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Welcome, everyone back to Zealous for Good Works part three. And this is going to be a kind of an exciting one. This is some stuff the Lord’s been showing me recently. Everything just kind of seems to all wind together as you know how the Lord does. But before we get started, just a quick update for our podcast listeners who are out there, since I do this live in front of a studio audience, and then we put this out on the podcast. So just a reminder to subscribe to our podcast if you haven’t already, and you can just hit the subscribe button on your podcast player and they’ll just let you know when we publish new podcasts. Be sure. Also, if you like these, please be sure to share it on social media. On your podcast player, you should see a little share button and you can send it out to your Facebook friends or just to text to someone that you think would be interested in it. And the final thing is, if you come back and listen to this again or actually come to our website, the podcast channel website, whether it’s get Radical faith dot com or get sellers call on EW.com and watch the video, you’ll get so much more out because you only get half the communication when you just listen to it. You get less than half the communication when you’re listening to it while you’re doing other things. But if you can actually watch it and pay attention, you’ll get a lot more out of it.

So you’ll enjoy that. My wife is grinning over here because she listens to my podcast. I’m in the middle of cooking dinner and everything else and but I did the same thing, so it’s okay. Just a real quick review of where we’ve come from and where we’re going. So we’ve been talking on this topic of being zealous for good works. This comes from Titus. Titus 214 says that Jesus gave himself to redeem us as a people for his own possession who were zealous for good works and what we did on our first session, we started talking about those good works and said, What are they? And we came up with a simple thing that these good works are these good works that the Lord prepared before the foundation of the world that we should walk in them. This comes from Ephesians two. And what these good works are, is this is actually your destiny. What has the Lord called you to do with your life? He’s already created these good works. They are already there. It’s your job to figure out what they are and how to pursue them. And so that was our first thing we started talking about. And while we talked on that, we came up with the discussion of Is a lord looking for quality or is he looking for quantity? What are we measured on? And we found with the parable of the sower and the seed, that the only thing that counted was the seed sown on the good soil that produce fruit.

And so what we found is that fruit is actually quality. It’s the only thing that lasts for eternity. And we are measured on those things that lasts for eternity. The good things that we do in life, if they don’t have eternal impact, they are counted as worthless. So the first step in doing anything, in serving the Lord is it has to be quality to even count. And then from there, everything else that we do that’s quality, we’re measured on quantity. How many of those things. That’s why the that’s why it doesn’t say innovations that God created a good work for us to walk in, but that he created good works, that we should walk in them. So it’s multiple is quantity. And then the last session we started to talk about something a little bit different, and we started to talk about how do you bear more fruit? And we came through a five step process. The first one is you need to focus on what it is the Lord has called you to do. And this is where we use the three circles, a Venn diagram, and you look at the things that you love to do. And then the things that you are good at doing, and then those things that can make disciples because the focus is the great Commission.

God, Jesus says number one priority for us is to make disciples and teach them to become as I am right. Teach them to do all that I commanded you to do. And the disciple is to become like the teacher. And so the things that you love to do that you’re good at doing and that can make disciples. That sweet spot is your focus that is directing you where the good works are. So the way that you identify your good works is you take this simple assessment What do I love to do? What am I good at doing? And what are those two things can I do in some capacity to make disciples? And whatever that is, that’s where the Lord’s most likely called you. That’s where then you pray about it and you seek the Lord and confirm it. I told a short story of a guy who loved rock climbing and he was really good at it. And he’s a passionate Christian. He was zealous for good works and where was the Lord calling him? So he eventually decided to start a rock climbing school to teach people advanced rock climbing and use it as a ministry to reach them for the gospel. Okay, So that’s one way to do it for me. I love marketing and I love studying God’s Word. I’m good at teaching. And so why not use those three things? So I have a marketing business and I teach the gospel to my clients, which is what this podcast is all about, and that’s building up disciples.

So that’s the first thing we looked at last time in terms of these five steps, the focus, which is what have you been called to do? Then the second thing we looked at is the second step in doing good works is you have to prioritize. You have to say, if this is a good work, I’m going to make it a priority in my life. I’m not just going to set it on the back burner. I’m going to make it a priority that I can start to focus on consciously and deliberately. And we read a story about a guy named Ginger who is in Australia, and he was in the military. He was just a total reprobate. And then he came to Jesus and it totally changed his life. And he was so thankful for what Jesus did that he committed to the Lord that he would do something simple every day to serve him. And he didn’t have that many skills. So the one thing he said I can do, I can hand out gospel tracks and I’ll hand them out to ten people a day. And 40 years later, ten people a day, 365 days a year for 40 plus years, hundreds of thousands of gospel tracks, lots and lots of people coming to the Lord.

And life changed because of that simple commitment. So the key is, what are you prioritizing in life? And prioritizing means that you start to produce good works, right? You start to prioritize it. Then the third thing is we talked about stop doing. Stop doing is all about the parable of the Satan sower. And this is soil number three. The seed hits the soil, it grows up among thorns, but the thorns choke it out and it produced no fruit. So what type of things are you doing that is choking out your good fruit? They could be good things, but they’re not great things. There is an old saying that good is the enemy of great. Right. And Steve Jobs made the comment. He said understanding what not to do is probably as important as understanding what to do. So the idea is what are the things? What are the thorns in your life that is crowding out your ability to produce fruit? And this helps you start producing more fruit. I shared a story of a crisis pregnancy center. It was in Dallas and still is, I believe. And they were started with a singular purpose Save Babies from abortion, which is a really great work. They are passionate about it. They’re good at it. As they started to grow their ministry, they started adding other divisions and other ministries that they could reach out to those same moms and really nurture them along to the point that when a friend of mine was working with them, their budget at that time was three and one half million dollars a year.

