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(piano music) (gentle piano music) (piano music) (piano music)

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[ Music ] ♪ The Lord is my light ♪ ♪ And my salvation ♪ ♪ The Lord is my light ♪

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♪ And my salvation ♪ [MUSIC] ♪ On my salvation ♪ ♪ Who shall I fear ♪

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♪ Who shall I fear ♪ ♪ Shall I fear ♪ ♪ Who shall I fear ♪ ♪ The Lord is my strength ♪

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[ Music ] ♪ Oh, my Lord ♪ ♪ Who shall I fear ♪ ♪ In the night ♪

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[ Music ] ♪ Oh, in the time of trouble ♪ ♪ He shall guard me ♪ ♪ In the time of trouble ♪

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♪ He shall guard me ♪ ♪ He shall guard me ♪ ♪ Who shall guard me ♪ ♪ Fear ♪

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♪ Who ♪ ♪ Shall I ♪ ♪ Fear ♪ ♪ The Lord is the strength ♪

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♪ Of my life ♪ ♪ You shall ♪ ♪ Be ♪ ♪ Wait on the Lord ♪

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♪ And be of good charge ♪ ♪ Wait on the Lord ♪ ♪ And be of good courage ♪ ♪ Wait on the Lord ♪

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♪ And be of good courage ♪ ♪ He ♪ ♪ Shall strengthen ♪ ♪ Thy heart ♪

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♪ Shall light ♪ ♪ See ♪ ♪ Who shall I ♪ ♪ See ♪

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♪ The Lord is a trap ♪ ♪ Through my life ♪ ♪ Who shall I fear ♪ - Amen, amen.

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Hear this word recorded in the gospel according to Saint Matthew, chapter 6, verses 25 through 34. Reading from the new international translation of the Bible. Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink, or about your body, what you will wear.

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Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air. They do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?

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Who of you, by worrying, can add a single hour to his life? And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow? They do not labor or spin.

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Yet, I tell you, that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothed the grass of the field which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you? Oh, you of little faith.

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So do not worry, saying what shall we eat or what shall we drink or what shall we wear. For the pagans run after all these things, and your Heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, but tomorrow will worry about itself.

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Each day has enough trouble of its own. Seek ye first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. This 33rd verse of that chapter is the text around which our message is centered.

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First things first. Today we have the glorious privilege of beginning again. Before us are the unwritten pages of the future. And what is to be written there depends on us.

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When, how, and where we start are important factors in any undertaking. Countless mishaps in life are caused by bad beginnings. We recognize golden opportunities. We have the zest and zeal.

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But somehow the beginning is wrong. Many races have been lost because of a bad start. The runner puts the wrong foot first. This time as we are in the threshold of a new year,

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it's a time to put the right foot forward. And as the years come and go, the accumulation of experiences should help us live more nobly. The significance of this new year depends upon our scale of values. Human destiny is determined by our recognition of life's abiding values and the place these values occupy

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in our minds and in our lives. Now Jesus was concerned about human needs. He was not unaware of the things that we need. But what he does emphasize in this particular passage

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as he sets forth in what we commonly call the sermon on the mount, the monocata of the Christian life. These are the values that you should embrace if you would seek to live that life which is abundant.

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If you would seek to be whole, if you would seek to follow in my steps. Now, Jesus looked at our bodily needs, our what we call our bodily comforts,

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but he also lifts up our spiritual needs. He does not divide the human being into separate compartments, body and soul. He looks upon the whole,

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because one affects the other, and it's a matter of priorities. I think one of the great problems we face in making decisions and in ordering our lives

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is that so often we have a tendency to give primary consideration to secondary matters. And so what we are really concerned about in this word, when Jesus says,

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don't really be concerned about what you shall eat. And of course, that's the primary concern with many people. What do I have to eat?

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What shall I wear? Now Jesus no doubt was preaching to a multitude of people who were poor. And I don't need to tell you how poor people who are deprived of these things focus on this. We have had a great deal of attention focused on the homeless and the hungry.

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And that's an important element in our society. Even now there are those who are preparing to go before the city fathers and to ask that a certain piece of property, a certain ground be provided for the homeless. They have tent or some type where all the homeless can gather. And so sure they were concerned about what we shall eat and what we shall wear and where

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shall we stay. Now these are important matters. And when we look at many of our budgets, they take primary consideration. Some of us when we arrange our budgets, the first thing we put on the budget is the mortgage.

