THE MORE AND THE MUCH MORE

(Post by: Michelle Hobbs)

Our family has had the opportunity to visit a church in Indiana to hear an evangelist friend preach this week. He is one of those rare men who are truly anointed by God to see hidden gems in the Word, and then has the ability to communicate those gems to others.

He has been discussing Matthew 6 this week, specifically verses 25-34. A familiar passage often cited in regard to worry and anxiety. While this passage is a good reminder to rely on God for everything; a great statement about the uselessness of worry, it is so much deeper! I have not been able to stop contemplating the words “more” and “much more” used in the passage. Let me try to explain.

This passage is part of the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus is trying to convey to His disciples what the new covenant, a relationship with Him, should look like. He is trying to give them a picture of what His kingdom should look like. He wants them to understand how radically different His kingdom will be from what they are used to (dare I say, from what we are used to, even).

His kingdom is not based on keeping the Law, checking boxes, doing charitable deeds for deeds sake. It is not a place you come and visit once or twice a week and then leave to go on about your own business. The way that many of us treat going to church as if that alone is our Christianity.

His kingdom is meant to live inside of, and flow out of, His people at all times. Our relationship with Him is meant to be such an intertwining, a complete merger, with Him that He is our life. Me filled with the Holy Spirit, you filled with the Holy Spirit, that is the kingdom!

That is how our prayer, “Thy kingdom come on earth” is fulfilled!

Back to the “more” and the “much more”. In verse 25, Jesus asks…“Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?” He is asking His disciples, and us, to start thinking in the spiritual realm versus the physical realm. He is not denying that food and clothing, the physical, are important. He is asking us to consider how much worry and energy we give to making sure our physical needs are met, even exceeded. Now consider how much worry and energy you expend on making sure your spiritual life is at its fullest. How do they compare? Are your proportions correct?

Your eternal, spiritual life should be your focus, your top priority. Instead, most of us are way more focused on our temporary, earthly life. We work and earn and spend and save. We budget. We plan. We buy things that we think will make us happy, things we think we must have because our neighbors have them. We think we must dress and look a certain way because our friends do. Just think about how much time, energy, and brain power you spend on trying to acquire physical stuff!

Now, let’s be honest with ourselves. Do you spend more time, energy, and brain power on trying to acquire a closer relationship with Jesus? Do you worry about it at all?

Then Jesus says something that literally made me cry. In verse 26, he tells us to look at the birds and how God provides for them. Birds that are not made in God’s image, that can be bought two for a penny. He follows with this question…”Are you not much more valuable than they are?”

He repeats this concept with the example of how God clothes the grass of the field with splendid flowers (verse 29). Grass that is here one day and gone the next, not eternal. He asks again…”will he not much more clothe you?” (verse 30)

Friends, do you get what Jesus is saying? If we will do the more, God will do the much more!

If you love Him more than physical comfort, if you seek Him more than you seek stuff, if you focus on Him (the heavenly treasure) more than you focus on earthly treasures, if you desire His will more than you desire your own selfish way, God will be able to do much more in you and through you and for you.

Malachi 3:10 says, “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this, says the LORD Almighty, and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.”

God wants to do much more in our spiritual lives than we could ever ask or even imagine! We limit His blessing and our closeness with Him; we limit His ability to make us truly happy by not simply pursuing the more.

I think this teaching hit me especially hard because we have been watching people and families fall apart this very week because they are pursuing earthly treasures and their own selfish desires more than they are pursuing the spiritual.

Let me be absolutely clear. Your heavenly father knows what you truly need to be completely fulfilled. He created you, after all. He wants to give you much more than anything or anyone on earth can give you.

Praise the LORD! He is the God of MUCH MORE!

SO, WHAT IS YOUR RESPONSE?

= What did the Lord reveal to you while reading this blog post?

= Are you willing to pursue the more?

= What are you going to do differently?