They had 20, 25 employees doing all kinds of great work. And so my friend asked him and said, How many babies did y’all save last year? And the executive director said, I don’t know. So what? Can you look up the record? So she did. She came back a little sheepishly and she said, We saved seven babies last year. What happened is they started doing all kinds of good works that choked out the great work. The number one thing that they are in business to do their good work, that was the destiny, was to say babies. And they weren’t saving babies because they were busy doing all these other things, busy work. So my friend suggested that they cancel all the other programs, let those people go and focus back on the number one priority. The next year. They had ten times increase in good works. They went from saving seven babies from abortion to 70, and the next year they had a ten times increase as well. And they saved 700 babies simply by stop doing the things that distracted them from their number one job. And the hard part of the stopped doing is these are usually good things and they’re impacting people’s lives to a degree, but they’re not making the great eternal impact of those things that the Lord has called you to do, the things you love to do, you’re good at doing, and that can really be used to make disciples.

The fourth thing that we’ve talked about after the stop doing is to start to apply strategy in what you’re doing. And what strategy does is allows you to go from more fruit to much fruit. By this my father is glorified that you bear much fruit, right? That you bear much fruit. And so the question is, once you’ve stopped doing the things and you’ve got the clutter out of your life and now you’re focused. Then how can you apply strategy? What type of strategy can you apply to multiply and increase the fruit so that now you’re doing much fruit? Okay. One of the things I did just with my teaching is my teaching. My priority was start teaching radical faith. So I did it in my Sunday school at my church, and I impacted tens of people over the years. Then I started to put it on CD’s for my business community and now I started to impact hundreds of people. And then more recently, we started putting it on podcast and now we’re able to impact thousands of people. It’s the same teaching. All it is is changing the strategy to exponentially push it out there even more. So what is it in strategy that you can do to impact your fruit from going from more fruit to much fruit? And then the fifth and final thing we talked about was looking at everything you do through what I call the eternal impact lens.

Internal impact lens. And what this is all about is every time you have other opportunities come your way. Things that people ask you to participate in. Other things that you say, Oh, this would be a really good add on sort or like with the crisis pregnancy center, this would be really good because we can minister in this way. Every time you have other things that come your way, opportunities, you always need to look at those through the eternal impact lens of saying. If I do this, what happens to my eternal impact of the focus and the priority that I need to be doing and what this will do? Is it will allow you at that time to continue. You’re a good works. Even more if you’re not careful and you don’t look at every new opportunity that comes your way through the eternal impact lens, then you stand a good chance of starting to veer off course. Get what we call mission creep right? It starts to creep out your mission, and now you start to wander and you lose the quantity of what the Lord’s called you to do. And you start focusing on good things instead of great things. So that’s where we ended up last time. Today I want to talk about a little bit different thing.

So the question then is. Once we start to prioritize, to start our good works, look at the things that we can do to stop doing that, crowding out those good works, and then look at strategies where we can do even more. What this takes is this takes an element of faith, because at this point, as you start to apply all of your resource, all your mental focus, all of everything else you do, then by definition, other things that you feel you need to do start to have less opportunity for you to do it. One way to say it is you have a job and the Lord’s called you to build over here and it’s not necessarily where your job is. So do you keep working as many hours in your job or your career? Providing for your family and your lifestyle? Or do you go over here and do what you know the Lord has called you to do? Because now you have this big choice. Does that make sense? That’s where I want to take it today. How do you start to do that? And what’s interesting, have you all ever had one of those times when in your quiet time with the Lord and the audience you listen to the things people comment that you just get this consistent message from wherever you are that the Lord keeps saying the same message over and over again, through different, different words, different means.

You know what I’m talking about. It’s like, okay, I get it. Lord, you’re telling me this. Well, that happened to me recently, and that’s what this session is all about. And I want to walk you through this. So when we’re zealous for a good works, if we’re really going to be zealous for it, there’s going to be an abandonment of I’m going to I’m going to run with reckless abandon toward the good works. That’s what zealous is all about. It’s not mediocre. Being mediocre for good works is being zealous for good works. And if you’re too zealous, you’re going to see it because it drives everything that you do, You’re going to be passionate about. It’s all you can think of and you’re going to run with reckless abandon. Think about when you’re dating and you’re dating this person that ends up being your spouse. In that dating period, you become zealous for that time with each other and it’s all you can think of every moment of your day. You structure your day to be with that person because you’re zealous about being with. Does that make sense? And when you do that, all kinds of other things fall by the wayside. How do you do that here? So the first thing we find is don’t be anxious. So I want you to turn to Luke 12. I want to show you a pattern. And what startled me.