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And the food, and then how much we're going to spend for our clothes. And when we get through arranging that order of priority, we have nothing down there for God. There are many who arrange their time in such a way that the first thing they have would

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be their social concerns, their involvement in the activities of the community. And of course we are overrun with that. And those things are important. But what Jesus is suggesting here is that we arrange our priorities in such a way that we put first things first. And if we arrange here in the morning of this year our priorities in that manner, then life

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will be well with us, no matter what happens. When I was a freshman at Bishop College, I have told you many times the struggle that the family went through in sending me to school. My mother was the chief means of support and I was supposed to pay $22 a month to the school

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and she was just making 32. She was supposed to take care of home and all the expenses there and send 22 for me. Well I understood that. She had talked to me about the struggle.

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She said, "But you go on Marvin. You get there, God will provide a way." It was God. So I went on in that phase.

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We borrowed most of the enrollment fee, $41 I think at that time, and we borrowed most of that from Long Sharks. And so when I got there, I knew how I got there and I was determined to stay there and I was spending all the time I could in the library.

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And so I had a girlfriend who said, "Now you don't have enough time for me. You spending too much time in the library." I told her I figured it as my mother was washing and ironing and struggling all that to send me to school and I had the Ability to make the honor roll. I'll at least do all I could and arranging my priorities

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To do the best that I possibly could in school And so that meant that we broke up Well when you when you sort of arrange your priorities in the right way you'll break up with a lot of things And sometimes people have to go through a serious experience, a critical experience in their lives in order to do that.

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I had one friend, when he went to the doctor and the doctor told him what his ailment was, and it was a question as to how he was going to survive. And he came home and he thought about all the things he was doing and he said to me, "Marvin, I rearranged my priorities." And if we somehow recognize what life is all about, that we will rearrange our priorities. So first of all, what are the goals that we have selected?

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What's our chief goal? What's our main goal in life? Listen, some youngsters say, "Well, my first goal is to get rich." And I've seen some, I've pastored some who were concerned about getting rich.

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It comes to mind now one young man whose primary concern was to get rich so he started a business and he did all kinds of unethical and illegal things in order to make it. Well his business didn't succeed, but his main goal was to get rich. But Jesus says now, "First of all, in the arrangement of your priorities, look at your goal."

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Mike Singletary, who is an outstanding football player, identified with the Chicago Bears, stated that he's just gonna remain on the team for the next two years and during that time he hopes to have a perfect game. And this is what he said, "When I leave this game, I don't want to look back. So the next two years I'm

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going to put myself on the line. In life, you have to have guidelines. If you set goals, you need to set a time frame. You can't just keep saying, "I'll do it next year." You don't know what's going to happen next year or tomorrow. I think that's a good word for us to consider. You know some things that we should have done last year, you said well I'll do it, I'll

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do it next year and you didn't do it. And here's the goal, here we are with this year, so well I'll do it next year. Well what he's really saying is that we need to set goals And Jesus said that the most significant goal that we can set is to put God first, seek ye first the kingdom of heaven and his righteousness and all the other things.

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In other words, what he's saying is while we have these bodily concerns, that our first concern ought to be that of the spirit. >> Yes. >> And that the spirit should be superior to the body

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so that the body is subjected to the spirit. And if we put God first in our lives, if we look for that which is good and true and beautiful as a means of ordering our lives,

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then he says life will go well with you. [audience murmurs] Guidelines for the future. Seek ye first, first the kingdom.

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How do you think about a kingdom? We think about territory in this world, territory, and we think about how vast it may be, the boundaries of that kingdom.

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We think about the territory in our lives, our influence, our commitment, our energies, all of it, as far as the human span can reach, so to speak, that territory that we cover.

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Let God rule. the rule of God's spirit in our lives. That's the first thing, the rule of God. Seek first the kingdom of God and its righteousness,

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its righteousness. And of course, what Jesus does here in saying that if God rules in the human heart, he spends the fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters

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of Matthew telling us how it will be, what things will do if God rules in our lives. And many people read that if we take it and discuss verse by verse, you know, turn the other cheek of someone that does wrong, smites you on one cheek, turn the other. Some say, "Well, I'll never do that." You know, if they require you to go one mile, go two. "I'll never do that."

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But Jesus says that this is the way that first of all, seek to do what God wills for your life. And if you seek to do what God wills for your life, if you seek to carry out his righteousness,

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if you seek to be rightly related to him, first of all, that your life will be whole, your life will be meaningful, and you will be making the kind of contribution in the future

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that is ordained of him. Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. Don't have to worry about what you're gonna wear, where you're gonna stay, what you're gonna eat. These are concerns, but if you put God first, he knows you need these things.

