Enemies to Righteousness, Part 1: Worldliness, Matthew 6:19-24
We’ve been arguing that the theme
to this great Sermon is the theme of righteousness, and that the key to this
message is found in 5:20: “For I say unto you, That except your righteousness exceed
the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into
the kingdom of heaven.” It is about this
righteousness without which no one will enter into the kingdom of heaven, a
righteousness that is rooted in the heart (Beatitudes, 5:3-12), guided by the
Law (5:13-48), and motivated by the glory of God (6:1-18).
We now come to a new section in
this sermon. In the remaining verses of
this chapter (6:19-34), our Lord deals with what I am calling the “enemies of
righteousness,” those things that will kill the pursuit of righteousness in the
heart and life. The enemies of
righteousness are many, but our Lord deals with perhaps the two most deadly:
worldliness, or a matter of misplaced loyalty (19-24) and anxiety, or a matter
of misplaced trust (25-34). It is well
worth noting that righteousness does indeed remain the theme in these verses;
it is summed up by our Lord in verse 33 in the words, “But seek ye first the
kingdom of God and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto
you.” However, no one seeks first the
kingdom of God and his righteousness who does not first deal with these matters
of worldliness and this lack of faith that we call anxiety. In other words, worldliness and anxiety are
enemies to the pursuit (“seeking first”) of righteousness.
Righteousness is the word our
Lord uses, but it has many other names: holiness, obedience to God’s word,
keeping the commandments, and so on.
What the Lord says in 5:20 the author of Hebrews essentially says in
Heb. 12:14, “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man
shall see the Lord.” Grace not only
forgives sin, it frees us from sin’s foul bondage. It not only rids us of the guilt, but enables
us to say “no” to sin. I love the way
Paul puts it in Titus 2:11-12, “For the grace of God that bringeth salvation
hath appeared to all men, Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly
lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present
world.” Grace kills the dominion of sin
in the life of the believer (cf. Rom. 6:14).
Now I glory in the fact that our
sins are forgiven freely through Jesus Christ.
It is our only hope. We do not
have to merit God’s favor because we are accepted in the Beloved (Eph.
1:6). Recently, I was reading again in
Psalm 103, and these words landed on me with great force and joy (especially
verse 10): “The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in
mercy. He will not always chide: neither
will he keep his anger forever. He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor
rewarded us according to our iniquities.
For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward
them that fear him. As far as the east
is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us” (8-13). God does not deal with us after our
sins! That is grace.
But we have to be careful, lest
we fall into the category of people who say, “Let us sin that grace may abound”
(Rom. 6:1). Grace is not glorified in
the lives of believers who claim to be forgiven and yet who remain under the
grip of sin. Grace is glorified in the
lives of those it has freed from the power of sin. The grace of God is magnified when it takes
an unrighteous person and makes him/her a righteous person both through the
imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ and through the power of the Holy Spirit
in their life. And it is vain for a
person who lives in unrighteousness to claim the righteousness of Christ (1 Jn.
2:29; 3:7-10). Or, as our Lord put it,
unless our righteousness is more than external piety, unless it is real and
springs from the heart, we will never be saved.
So it is important to seek first the kingdom and righteousness of
God. And so it is important to repent of
those attitudes of the heart that would keep us from doing this very thing. Which brings us to the text.
Now I claim that this text is
about worldliness, even though that word isn’t used here. So what do I mean by “worldliness?” Biblically, the “world” is not a reference to
the earth, per se, as it is to humanity in opposition to God. “He was in the world, and the world was made
by him, and the world knew him not” (Jn. 1:10).
“And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in
wickedness” (1 Jn. 5:19). Thus, when our
Lord says, “God so loved the world” (Jn. 3:16), the point, as D. A. Carson is
wont to put it, is not so much that the world is so big but that the world is
so bad. Thus, worldliness is the
property of being like the world (just as godliness is the property of being
like God), and since the world is in opposition to God and lies in wickedness,
it means sharing the characteristics of those who, by their thoughts,
attitudes, and acts, show that they are hostile to God. It is no wonder then, that James tells us
that those who are friends to the world are enemies to God (Jam. 4:4).
Worldly people are therefore
primarily concerned with the things of this world, not with the things of
God. They are ruled by Mammon and not
Christ. Their focus is on the things of
this world and they are blind to the beauty of the things of God. They live for earthly treasures because they
cannot image anything more important than those. God does not have their heart, the world
does. And that is worldliness.
Worldliness is not, therefore, a
lack of religion. This is not a text
directed at atheists, or to those we would nowadays term philosophical
materialists. Remember that this sermon
was preached to people who were generally religious. We are all in danger of worldliness. It’s why our Lord preached this sermon to
them (and to us). It’s why the apostle
John wrote to Christians, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in
the world. If any man love the world,
the love of the Father is not in him” (1 Jn. 2:15).