This is Luke 12, starting with verse 22. What startled me as the Lord was sharing this is I never saw this. What I’m about to show you today. I never saw it instinctively kind of back in the back of my brain and understanding I understood it. But what he made so clear to me was unmistakable. But it ties into everything I’ve been teaching in some other capacities. So with that, let’s read the. Don’t be anxious. Luke 1222 through 28 and all of my passages are coming from the naive, just FYI. Then Jesus said to his disciples, therefore, I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or about your body. What you will wear for life is more than food in the body, more than clothes. Consider the ravens. They do not so a rape. They have no storeroom or barn. Watch this yet. God feeds them. And how much more valuable are you than birds? Who of you, by worrying, can add a single hour to your life since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest? Consider how the wildflowers grow. They do not labor or spin yet, I tell you. Not even Solomon and all of his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God closed the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow, is thrown into the fire. How much more? And watch this.

Will he clothe you? You of little faith? So you go, okay, I’ve read that a number of times. What’s the big deal? Well, Jesus teaches not to worry about your food or clothing or any of your provision. And why? He says, don’t worry because you don’t think you have enough. Or that you’re afraid that you’re going to run out. And why are we not to worry? Why are we not to be anxious? Because God loves us so much that says that he will provide it for us. That’s why we’re not to be anxious, because the Lord will provide all that we need with. And this is the point with no requirement on our part to toil for it. And he provides it simply because he loves us. What’s the implication? The Lord provides it. It’s not that the Lord provides it if we work hard enough to earn it. Is that he provides it for us because he loves us. And that’s why we’re not to be anxious. See, if I have to go out and earn it, I’m going to be anxious if I’m doing enough. Watch this. As it relates to being zealous for a good works, I want to go out and be zealous. I got this job. I need to come back and really work the job because I got all these bills. I’m anxious. For providing my provision. But Jesus is saying, don’t be anxious because it’s your father who gives it to you.

Is his good pleasure to give it.

It is his good pleasure to give it to you as well. The other thing is, not only is it is good pleasure. We are not to toil for it. This is the. Aha. So before you say, well you’re supposed to work hard, it’s good to work hard, right. The Lord never tells us not to work. Well, that’s not quite true. What’s interesting? Is Jesus never tells us that we have to toil and work hard for our provision. In fact, it’s just the opposite. Jesus never tells us anything but the fact that the Lord will always provide it. That he’s going to take care of all of our provision. But the catch is this We have to be doing the work he’s called us to do in the way that he’s called us to do. We have to be zealous for the good works that he’s called us to do. And he promises if we’re doing what those good works are, he will always provide. Over here, I had a fun story, interesting thing that happened just a couple of days ago. We had a guest stay with us. And she’s looking at the house and she says, So what do you do to earn money? That’s how I just spend time with the Lord and I teach his word. She starts looking at this house. You say, Well, you know, it’s going to take some money to pay the mortgage on this thing. And she was kind of tiptoeing around. Asking, you know, what do you do? Because this doesn’t come free.

Right? So I kind of teased with her. But I knew where she was going. But what I started explain to her is, is if you’re pursuing what the Lord has called you over here, he’ll always make the money. Come in over here on the other side. Yes, I have a job. I have a business. I tend to the business, but I don’t focus on it. I focus over here. And the Lord has promise. If you focus over here doing what I called you to, I’ll take care of your business and I’ll bring the business in that you need. I said, Fair enough. So I don’t have to worry about the business because he has promised to take care of it. That’s what he’s talking about here. If you’re doing the good works that he’s called you to do. And you’re pursuing it with a passion. You can pursue it without any worry about what the Lord’s going to do in provision because he’ll always take care of your needs. That’s the first thing we get out of this Luke 12 passage. But let me show you the next one. So what we get first out of here, let me just write this down. Don’t be anxious. And why is that? Because God will provide. We’re going to see this thing come out. God will provide. When you’re zealous for good works. Let’s look at the other one. My wife had a little conundrum over this one.

She was asking me the other day, what’s Laura teaching you? And this is the part that came out. Sell your possessions. So being zealous for good works. Luke 12 versus 32 and 33 a. Says, Do not be afraid, little flock for your father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. There it is again. Give you the kingdom, sell your possessions and give to the poor. So three things we can take out of this little passage. The first one is we are a little flock. What that means is that we’re the sheep and Jesus is our shepherd. And if you start to think about what is, how does shape and shepherds work? Sheep do not toil for their food. They simply go wherever the shepherd leads them and eats it. They don’t wander around on their own, looking all over the hillside, looking for something to eat. They simply just follow behind the shepherd, and then the shepherd lets them stop and then they receive whatever is there. That’s it. That’s how shape work. And it is the shepherd’s responsibility to provide for the sheep. It’s not the sheep responsibility to provide for themselves. After all, sheep are stupid, right? So they don’t have any brains to go out and provide for themselves. So that’s the first thing we get out of this. The second thing. It says Your father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. Now, this is referencing the new kingdom, Right? And with the kingdom comes all of the provision that the kingdom already produces.

