A Faith That Puts God Second

start with an easy question today if you are a Christian if you're a disciple of Jesus online you can type this in the comments section if you're a follower of Jesus what should come first in your life what should come first it's an easy question the answer starts with G and rhymes with B if you're a Christian what should come first in your life the answer is God should come first in your life right seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and then all these things shall be added unto you Jesus said the

most important command is to love the Lord your God with all your heart all your mind all your soul and all your strength if you're a follower of Jesus what should come first in your life the answer is God should come first in our lives sadly though many of us claim that God is first in our lives but our lives don't reflect God being the first priority and I'll illustrate this to you um and ask you what are some categories in life what are some priorities we know what God is a priority in your life

what are some other categories in your life that would would be something important someone shout something out what else God and marriage and family very good you got the card right ding ding ding marriage and family uh if you're married you better prioritize your spouse if you have kids you want to prioritize your kids uh you want to value your grandma your grandpa your brothers your sisters family should be very important to you what else would be in there I would say your career you went to college you borrowed $40 million to get a degree

right you're paying off your debt you'll be doing that for the rest of your life it feels like because why you want to have a good career you want to have a good job you want to have a profitable income you want to do something that matters what else do you have in your life you're going to have your money and your stuff stuff cost money want to buy some decent stuff you don't want your stuff to own you but you want to have a good life you want to enjoy it and then I'm going

to say just to keep it simple your hobbies right you uh you want to enjoy some things that you do now what I want you to do for a minute is I want you to imagine your life as a series of chairs this would be your first chair uh first priority the most important thing would go in shair number one the second shair would be important but not the top priority the third share would be the third most important thing the fourth share would be the fourth most important thing and in reality you're going to

have 8 9 10 12 15 18 different things like this and 8 9 10 12 15 different shares but I didn't want to take up the whole stage or the whole talk setting up this illustration so we're just going to keep it simple now let's go ahead and play along if we're a follower of Jesus what should go in share number one and the answer is God if we're a follower of Jesus what should go in share number two what do you think probably your family and let's just stop there because we could go on

but let's just do some real talk is this a reflection of most of our Lives probably not I can't speak for you but a lot of people that I see are or even in my own life there's often something else that seems to go in the first chair one of the most common things that I see that goes in the first chair would be what your job your career just takes up a lot of time and then hopefully you know you get home and you have some leftover for your family and you you you treat

your family well you know you all the kids and you you have a decent marriage hopefully so and then after that I'm going to say that for a lot of us you got to pay the bills and you want to work hard and you know you got to have a nice life and you got to have money and stuff in order to enjoy your hobbies and you don't want to miss whatever your hobbies is CrossFit video games waterc coloring competitive speed knitting whatever it is you want to have your hobbies and then um uh got

God I'll just put God there because in many of our Lives what happens is we say that God is first but our actions say something very different the title of today's message is a faith that puts God second let's all pray father we um we acknowledge that you are the king of all you are the Supreme Lord and your loving Heavenly Father father and God according to your word we are to put you first and God I acknowledge that I don't always do that so today we ask that by the power of your Living Word

and the convicting Grace of your Holy Spirit would you draw our hearts to you that we could put you first in all that we do we pray this in the name of Jesus and if you agree say amen amen uh we are in the message series called Christian is if you missed maybe the last couple of weeks you say what in the world does it mean to be Christian is uh well Christian is would be somebody there's a lot of people like this I've been like this that might have a halfhearted faith and it's someone

that would wear the label Christian of course I'm a Christian but they don't fully follow Jesus and one of the most common common qualities of someone that is Christian is is someone that has what I call a faith that puts God second how would we Define that our working definition would be this a faith that puts God second reflects a divided heart where God is first in your words but not in your life it's a faith that puts God second like we say yeah I truly want to honor God I want to live for God