In other words, you can be very
religious and yet in the truest sense of the word remain godless. You can go to church and be involved in
church, read your Bible, witness to others, and so on, and yet have your heart
enthralled with the things of this world.
The key to killing worldliness is not a matter of being religious. It’s not a matter of doing this or that. It’s rather a matter of the heart. It’s why our Lord said, “For where your
treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
Nor is worldliness necessarily
determined by the things one possesses.
Your godliness does not necessarily plummet as your financial successes
rise. Poverty does not guarantee
piety. This was the mistake of many in
the monastic movement. They were
governed by the idea that the path to godliness was the path of poverty and
separation from the world. Wall yourself
off from lower things. Spend your days
in quiet alone with God. But that is not
the path away from worldliness. You
don’t stop worldliness invading your heart by removing yourself from the world
or by selling all your possessions. It’s
a heart issue, not a location issue or an issue with the circumstances in which
we find ourselves.
We find the key to battling
worldliness again in those words of our Lord in verse 33: “Seek first the kingdom of God and his
righteousness.” What is first in your
heart? Who or what is the priority of
your life? Who do you love above all
else? What has your attention above
everything else? Where does your loyalty
lie? In some sense, God requires every one
of us to have such a heart for him so that if he were to tell us, as he did the
rich young ruler, to sell all that we have and give to the poor, we would do
it. We are to love him with all our
heart. We are to love him more than our
dearest friends: “If any man come to me and hate not his father, and mother,
and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also,
he cannot be my disciple. And whosoever
doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. . . . So likewise, whosoever he be of you that
forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26-27, 33). We should note that clearly our Lord was not
telling children to forsake their parents in an absolute sense. In another place, he rebukes the people of
his day for making an excuse (and a religious one at that) for not honoring and
providing for their parents (cf. Matt. 15:1-9).
His point is that we are to so love him and loyal to him that compared
to that our affection for others – including our own family – is like
hate. He is to be first, even before our
own selves. Our problem is not this
stupid notion that we don’t love ourselves enough. Our problem is that we don’t love God as we
ought.
In our text, the Lord Jesus gives
three different metaphors that underline the sin of worldliness. In verses 19-21, he uses the metaphor of
treasure, and tells us that we cannot value both heaven and earth at the same
time. In verses 22-23, he uses the metaphor
of sight, and tells us that we cannot focus on both God and the world. In verse 24, he uses the metaphor of slavery,
and tells us that we cannot serve both God and Mammon. In other words, it comes down to a matter of
love (who or what has your heart), a matter of sight (who or what has your
attention), and a matter of service (who or what has your loyalty). In each case, God is to be preeminent. If he is not, we have fallen into the
clutches of that enemy of righteousness: worldliness.
Now why should we do this? Here we see the condescension of our
Lord. He could have simply told us to
love him above all others and all things.
But he gives us reasons. He
didn’t have to do that, but he does it because he loves his people and he wants
to give them every help they need to fight sin and grow in grace. And in our text, I see at least five reasons
to turn away from worldliness and to give our heart completely and unreservedly
to God and Christ.
First of all, he reasons from the temporary nature of the things of this
world: “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust
doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal” (19). In the first century, fashions didn’t change
much, and clothes were passed down from one person to another. And yet, old clothes had a tendency to be
eaten by moths. “Rust” was not just a
reference to ferric oxide, but to the effects that mice and moths had in
general on one’s belongings in a first century Judean home. The things that we possess eventually break
down or die. The word “corrupt” does not
just refer to something becoming less attractive or useful – it could be
translated “destroy.” Things break and
stop working. We have to throw them away
or get rid of them. And this is true of
anything that belongs to this earth. As
the hymn puts it, “In all around change and decay I see.” Nothing that we have or own that is from this
world will last forever.
Why then would we want to “lay up
treasures upon earth?” Of course, it
does make sense if this is all there is.
But we know that this life is only a prelude to the next. In the age to come we will bring nothing of
this earth with us. And when I die, it
will not matter in the least what kind of home I lived in, what kind of clothes
I wore, what kind of car I drove, how much money I made, or what people thought
of my accomplishments. Everything is
fading and corrupting and will be destroyed.
This is the logic of the apostle Peter in his second epistle. He reminds his reader of the “day of the
Lord” which “will come as a thief in the night: in the which the heavens shall
pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat,
the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up” (2 Pet.
3:10). Now notice the deduction that
Peter draws from this: “Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved,
what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness,
looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens
being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent
heat?” (11-12). In other words, don’t
lay up treasures that are only going to be burned up. Rather, pursue godliness.
Now again, our Lord is not
reprimanding people for having possessions or even for saving for a rainy
day. Rather, as Stott put it, “to ‘lay
up treasure on earth’ does not mean being provident (making sensible provision
for the future) but being covetous (like misers who hoard and materialists who
always want more).”[1] Note how our Lord puts it: “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon
earth.” In other words, don’t be selfish
with your belongings. Remember that all
that you have ultimately belongs to the Lord.