Because sons of a king do not work right, they always are given the kingdom and the provision is given to them without their labors. And that’s kind of what this is referencing. But even though this is referencing the New Kingdom, it says that the Lord is the same yesterday, today and forever. And so even though it’s the New Kingdom, this shows his character that he still gives us the old kingdom. And with the old kingdom where we live now, it’s all provision he provides for us. And that’s what we get out of this is that he provides all we need. It’s not what we do that provides it. And then the third thing we get out of this is we’re commanded to sell your possessions and give to the poor. Then that makes you have sort of like a little heart attack. Oh, my gosh. Sell everything, become destitute, have nothing. Trust on the Lord. Well, that’s not what he’s talking about. Because it was only the rich young ruler that Jesus says, Go sell all that you have and give to the poor and come follow me. Because he knew that the rich young rulers problem was he was holding on to his wealth. Here, Jesus simply says to sell your possessions and give to the poor. So how are we to live if we do that? Well, simply, we’re the sheep. The Lord is always going to provide. He’s going to give it to us to provide.

But it goes a little bit deeper because what Jesus is doing in this is he is sharing that. This is a general command of how our heart should be, that to always take care of someone in need. And if we don’t have ready resource to take care of someone, be willing to sell our possessions to take care of them. And we can do it because the Lord has promised to always take care of us. So if we were to kind of rewrite this passage. That says Do not be afraid. Little thought for your father has been pleased to give you the kingdom, sell your possessions and give to the poor. We can kind of rewrite this by saying, Do not be afraid to sell your possessions and give to the poor because your father will freely provide all you need. As a shepherd does for a sheep. Now, that’s basically the context of what he’s talking about. And this is what we see in Acts four. You know, we see the group of believers. They all hold everything in common. And you have believers that are selling some of their property, bringing the resources in to distribute among those that don’t have anything. And so that’s the context that we see here that Jesus is talking about. So what’s our interim conclusion? With 12 of these. Both of these are saying the same thing. Don’t be anxious. Why? Because God will provide. Be willing to sell your provisions. Why? Because God will.

Provide.

And the other thing that we get out of this. Is in both cases. It says that the Lord will give it to us. Very simply, he will give it to us without us having to toil. Now let’s look at the Lord’s Prayer. Another passage. This also is going to come from Luke. Luke 11 three. We’re just going to look at one line of the Lord’s Prayer. Luke 11 three. And it says, Give us. There it is again. Give us each day our daily bread. How many times have y’all recited that? Over the years. Hundreds or thousands, maybe. Have you ever really thought about what this sentence means? See, every time I’ve quoted this, and I’ve been quoting this probably since ten years old. Okay. And I give intellectual assent of give us this day our daily bread. But I’ve never really given it a not in a huge degree, the conviction of a heartfelt, faithful conviction. To live that way at face value. Does that make sense? We give this intellectual assent. Yes. God provide everything for me. But then we’ve always been taught I have anyway work like it’s all up to you and pray like it’s all up to God. And between the two of you, you’ll get all your provision. But that’s not what this is saying. It says Where to ask the Lord to give us. Not to reward us for good labor. The word give in the Greek actually means to give freely of one’s own possession.

And so what this is saying give us this day our daily bread. Give us each day that our daily bread, our provision already belongs to the Lord. We’re not asking him to reward us for working hard in the field and and reward us with our provision that we’ve earned. We’re saying, Lord, our provision you already own. Give it to us. Without the toil that goes along with it. And now you’re going. I don’t know if I really agree with that. We’re supposed to work hard. Proverbs says the lazy man gets nothing and the diligent man gets a lot. I know where you’re going. And Proverbs 31, the diligent wife. And we’re supposed to be diligent with all we do. But that’s not the message that we see throughout the Bible. That’s definitely not the message we see throughout Jesus’s teachings. And if you really start to peel back the onion, you start to look at this, you start to see a deeper truth. And that’s what the Lord’s been showing me, and that’s why I’m guiding you through on this. So let’s look at a couple of things here. First. Give us. We don’t ask the Lord to reward us. For doing the hard, strenuous labor for our own provision. We’re simply asking him to give us our provision from that which is his. So if you remember, Peter says that we are a royal priesthood.

Do you remember that? I think his first Peter, that we are a royal priesthood for God. We see the same message in Hebrews that we are brothers with Jesus. He is a high priest. We are priest. We see in the Old Testament that the Levites were called as God’s own tribe. And he says that you have no inheritance in the land because I am your inheritance and I provide all for you. That’s the same message we’re seeing here, say, the 12 tribes of Israel. They were the ones to toil hard in the land, but not the priests. The priest did not toil at all. All of their provision is given to them by the Lord. And if we are sons of God, sons of God by faith. If we are a royal priesthood and we are doing the good works that the Lord has laid out for us to do building His kingdom. Our provision is given to us by the Lord. We don’t have to strain and toil for it. And that’s why Jesus keeps saying, Give, give, give. Ask your father to give. Your father will give. He will give. Because it’s all given to us. It’s not earned by our hard labors. We’re going to see that a little bit more. But let me go down this a little bit further. So first thing we find here is the giving us means it’s not a reward for something we’ve earned.