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He controls this world. He controls all the food. In fact, when Adam came into the garden, God had already arranged everything for his keeping. and God has already arranged it and if we are following the leadership of his spirit we don't have to worry about the future. Seek first the kingdom of God

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and his righteousness and all these things will be added to you. I think all of us need to hear that word. We look at most of our churches, possibly a very small group

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supports the church. Very small group is faithful to the things. And most people in most of our churches want to have their names on the church roll, but do not want to carry out what is involved in that commitment.

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As one person put it, they look for the church as a place where they go and when and celebrate the time when they're hatched, when they are matched, and when they're dispatched. Those three times, hatched, matched, and dispatched.

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But what he's saying is arrange your priorities in such a way that First things come first. It's been a little different. We read about the scandal on Wall Street with Ivan Bushki. What happened? Well, he was concerned about getting richer and richer. And he ends up in disgrace. See, first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, His way. What would God have me do?

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No matter what the cost may be, no matter how heavy it may seem to burden, He's there to help us bear it. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all will be well during the year. We don't know, we say it so often, we don't know what the future holds, but if we are rightly related to the one who holds the future, all will be well. seek first the kingdom of God. Well, there was a heated baseball contest and the

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batter was crouched over the plate and it was a situation in which there were three balls and two strikes. The pitcher went into his windup and he let go of the ball and the batter who was crouched over the plate swung and the ball went up, up, up. continuing to clear the fence.

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And the runner raced toward first, then second, third base, and then on home.

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His teammates gathered around to congratulate him. There was great excitement, pandemonium in the stands. The spectators danced and shouted for joy because they thought he had knocked

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the home run. But in the midst of all the celebration, there was a man walked on the field in a blue suit and he pointed toward the runner and said, "You're out!" He said, "What do you mean? That ball was in fair territory?" He said, "Yes, but you're out." He said you fail to touch first base.

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And this is a game in which you must touch first base. No matter how well you run, no matter how hard you hit the ball, that you've got to touch first base. And so that's the word that Jesus is giving to us here in this message to his disciples

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and the long ago and to his disciples and every generation to us who are situated here in the 20th century and the eve of, well, right now in the morning of a new year. And hell on hell on hell on hell must have touched first base, yes, in all of our running and all of our doing to touch first base.

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For the Lord God Almighty is to be put first in our lives. You put him first, he's first. In the beginning God created heaven and earth. In the beginning God scooped up the clay

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and made us in his image. God did it in the beginning. And heaven helped us to have that God as the leader of our lives.

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He said, "Put me first because if you fail to do that, "you're acting like the pagans." They're the ones who are primarily concerned about what they're going to eat

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and what they're going to wear and where they're going to stay. But my disciples are concerned about the eternal values because time will take away all of these things.

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Time takes its toll on us. I say to my friends, you know, I can remember when I wanted to eat these things and I didn't have the money to buy them.

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I said, but now that I have the money to buy them, I can't afford to eat them. You know, that's what time does to us, but somehow in the midst of the transitory,

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in the midst of these things that change, but time, we're not gonna be the same this year as we were last year. It takes its toll upon our bodies,

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but so, and recognizing that what Jesus has really said, you hook up with something that's eternal. Because we're on our way out, and someday, somewhere, eternity will invade time,

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And we want to be hooked up with the God who is eternal. And that's good enough. He's the one who made us. He's the one who cared for us.

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And he's the one who redeems us. And he's the one who has prepared for us an eternal home. Seek first the kingdom of God. And all other things that you need will be added to you.

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Don't worry about it. Some people, they're going to lose something. They get too close to God. And the church, you're not gonna lose.

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They think some gonna be subtracted, they're gonna miss some fun out there in the world. But what's really gonna happen is you're gonna have so much more added

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than you have your own. (piano music) Father, I stretch my hands to thee. - No other help I know

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is not withdrawn by a trust in thee, O Lord. (singing) [MUSIC] [MUSIC]

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♪ Father ♪ ♪ I trust ♪ ♪ My love ♪ ♪ To thee ♪

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♪ Oh ♪ ♪ I am ♪ ♪ I know ♪ ♪ Give up ♪

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♪ Live for ♪ ♪ Thyself ♪ ♪ From me ♪ ♪ O'er the land of the free ♪

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♪ And the home of the brave ♪ ♪ God keep ♪ ♪ Thy holy ♪ ♪ Is found in thy ♪

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♪ People ♪ ♪ I do ♪ ♪ My God ♪ ♪ One day, one day ♪

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♪ I do see you ♪ ♪ I saw from early last night ♪ ♪ From early last night ♪ [Music]

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