I want to please God what I do Jesus gave his life for me I want him to be the Lord of my life and so I'm going to put him first and I'm going to love him but then Life Starts happening and distraction start taking over and we claim that God should be first in our life but God actually often gets left out a faith that puts God second uh the Bible says anytime that we put something ahead of God do you know what it's called it's actually called idolatry someone said hey Pastor Craig why

are we hitting it so hard New Year why aren't you preaching this is the year of breakthrough new year new you and you're doing idolatry why because I believe the Holy Spirit wants to say something to us convict us transform us so what I want to do is I want to show you two Bible verses on idolatry the first one is the very first command of the Ten Commandments if God's going to give you the first of Ten Commandments one that comes first all of them are important but one comes first this one comes first

in Exodus 23 God says you shall have no other gods before me you shouldn't have any Idols there should be nothing in our lives that we rank as a higher priority than the Lord Our God that's the Old Testament we see it in the New Testament as well John said this he said dear children what should you keep yourselves free from you should keep your lives free from Idols now if you're like me when you think of Idols what do you think of I tend to think of someone bowing down to a golden statue it's

an idol it's a golden calf or something like that and that would be an idol but an idol according to God's word is actually much different from that I would say to you this idolatry isn't just bowing to golden statues it's putting anything before God it's anything even a good thing that we put before God and when we take a step back and we look at this okay if God is who he says he is he is the creator the sustainer the Lord of all the king of all Kings if he is that then he

has the right to ask us to put him first but practically speaking let's just be real like practically speaking that's a big ask because we all have priorities right we all have dreams we we all have interests we we have a lot going on in our lives we got a lot to do why is God being so demanding why does God want to be first well I can give you a hundred reasons we're going to focus on one of those reasons today besides the fact that he is worthy of it one of the things we

need to understand is that God wants to be first in our lives because God is a jealous God God is a jealous God I'm gonna ask you for your honesty I'm gonna get a drink because I need to I need I need some I need some I'm because we're because it could get hot in here how many of you would be honest enough to say and you you may not feel this way but how many of you when you hear that God is a jealous God that metaphor doesn't sit well with you anybody say I

don't really like God is jealous I don't really I really don't like that like God is petty like that some you go like hey I had a jealous ex and that didn't go well I'm not bringing God into this conversation I'm sitting down of it right a no way uh I don't really love that idea of God being being a jealous God but when we look at scripture scripture is really really clear that God is a jealous God let's look at three verses we're going to start in Exodus Exodus 34:14 tells us do not worship

any other God for the Lord what is his name whose name is jealous is a what he is a jealous God let's look again at Exodus 20 and verse 5 says you shall not bow down to Idols or or worship them why because the Lord your God he says I am a am a jealous God the next verse says this Deuteronomy 4:24 for the Lord your God is a consuming fire everybody say it with me could type it online what is God God is a jealous God now if it comes across you kind of like

negative like why would God be jealous I mean that's some kind of petty human emotion makes God sound insecure if you have that reaction so did I we step back and we recognize who is God God is infinite in power god is perfect in Holiness God is Sovereign over all creation why would a god like that be jealous well when scripture describes God as a jealous God it's important to understand that metaphor in in a Biblical and a relational context I show you something powerful from the original language the word that's translated as jealous uh

in the Old Testament is the word Kan Kan there a very interesting word if you look at this word Kana uh the root word actually only has one in that one has two uh the root word cana with one n describes human jealousy but when there's a second n or noon that's Hebrew if you want to impress your friends say it's got a second noon that's a second n it when it has a second n this word becomes a word that is only ever used for God the second in is what's known as an intensifier

in Hebrew grammar the second n intensifies jealousy to the infinite degree there is no jealousy in the world greater than when Kan has a second n the second n says it's reserved for God and God alone it's not human jealousy which is flawed and self- serving like my jealousy or like yours no God's jealousy is rooted in his covenantal love for us in fact the word Kana with two NS it describes God's righteous consuming Covenant keeping jealousy that relentlessly pursues and protects his relationship with people it's a righteous holy consuming jealousy from a God who

gave it all for you and wants you to give it all back to him it's his covenantal jealousy in fact in the New Testament God describes his jealousy this way he says I am jealous for you not with a petty jealousy not with a human jealousy but with what with a Godly jealousy it's a different kind of jealousy that is holy and righteous it's pure is is passionate and is protective why because God loves you and God wants what's best for you and anytime you put something anything before him it hurts you David said this