It’s not wages that we’ve earned. Give us, Lord, provide the wages that I’ve earned. No give from that which is yours. My provision. The second thing we see out of this, it says each day. So we’re to rely on the Lord. To give us our provision each day, every day. And this is referencing, if you remember, Israel in the Old Testament times, they come out of Egypt. They go into the wilderness, period, as the Lord is training them to be his people, teaching them who he is, his character and what he does. And part of that, a big part was this thing called Mana, and Mana is their provision, and it said that they would harvest the mana in the morning and some people would keep it till the next day. And what happened when they kept it the next day. Yeah. It would stink and turn rancid. Right. They couldn’t eat it. What do you think the Lord was doing? He was training them. Trust me, every day for your provision for I give it to you. They never had to work for their provision through the entire time of being in the wilderness. The Lord was teaching them that you trust and rely on me, and I give you your provision from my abundance. That’s what this is talking about. Give us each day our daily bread. We’re to live in such a way that we don’t worry about trying to store things up for tomorrow.

Right. You remember all those proverbs that say, you know, save for the later years and build up that barn, right? Build up your nest egg and your resources. I’m not saying that’s bad. What I am saying is Jesus, Jesus doesn’t teach it. Jesus teaches. To give us each day our daily bread to be willing to sell our possessions freely at any time and be anxious for nothing. It says even the Ravens do not store up in barns, and yet the Lord feeds them every single day. And that’s what Jesus is trying to tell us. If we’re going to be zealous for good works and pursue what he’s called us to do to make disciples with abandon, with reckless abandon, we cannot be focused on trying to make our own provision. That’s a good work, but it’s not a great work. It has no eternal impact. And it also says, I don’t trust your word, Lord, that you’re going to give to us. And we get to show you you have a job. How and where does the job fit in? I’m getting there, but I’m just setting the stage first. So the Lord is teaching. He was teaching Israel in the wilderness. Rely on him entirely for their provision. And Jesus is teaching us the same thing. Rely on Him only for our provision. And that that provision is to be given, not earned.

Priests do not earn their living. The 12 tribes who were given the land had to earn it, but not the priest. But it doesn’t stop there. The Lord’s Prayer. The message is God will provide, right? Okay. The next thing is we’re to seek first his kingdom. Right sake, first his kingdom. Let’s turn to Matthew 633 on this one. Matthew 633 is the end of the same passage we read in Luke earlier. They’ll be anxious for nothing. It’s just a companion of that same message that’s recorded in Matthew. So Matthew 633. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness. And all these things will be. Gosh, there it is again, will be given to you as well. Sake. First his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you. They’re not compensated to you because you work hard. They’re not your earnings, they’re not your wages due because you actually work for your provision. In fact, if I may be so bold as to say it this way. If you feel you have to toil for your provision, you are in sin. Because everything Jesus teaches is that your Heavenly Father will give to you because you are His Son, because you are His priest and priest royal priesthood that do not work for their living. They served the Lord and the Lord provides. That’s their difference. They’re still labor, but the focus of the labor is on good works that he’s called us to do and not worried about.

How do we make provision? I’m still going to talk about a job in just a moment. Okay, We’re getting there. But the crux of the matter on this passage and this is really the key of everything, is to seek first. His kingdom. Only if we seek first his kingdom. Do all of these other things get given to us. So it’s an if then and in an if then statement, if we do what the Lord has called us to do, then he promises all the provision. What he’s called us to do, by the way, is to do it in his effort, his strength, not ours, to do it by faith in the spirit, not to do it by flesh and the natural. Any time we try to do God’s work by human labor, it always amounts to very little. You see this a lot in the mission field. You have a missionary. They go out there and they get burned out in 3 to 5 years and they come back home. Why? Because they did it all in the flesh, thinking it was how hard they worked, how many hours they put in, how compassionate they were, and they forgot that it’s the Lord’s job to do their work for them. All there to do is to tend the work that they’ve been called to do. Paul Beck We did a teaching on the three bodies in the Body of Christ.

You have the servants, the saints, the sons. The servants are the ones that they don’t really believe in the aspect of faith in doing work. They believe in faith for Jesus, for salvation. But everything else is. It’s all interpreted through man’s wisdom. Those is where you get most of the burnout as you move more into the saint and into the Son Church. What happens is there’s a much more reliance and understanding of faith that by faith, all things are possible. And so when you have someone that goes into the mission field, that does it through working, through faith, through prayer, through allowing the Lord to work through them, not only do they have great fruit that they do and lots of fruit that they do on the mission field, but they don’t get burned out because they’re always working from a position of rest. They’re doing their work of the ministry in rest, not in toil. And that’s what the Seeking First Gifts kingdom is all about. The only way that you can seek his kingdom first and all you do is that you do it in rest and you do it in rest by being by faith in the spirit. That may be I’m not sure if that’s resonating. You’re not doing it by your own labors. You’re contributing the labor, the activity. But all of the expectation of how what’s going to happen is entirely the expectation.

The Lord’s going to do it through you, and therefore you are just the human body through which the Lord’s spirit manifests through you is no longer. I hear it, but Christ who lives through me. Galatians 220 That’s what’s seeking first has Kingdom. Is about. And when you do that, our provision is given to us. It’s not compensated to us as a reward for the work we do so. Interim conclusion. So far, all of these passages have a clear message, and that message is our provision is not from our own labor, our own hard work. Our provision is entirely from the Lord And the promise that the Lord will provide God will provide every single one of these things. The common theme is the Lord will provide. Have no concern about how you’re going to pay your bills, about how you’re going to handle these things, all these other things in your life as you’re zealous for the good works the Lord has called you to do. He will make all provision a bound to you and he will give it to you from his resource, not from yours. Now, let’s talk about work. Yes, we must work. We can’t just sit home and do nothing unless you’re me right now. I’m teasing. But Scripture teaches that it’s not our labor that produces what we need. And every time you see faith. Man always contributes to little that he has.