Use them wisely under his Lordship over your life. Use them to glorify his name and to advance
his kingdom in this world. Don’t live
for yourself, live for Christ – even at the level of your possessions. That is what he is saying. Own your possessions; don’t let them own
you. Christ must have your heart, so
don’t give it to things.
Second, our Lord reasons from the enduring nature of our heavenly
possessions: “But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither
moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through and steal”
(20). Treasures in heaven refer to that
which is rewarded the believer in the age to come for the things that he/she
has done for Christ in this life. Our
Lord has already said that those who endure persecution for his name will
receive a great reward in heaven (5:12).
Now that does not mean that this
reward is merited. Every gift from God
to us whether in this life or the next is exactly that: a gift, freely given by
grace. The faith behind a righteous
life, the grace and strength to remain faithful to Christ and to live for him –
all this is done by the grace of our Lord.
Without him, we can do nothing.
With him, we can do all things.
The amazing thing is this: in the age to come, though he receives the
praise, yet he gives us the reward.
There is no contradiction in heaven between grace and reward.
And this reward is something
nothing in earth or hell can touch. No
moth or rust can corrupt or destroy it, no thief can break through and steal
it. Blessed be God, we have been born
again to a living hope by Jesus Christ, “to an inheritance incorruptible, and
undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you” (1 Pet.
1:3-4).
And it is a treasure. It is something infinitely valuable and to be
desired, not only because it lasts forever, but because every reward in the age
to come is a reward in a place where God manifests his glory most fully to
bless. Things on the earth begin to
become corrupted in our hearts long before they become corrupted in
themselves. And even if an earthly
possession could last forever, it would become corroded in our enjoyment of
it. But not so our enjoyment of God in
the age to come. Our enjoyment will only
increase, not decrease, because the object of our joy – the Triune God – is an
infinite and inexhaustible treasure.
Third, our Lord reasons from the idolatry of worldliness: “for where
your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (21). Not only is it common sense to pursue
treasure in heaven rather than treasures in the earth, but it is sin.
If your treasure is of the world, then the world is going to have your
heart. And that is idolatry. Idolatry is not just bowing down to a
statue. Idolatry is valuing anything
above God. It is worshiping and serving
the creature rather than the creator (Rom. 1:25). In other words, worldliness is breaking the
First Commandment.
Then, fourthly, our Lord reasons
from the fact that worldliness corrupts
our perspective (22-23). I like the
way the KJV translates this passage. The
ESV translates this as: “If your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of
light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness.” As far as it goes, that is a good
translation. But the translation “if thy
eye be single,” is also a good translation, and I think brings out the meaning
a little more clearly. What our Lord is
saying is that our focus is to be on the Lord, and that if we try looking at
both the Lord and the world at the same time we are going to be like someone
with double vision, or worse, like someone with no vision, a blind man. Jesus is saying that the man who “divides his
interest and tries to focus on both God and possessions . . . has no clear
vision, and will live without clear orientation or direction.”[2]
You simply cannot focus on this
world and see true realities clearly. You will be blind to truth and the value of
spiritual things. You will not be able
to direct your paths in the right way (cf. Prov. 3:5-6). We begin to value the temporary over the
eternal. This is what happened to
Demas. How can someone like Demas, who
traveled with the apostle Paul and saw miracles and heard the gospel preached
from a truly inspired man, how can he fall away? The answer lies in Paul’s words to Timothy,
“For Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world” (2 Tim.
4:10). His eye was no longer single, and
he lost sight of what is most important.
Consequently, he fell in love with the world, and so he departed the
apostle’s company and the service of Christ.
How tragic!
Finally, our Lord reasons from the impossibility of dividing our loyalty
between this world and God: “No man can serve two masters” (24). It’s impossible, you cannot do it. Neither this world nor God are satisfied with
a divided loyalty. They are not like
employers, whom you can work for part time, but they are masters who claim
entire ownership.
The reason is that they are
opposites. You cannot be in the light
and in the darkness in the same way at the same time. If you love one you will hate the other. They are incompatible. You cannot walk on both sides of the road at
the same time. God will have all of you
or he will have none of you.
And so our Lord reasons with us
to abandon our love of the world and to embrace God who is the true and lasting
and deeply satisfying reward and treasure.
Where do you stand this morning?
Who has your heart, your attention, your devotion? My friends, do not be like the rich young
ruler who, when confronted with the choice of following Christ or remaining
devoted to worldly wealth, chose to walk away from Christ. Follow Christ! He is your Lord, your true Master, and he is
the one who saves from God’s just wrath against us for our treason and loving this
world above him. May we all be drawn to
him with a heart united to love, trust, and serve him.
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