we will only look at chapter 6, and will only touch the surface of this great chapter. There are several topics in this chapter including; giving, prayer, fasting, worry, and treasures. All of these topics carry one emphasis in common. The emphasis is selflessness. Our society today is structured around “success.” This “success” is described in the amount of materialistic things you attain, or how you affect this world through the influence and popularity you achieve. In fact, our society rates our success on the amount of our selfishness. Jesus speaks on giving, prayer, fasting, worry, and treasures as a specific choice that we make between serving God or mammon (materialism). Matthew 6:24 “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.” If you take materialism out of the equation, most if not all of the social justice groups would disintegrate. Materialism is the underlying motivation behind the movements. Could you imagine if our Country would use these three chapters as a guide in making decisions? Our founding Fathers did just that, and God blessed America greatly. Yes, mistakes were made and corrected. America took a hard nose dive when we began ignoring the Bible, and turned to our own human logic and wisdom. We turned our backs on God, and we are just beginning to see what it will look like when God turns His back on us. We cannot force others to adhere to Scripture, but we can stand up, and like Joshua, proclaim “as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord!”