And the Lord always produces the abundance that you need. You take the Widow and Zara Faith with Elijah during the time of the drought. She contributed the little that she had, a little jar of oil, a little jar of flour with only one meal left. And by contributing that, the Lord multiply it to last until the end of the drought. You take the other widow with Elisha. Her husband died with a bunch of debt. The creditors were about to come take her two sons as slaves. She goes to Elisha and Elisha says, Well, what do you have in the house? All I have is a little jar of oil. That’s all you need. Go get all the jars in the village. So she started to take that one little jar that she had and poured it in all those jars. And the Lord produced the abundance. We see this even with Jesus. Feeding the 5000 with five loaves and two fish. So we always contribute. We always take the little that we have to contribute, and the Lord produces the abundance that we need. That is the pattern that we see. We even see this with Adam. So Adam is the the first Adam, when he came to Earth, he was the picture of a son of God. When he left Earth, he was a picture of human man. Totally different as a son of God. His job was to tend the garden.

Which is he provides labor, right? He’s going to attend it, but he’s not working it. He’s not toiling it. It’s already planted. All he does is he tends the garden. The Lord produces the abundant harvest that he needs. But when he fell and God booted him out of the garden. And now he is a human man, not a God man, Right? He lost his God man status now in the earth. He has to sweat and toil and labor for all of his provision because God no longer provides it. Why doesn’t he provide it? Because he’s no longer the Son of God, and that in that aspect, he’s no longer in that role of simply tending what the Lord has done is now up to him. And so we have our choice. We can either live as Adam and feel like it’s I have to work like it’s all up to me. To produce all that we need. Or I can choose to be a son of God, a royal priesthood, and act by faith in accordance to everything the Lord has been showing us. And say, Lord, you promise to give me all my provision, I will attend my job, I will attend my occupation, I will turn my, my career, whatever it is. But I’m not going to worry about my provision there because I’m going to be zealous for the good works over here, wherever they are.

They may be tied into my career. They may be in a different direction. Here’s a scary thought. My career does afford for my good works where I’ve been called, so I now have to choose. Do I? Do I leave my career everything I’ve been trained in the natural to do to earn money and is producing an income and helping us survive. And do I abandon that and go pursue what I know the Lord has called me to do? That’s scary. Can I actually trust the Lord to take care of all of our needs to make all abundance be given to me? Or do I act by sight and by fear? And I stay where it’s comfortable financially because I got a job and I got bills. That’s the step of faith. You see what I’m talking about? Or do you believe God’s word at face value? Or do you apply man’s wisdom into it and say, Well, that can’t be true. That’s too risky. I’ve got a wife and kids, or sometimes I got a husband and kids, right? Depending on who’s a breadwinner. We got a mortgage, we got car payments. We have school education. How can I put all of that at risk and do what the Lords call me to do? You can do it because the Lord has promised that if you seek first His Kingdom in His righteousness, all these things will be given to you. Yeah.

I was just telling me when you were saying that. He said the true revelation of God’s relationship to his kingdom is actually the treasure in the field. Yes. And you’ll sell everything to buy the field because he showed you the treasure.

That’s it, right? That’s a whole idea. The treasure is the Lord. And where your treasure is there. Will your heart be also? And where is your heart? Your treasure of your money from your job and your security, or the Lord and His promise of all abundance greater than your job will ever provide.

Why would you sell everything you have to buy the U.S. Treasury?

Now, keep in mind, these are heavenly truths, right? These are not earthly truths. The difference between a heavenly truth and an earthly truth as a heavenly truth requires faith to manifest it into your earthly reality. And if you don’t have faith. It won’t work.

That’s why he. I’m out. You said don’t take your purse. Don’t take any shooters. Don’t take an extra coat. He’s telling you to go.

Out and trust the.

Lord.

Take nothing. Just ask when you go into the town. Who do you. Who is a worthy man?

And do you say.

That man will provide for you?

He will. And you remember when they came back? Did he say? He said. Did you lack for anything? No. Right. And so he’s teaching them in, training them the same thing God did with Israel in the wilderness. Every day the Lord provides and the provision is always through something in the natural that looks like it was going to happen anyway. It’s always a cause and effect. Someone gives us a check here. I make another cell over here and we say, Oh, God’s not really providing all That’s just normal stuff. That’s how God provides, right? Very rarely does he just put manna there and you open up the door and there’s a pile of gold. You know, that’s not that’s not normal. Well, let’s keep going. And before I ran out of time too much. So you have to act by faith. How do you know if you’re acting by faith when you do this? The simple answer. The evidence of faith is a mountain moving. The evidence of faith when you do this as the Lord provides, Right. That’s when you know you’re acting by faith, because the Lord provides. But it’s a little bit more than that. When you. Prioritize the good works that the Lord has called you to do when you make it your priority. You clear out all of the thorns in your life that’s choking it out from being more fruit, and you start to really apply the strategy of What can I do to create much fruit? It’s usually the strategy of creating much fruit that you have to give up your security.