he said those who run after other gods those who chase After idols those who don't put God first those who run after other gods will suffer more and more can we slow it down for a minute if you're struggling you're hurting you're dissatisfied there's there's something in you that you know it's not the way it should be if you're hurting maybe it's because you're putting something before God in your life and that idolatry is taking a toll on your life maybe you find yourself you've got constant tension all the time you always feel overwhelmed you're

anxious maybe you battle with depression it might be that you you feel disconnected from God you like try to talk to him but you don't sense him or maybe you feel disconnected from people you don't have anybody that you really trust in your life any that you can open up with and bear your soul and don't know if they're really going to be there for you or love you or accept you maybe you spend more money then you make trying to fill some void on the inside or you drink too much smoke too much get

high trying to numb the pain maybe you get angry and you lose your temper or you feel bored and empty so you look at porn and you think that whatever that is you think that's your problem I would suggest that that whatever that is is not likely your problem that is likely a symptom of your problem and the real problem is very likely idolatry is that we're putting something in God's place you may say Okay Craig I was with you the last two you're getting in my business you ticking me off this time and and

you might push back I get it you might say hey I'm not getting high I'm not looking at porn you know I'm not battling with idolatry I'm just enjoying my thing don't mess with my thing this is my thing it's not bad it's my thing you might say golf's my thing God created golf courses Don't Mess With God created this is my thing or you might say no my house is my thing love my family I want to have a good house I want everything to match I want to be a good host I mean

just you know who who what's wrong with my house being my thing you might say um my image is my thing I want to look good I want to be fly when I walk in the room I want people say she's got he's got I want it to match I want to look good I want to take care of my skin I want I want everybody say hey yeah she she looks good you I me might be your kids my kids are amazing have I told you about my kids your thing might be your kids

your whole life is your kids what's wrong with that you might say hey of course I want a boyfriend or a girlfriend I mean of course I mean like what's wrong with that or hey so I'm Into Fitness it's like this is the Temple of the Holy Spirit I should honor God with my fitness it's just my thing don't mess with my thing it's not this isn't a bad thing it's a good thing and I want to say you might be absolutely right very possibly your thing whatever that is may not be a bad thing

unless you're putting it before God unless you're putting it before God and even Good Things become Idols when they take God's place in your heart even if it's a good thing it becomes a bad thing it becomes more important in your life than God is in your life so if you're like me you're going to raise a question like so how do I know if my thing my interest is like an appropriate passion or is it something that's becoming an idol for example you might really want to be good at your career you're trying to

succeed professionally and you're say that's a good thing right or am I like obsessed with it and it's become my identity you might say I love my hobby like I'm really good at video games and besides you can actually make money doing that today if you're really really good at it right or you're into fantasy sports and like that's your your release or you're just trying to grow grow your YouTube channel whatever it is you're going it's okay right I mean it is isn't it or or do I love it too much like I love

my kids and sure I've designed my whole life around them I think I'm still married but I haven't seen my spouse in nine months because I'm pouring my life into my kids that's okay right they're my kids I'm supposed to do that right how do I know if my my thing is an appropriate interest an appropriate passion is it healthy is it harmless or is it idolatrous and dangerous what I want to do is I want to give the Holy Spirit just a chance to speak to you and we're going to wrestle with three very

very important questions you may write them down you can even take a photo of if you want and we're going to talk about these in our life group if we're not in a life group we're going to be in a life group because we need Community around us but we're going to let God work on us through these questions if you're ready say I'm ready are you ready I'm ready question number one is this we're going to ask does this my thing whatever it is does this lead me closer to God or distract me from

God this interest my my hobby my passion my thing is it something that is complimentary and and blesses my relationship with God and helps me enjoy and appreciate him and make a difference in other people's lives or is it so strong that it's actually taking me away from the heart of God and distracting me from putting him first second question do I rely on this thing whatever it is more than God for my comfort my Identity or my worth uh when I am hurting or alone do I go to this thing as my soul source

of comfort or do I go to God who is my comforter do do I need this thing to have meaning in Life or is God the one who gives me meaning third question would be this if God asked me to give this up my thing whatever this is would I give it up without hesitation if God asked me to stop would I say of course God if you ask me to stop beyond a shadow of a doubt I would do that because I love you and I trust you or would you say not that God