And if your heart is Lord, you call me to produce much fruit. I will do that with reckless abandon in the natural. Reckless abandon. Because you’re giving up whatever is your security over here. Don’t mean you quit your job. It just means that you change how you do it so that your time and focus is over here. It might mean that you quit your job so you can do what the Lord has called you to do with reckless abandon. And when you do that, you know, you’re doing you’re seeking his kingdom first because you’re giving it all. You’re willing to give it all away. And no, and put yourself only at the mercy of the Lord to do what his word said he would do. In other words, you’re testing his word so that he can prove it. True. That is stepping up by faith. How do you know if you’re not stepping out by faith? Because you put your kingdom and your provision first? And put his second. Any time you put him second. It doesn’t work. Once you put your kingdom and your provision first. Then it’s all about toil and sweat. You’re going to have to work as hard as you can and work like it’s all up to you.

Because at that point it is right. It’s only up to the Lord when you actually do what the Lord has called you to do. But we got one final passage. Wealth without toil. And we all like the sound of that wealth without toil. Would you like wealth without toil? Does God ever promise wealth without toil? Everyone’s quite turned to Proverbs 1022. Proverbs 1022. As I mentioned. When I put all this together, it was a period about probably 7 to 10 days, maybe two weeks, all these things. Lord just kept putting these things in my lap and opening and bringing these, these passages to me and started to reveal this common thread. Proverbs 1022. I say that because I didn’t go looking in the Bible to find verses to support a predetermined conclusion. The blessing of the Lord brings wealth without painful toil for it. Are you serious? The Lord says he’s going to bring wealth without you toiling for it. Yes. In fact, can I tell you a little secret? Watch this. We’re going to go to the Old Testament for just a real quick lesson. You have the 12 tribes of Israel. Joseph is turned into two tribes. So now you have actually 13 tribes because Joseph has Manasa and Ephraim, and Jacob claims them as his own children. Then you go into the wilderness and God claims one of those tribes as his own.

He claims Levi, this is now the tribe of the Lord. And that leaves 12 tribes of Israel. Does this make sense so far? God said to Levi, You have no provision in the land because I am your inheritance. So all of the 12 tribes were given land and they had to go out and toil the land, raise their herds and do all that stuff. And they brought a tie. The 10% of the very best to the Lord as a sacrifice. You remember that? And who get to who got to keep the sacrifice? The Levites kept the 10%. But now the Levites are not priests. They’re worker bees. Only a portion of Levites are the priests, only those who come through the tribe, the family of Aaron. So picture this now. I’m just going to do a little math to show you the great riches and wealth that the Lord has in store for those who operate as a priest. All right. So the 12 tribes bring the 10%. Which means 12 people give to one person, which means that one person now has 120% more than the average of each of the 12. Does this make sense? Just simple math. But out of all the Levites. There is probably and I’m now just guessing, probably one priest for every let’s call it 200 Levi’s. I mean, when you have a whole tribe and you just have one family group of Aaron to be the priest.

So what happens in now? You have these 200 Levites giving 10% of the best of the best that they received to the priest. Now, that priest has 20 times more individually than each Levite did. And each Levite had 120% more than each of the tribes. So what you see is the Lord’s inheritance is great wealth without toiling because the priest did the most important work. So, you know, tribes, they toiled the Levites, they did Ministry of the Lord and the Ministry of the Lord is they received the sacrifices. They did a lot of the work in preparing the sacrifices. But the priests, they did ministry to the Lord. And that is a much higher calling. And as a priest, they received the greatest abundance. And they did not toil for it. As a son of God, sons of God. Right. That’s what we are. Sons of God through faith. Children of God. A royal priesthood. Wealth without toil. Proverbs 1022. The blessing of the Lord brings wealth without painful toil for it. This is the same pattern that we see through all of these God will provide. It’s not our laborers that are providing it. Sure, we contribute effort in whatever career or thing that we do to create money, but that’s it’s only contributing the efforts, the Lord that multiplies it to the abundance that we need and that He chooses for us to have.

This is why we’re not to be anxious. Because God will provide. Where to be willing to sell our possessions and give to the poor because God will provide. We’re supposed to pray the Lord’s Prayer. God provide. Seek first His kingdom and all of these things will be given to you. Wealth without toil. That the blessing of the Lord brings, wealth without painful toil. All of this God provides. Because God gives. We don’t live off of our labors. We live off the inheritance of the Lord. As a royal priest, as a son of God, through faith. God will always provide abundantly all that we need. As we walk. As a Son of God through faith. That’s the key. Through faith. What is faith? God called me for good works. That’s my calling and my line of work and building up the disciples to make disciples. And I will pursue that zealously with reckless abandon and leave all of my provision entirely to the Lord. And it’s stepping out, not worrying about the future. Not worrying about. I don’t have enough money. I need to save up. Let me wait till I get a year supply savings before I go out on my own or whatever it may be. It’s saying, Lord, you said that you will provide every day.