God no don't make me do that let's look at him again and just ask yourself and and let the Holy Spirit speak to you does this lead me closer to God or distract me from God do I rely on this more than God for my comfort my Identity or my worth if God asked me to give this up would I give it up without hesitation and now I'm going to ask you is God trying to show you something is God nudging you the point at which you kind of get mad at me might be an

indication of where God is reaching out to you and and I'll go first um 29 years into leading this church I still battle with the idolatry of wanting to be light wish I didn't wish I didn't care at all I W I wish I put God's opinion above everything else but to this day there's a part of me that still wants to be liked and even respected liked and respected and maybe even loved if you're in the mood to love me like me and respect me and the problem is like a lot of people don't

I mean even some of you it's kind of crazy some people go like yeah I go to light I don't really like Craig I go really well I don't get it but is a thing and uh and and what I have to understand very sincerely is that that people pleasing is idolatry that's a form of idolatry and so what I have to do is I have to take that before God and say okay I I occasionally I'm trying to get my comfort or my meaning from what people think instead of from what you think and

so I tell myself over and over again okay Craig you cannot please everyone but you can please God you can't please everyone but you can please God I'm not called to please everyone but I'm called to please God I can't please everyone but I can please God I'm not called to please everyone I am called to please God and that's a bit of the idolatry that I have to crucify over and over in my life so I went first what about you like what's God trying to show you and I just beg you I mean

my heart's like I just want to like just I want our church to get it if there's something more important than God in your life acknowledge it what have you been putting in the wrong chair is there something in the wrong chair and if God is revealing something to you listen to him lean into it pay attention let him convict you with a righteous conviction so you'll repent before him and put him first and if you find yourself fighting back oh I shouldn't have come to church this weekend I don't like this me if you

find yourself defending your thing no no you don't understand Craig you're you stay away from that thing if you find yourself defending or rationalize it remember what you resist the hardest often reveals what controls you the most wherever you're pushing back if you're pushing back say no not that thing that may be the very thing that's in the place where God should be so when you know you're putting something ahead of God don't just fight the symptoms attack the root the root is idolatry call it what it is then if you recognize you're putting something

ahead of God what do you do you don't just remove it you replace it you don't just take it away but you put God first now why haven't you done [Music] this why haven't you why haven't I why aren't we always putting God first and the reason is we don't really want to because we all pursue what we want most don't we we prioritize our time around what's most important to us I mean this what I want so this is what I do and we try to get whatever it is that we want and the

reason why God isn't first is because we don't want God that much I think it's been this quiet maybe like 10 years ago but it's been a long time why is it that deep down so many of us don't really want God the reason that we don't really want God is because we don't know how how good God really is and the only way to know how good he is is to put him first the only way to know how good he is is to taste and see that the Lord is good to seek first

his kingdom and his righteousness above anything else above your hobbies your wants your desires your preferences to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and then everything else will be added unto you you delight yourself in the Lord you delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart not not just does he give you what you want but he gives you his Desires in your heart so you want what he wants when you put him first why don't so many of us want God because we don't know

how good he really is and the only way to know how good he really is is to put God in the first chair first chair priority of your life so please if there's something distracting you from him replace whatever that is with more of him because I promise you he loves you he cares about you and God is not trying to take something from you he's trying to give you something indescribably better he's trying to give you himself he is the Supreme Lord who still calls you friend and he's not calling us to be Christian

is sort of kind of well yeah I mean I go to church every now and then yeah I kind of believe in God you know yeah I mean you know yeah I'm not I mean I'm you know I'm I'm I'm kind of Christian I mean you know I mean I yeah I kind of have faith and all I want to go to heaven when I die no no no no no seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness love the Lord your God with all your heart mind soul and strength we're not going to

love him halfway we're not going to put him on the ground when there's not room for him God is a jealous God with a righteous covenantal jealousy that's protective of you a jealousy that says love me with all your heart mind soul and strength so the question is really really simple are you ready like are you ready are you willing are you ready if he asked you to give it up would you give it up whatever it is are you ready to put God in the first chair of your life it's time to stop treating

the symptom it's time to attack the root and the root is idolatry is anything we put before God and we don't just remove the idol we replace it with God the only way to know how good God is is to put him first so God I'm going first forgive me forgive me for all the ways that I put the cares of this world ahead of you and your kingdom God forgive me forgive me God forgive me God forgive me God forgive me God for not putting you first and God draw us close to you now

today as you're praying no nobody looking around those of you online at our churches I'm just going to keep it real real simple those of you who are a Christian You've Been Changed by Jesus you've been born a new you've been baptized you're a follower of Jesus you know your name is written in the Lamb's Book of Life you know you belong to God but you're not putting him first today you want to repent and you want to put him first all of our churches don't think about it don't rationalize it there's something you're putting

ahead of God you know you are his you are a Christian but there's something distracting you from him and today you want to repent would you lift your hands high right now lift them up just lift them up make it worship online type in the comment section I am repenting God forgive me I want to put you first if you if you leave your hands up and you just want to cry out to God we God just forgive us forgive us God forgive me forgive forgive my failings at this church God as a leader as

a pastor God forgive us as your people help us be a church that puts you first God help our families put you first as parents God help us show our children in generations to come that we put you first God at work help us to demonstrate you're the Lord of our lives and and put you first God help us to live for you above anything else God forgive us anytime every time anywhere we don't put you first and God I just pray for my church family family that that whatever it is we're putting before you

you'd convict us and you'd show us and we'd crucify that and God we wouldn't just remove it but we would replace it with you God help us to put you first as you keep praying today at at all of our churches uh without looking around there are some of you you would recognize you actually have never really put God first in your life if we sit down and I just ask you like hey if if you died to today are you certain that your sins have been forgiven that you belong to God if you said

you know I'm actually not certain I don't really know God's not first scripture tells us that Anyone who puts him first that anyone who calls on the name of the Lord would be saved how are you made right with God you're actually the amazing thing is you're not made right with God by your good works or by your religious efforts or by by giving money or by helping people the only way you're made right with God Is by stepping away from your sins and receiving the grace and the good news of Jesus who is Jesus

the perfect sinless Son of God who shed his blood and died on a cross for the Forgiveness of our sins and God raised him from the dead so that anyone and this includes you who calls on his name would be saved we're saved by grace we're saved by grace but then when you're saved guess what you want to follow Jesus you want to put him first today at all of our churches if you recognize he's not first maybe he's never been first and you you don't know where you stand with God today we're going to

step away from our sins we're going to step into the grace of Jesus and when you do God will hear your prayer he will forgive your sins today you're not just going to become better you're going to become new the old is gone and you become new at all of our churches online those who say yes I need his salvation he's not first today I make him first today I step away from my sin and by faith I give my life to him that's your prayer you say yes Jesus I turned from my sins I

give my life to you lift your hands high right now all over the place and say yes that's my prayer God bless you right here and over here as well others of you saying yes Jesus right back there and over here oh come on Church praise God for you right here God bless you others today say Yes Jesus I Surrender be the Lord Of My Life online type in the comment section I'm I'm surrendering to Jesus I want to put Jesus first in my life and in this holy moment let's pause for just just a

moment and recognize that God is doing Miracles pray aloud pray heavenly father I put Jesus first Jesus Jesus Save Me Jesus forgive my sins make me new I believe I believe that you died and rose again so I could be forgiven and so I could know you fill me with your holy spirit so I could put you first and show your love in all that I do my life is not my own I give it all every bit of it everything to you thank you for New Life you have all of mine in Jesus name

I pray pray come on Church could you give God some praise today come on come on come on come on welcome those born into God's family did this message resonate with you if so check out these videos to learn more about living like Jesus tap here to start watching [Music]