Give me this day our daily provision from your inheritance, not from my labors. And so I’m going to step out by faith. If you don’t do it by faith, none of this happens. Because we’re not sons of God yet, except by faith. Only at the resurrection do we become truly sons of God, right? That’s when we receive the new kingdom. But we are sons of God now, through faith. If you step out and do it by faith. So what’s the conclusion? First question is what are the good works that he has prepared beforehand that you should be walking in? Where are. What do you love to do? You’re good at doing. And that can make disciples. That should be your focus. And because of all of these promises, you can afford to seek first His kingdom and his righteousness and what He’s called you to do and not worry about your provision. And all of that provision will be given to you can run with reckless abandon. And never have to look back and never have to worry about how are you going to pay bills. So this is what Jesus did. This is what Jesus is telling us to do. All these passages. If you really think get down to it and think about it. All of this being zealous for good works has some characteristics. It’s the dying to yourself. All of your things that things that you think you need, the things you want, the things that are good.

It’s being willing to die to yourself. And pursue only the Lord. For the good works that he’s called you to do. Pursuing a deeper relationship with them. Seeking his kingdom first. And the Lord tells you if you do. Tremendous blessings await you because he’s going to take care of you. And when the Lord takes care of you. Watch this. Back to the priest. When the Lord takes care of you, He doesn’t do it. Slouch, really. Those priests, on average had 20 times more than the Levites. Which is about 25 times more than the average person. And they didn’t toil in the field all day. That was their inheritance from the Lord, because what they were doing is they were serving the Lord. Doing what he called them to do. Let me give this in one final picture. Assume for a moment that your father was a multibillionaire. Sorry, kids, I’m not. But assume that your father was a multibillionaire. And he said. If you will, simply pursue the Lord with everything you have and follow him in all his calling in your life. I guarantee to take care of all of your financial needs, your housing, your food, your transportation, your kids, their college education, everything you all your vacations, everything. You have no financial worry in your life. Just run with abandon and pursue the good works the Lord has already prepared beforehand for you to do.

If your father said that, how would your life be different? Than it is right now. Would you pursue the Lord with reckless abandon, knowing you don’t have to worry about anything in your life financially? Knowing that you don’t have to worry about how are you going to earn the money knowing that you don’t have to work hard? And any other direction other than the direction he’s called you to do to produce much fruit. By this my is glorified that you bear much fruit and so that you will bear much fruit. My father will give you all that you need so you can focus entirely on seeking his kingdom and his righteousness first. Are you willing to take his promises at face value and do it? Are you willing to step out by faith? Believe the Lord Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Are you willing to believe the Lord with childlike faith and say, I’ll do it? As opposed to man’s wisdom that says that’s preposterous. You’ve got to work hard. You’ve got to work, work, work, because you can’t expect God to just give it to you. And yet everything in Scripture says God gives to his children. So that. That has been zealous for a good work. God will provide if you do it.

I was just thinking how personally, it’s. You know, like service for your juror. Good works. The good works? Yes. For you. Not what he designed for somebody else.

That’s right. It’s very.

Personal. Very personal.

And that’s why you have to search it out. You have to keep asking yourself what? What do I love to do? What am I good at doing? And what are those things that I love to do that I’m good at doing? What of those can I do in a way that makes disciples and making disciples? As we talked in our first session. Sometimes it’s leading people to Christ. Sometimes. Is discipling young believers the next step? Other times, it’s taking them deeper. Other times it’s doing something else. But the whole purpose of disciple making is. And teach them to do all I have commanded you to do. Help them understand what Jesus said and to grow into being like Jesus model. That whole process is disciple making. And what like the assembly line workers we talked about on the auto manufacturing place? Every worker has his job. And if everyone does her job, the car rolls off the other end as a well done job. So what part are you are you to play in that role of disciple making? And do it with abandon. Any other comments or questions. Just thought provoking. Yeah. Scary, isn’t it?

Well, what about if your job gets in that sweet spot? I mean, what do you do? Well, what about if you really feel like God wants you to, for example, be a doctor? Yeah, And you can do your good work, but you still can earn money?

Absolutely.

What’s wrong with that?

Not nothing from. I’m saying that your your your primary goal is what’s the good work? What do you love to do? So that doctor loves serving in medicine. What is he good to do? He’s great in medicine. So how can he use both of those to make disciples like your dad? Every single patient that your dad saw, he. He’d bring them into the office and share the gospel and talk with them about spiritual things. A friend of mine, Bill Slappy, he was great in sales and he was. He loves electronics and building things and he wanted to make disciples. So he said, I’m going to start a telephone business, you know, selling telephone hardware to businesses, and I’m going to use that to get into every single business within my community and share the gospel with a business owner and all of his key people as part of my sales process. Real estate agent. If you love real estate and you’re good at it, then how do you use real estate to make disciples? Well, how about minister to every single person that you engage with? Every potential client asks them at the very least. Hey, is there anything I can pray for you on? At the very most, you’d be like my friend Bill, I’m a Christian. Can I ask you a few spiritual questions? And you make that part of your process. If you turn them off, that’s okay. Why? Because you’re not relying on your real estate business to provide your needs. You’re in your real estate business to do good works, and you’re relying on the Lord to provide your needs. And when you when you can separate. What you have to do to earn money and focus on what the Lord has called you to do then now you’re totally free to do whatever works to build good works. So sometimes having the job. Works perfect because that’s where the Lord already called you. Now the question is simply prioritize. Doing good works there and strategizing it. So this isn’t quitting your job. That’s why the Lord’s called you. But that’s where you take those three circles and see, does it fit?

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