Here's Pastor Alan Wright with today's blessing—a biblical, faith-filled vision for your life. You're made for counting stars, not scars. One Republic star vocalist Ryan Tedder penned those lyrics in the chorus of their Billboard-topping song. Said, "No more counting dollars. We'll be counting stars.
Yeah, we'll be counting stars." I wonder if he had old Abraham in mind, and the day the Lord brought him outside. And said, "Look up toward heaven and number the stars, if you're able to number them.
So shall your offspring be." I bless you today to turn your spiritual eyes heavenward to see the majesty and treasury of God's grace laid up for you. It's not yesterday's painful scars, nor the enemy's prison bars that define you. It's the stars, the promises, the hopes, the blessings of God. You'll be counting stars. Pastor, author, and Bible teacher Allen Wright.
As far as the gateway of grace, the spiritual discipline. The practice of simplicity doesn't mean you got to get rid of everything in your life and get rid of all the every busy thing you're doing. It means instead that here are all these things, and they only have their place of minor importance. And here's the kingdom of God. That's Pastor Alan Wright.
Welcome to another message of good news that will help you see your life in a whole new light. I'm Daniel Britt. Excited for you to hear the teaching today in the series "Gateways to Grace" as presented at Renolda Church in North Carolina. If you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program, I want to make sure you know how to get our special resource right now, which can be yours for your donation this month to Allen Wright Ministries. As you listen to today's message, go deeper as we send you today's special offer.
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This week, I had a day that was a really hard day.
Some hard things happened in that day.
Some things that that hurt my feelings and were hard, you know. And that night we're lying in bed, and this woman of God began to minister the word to me, and speak the word of God over me, utter prophetic promises of God's assuring and graceful presence. And we prayed together, and said good night. And I lay there restless for about an hour, trying hard. To stop that rush of thoughts that keeps going because of anxiety, and just in the middle of the night, this time our heads didn't butt, but for some reason we both moved our hand and towards the center of the bed, and our hands just touched each other, and we clasped our hands.
And just held hands until we fell asleep. You could have a thousand romantic partners, but you'll never have that without that kind of narrowness that comes in that covenantal commitment. I think we need to tell the world that kind of thing. That through this narrow gate on the other side is a vast. Field of life and beauty, and I think this is the invitation Jesus gives.
It's the allure and attraction towards His kingdom that beckons us inward. Come and seek first Me, Jesus says, and all of My kingdom, and let it be the one thing in your life, and everything else will find its place. Look closer at this text, verse twenty-five. I tell you, Jesus says, "Do not be anxious about your life, what you'll eat, what you'll drink, nor about your body or what you'll put on. Is not life more than the food, and body more than clothing?" It strikes me.
I was trying to read this as if for the first time, and it strikes me that Jesus here doesn't. Talk about don't worry about the non-essential things. He doesn't say don't worry about whether you've got the best vintage of red wine on your table, and don't worry about whether you've got the fastest chariot, and don't worry about whether you've got the largest house. He said, "Don't worry about food and clothes." He said, "Even the most essential things that you've got to have." Don't worry about those things. Isn't that interesting?
What you eat, that which sustains you; what you wear, that which covers you. He's saying, I care more than you do about what sustains you and what covers you. I don't think it's a coincidence that this is what God speaks of when He speaks of His grace to us, being in His Word, which is like bread that we eat. And that the very first thing God did for sinful humanity was He made them better clothing to cover their shame. Look, verse twenty-six at the birds of the air.
I don't think He's being rhetorical here. I think He's on a Galilean hillside, and there are birds flitting around, and He's pausing in the middle of His teaching and saying, "Look at the birds. Just stop and look at them. It's a form of meditation." To go outside of your own rush of thoughts and look at something like a bird, and start thinking about the bird's not worried, and I am. The bird's not very important, but I am important to God.
And yet, the birds find worms and dig up seeds, and God made it so that they would be able to have their food. Look at that, Jesus said. The word for anxious is a word that means to care, but it means caring in the sense of caring too much. He's talking about care as a relative matter. What do you care about most?
Verse twenty-seven. You, by being anxious, could you add a single hour or span to life? You're not going to get taller or live longer. And it probably means the same thing. In other words, we all know it, but he's saying it.
Worry is the most unproductive enterprise in the world. Verse twenty-eight. And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies. Again, I think there were flowers in the field.
See how they grow. They neither toil nor spin. Did I tell you? Even Solomon and all of his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field today alive, tomorrow throw in the oven, will He not much more clothe you?
Oh, you little faith! That little word there in Greek is one word: "little faith." Ones. I've preached about this before, from a sermon, a delightful sermon from Charles Spurgeon, where he says, "To say little faith, one." It's not Jesus really putting them down, but is to say you have at least a little faith, and a little faith is better than no faith. I think it was a pet term for the disciples. Don't worry, little faith ones.
Verse thirty-one: Do not be anxious, saying, "What shall we eat? What shall we drink? What shall we wear?" For the Gentiles seek after these things, and your heavenly Father knows you need them all.
So here is the explicit command to not worry, but to go against the stream, because you realize it's countercultural not to worry about such things. G.K. Chesterton said, "Only dead things float with the current." It's living things that swim against it. Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, like the Gentiles. They run after all those things.
Jesus is saying, but you don't have to. You have a Father in heaven who sees what you need. Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. Seek Him. Doesn't mean that it's lost and you need to find it.
Is to say that this becomes your heart's desire and pursuit. It is to pursue the kingdom, not just a ticket to heaven, not just to pray a sinner's prayer, so that I could not worry about eternity. He's saying, if you want this, all these things that are added unto you, let your whole life. Become so enamored with how good God is and how His kingdom, which the Bible says consists of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit, how wonderful it is that that's what you want. That's the secret.
And it's not new to God to say that the singleness of our heart's focus upon Him is the answer. He's always said this amongst Jewish people, and the most famous scriptures is called the Shema, because Shema in Hebrew means to hear or listen, and that's the opening words of Deuteronomy six four: Hear, O Israel. Shema Yisrael, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. Mother Teresa said, "You'll just never know Jesus is all you need until Jesus is all you got." It's why, beloved, that oftentimes.
Suffering that God didn't author, but that God redeems, is used in our lives to actually make us better. When you can't have some of the idolatrous things that pull us and make us anxious, and they fall away, and all we've got is God, then we start gleaning and appropriating. The promise of Matthew six thirty three that when you are seeking him like that, many other good things get added to you. That's why so many of have experienced this, right? Where it felt like in your life there was a stripping away of things, and then a drawing into God, and then it's like the whole field opened up after that.
Blessing upon blessing in my life has often followed when what I might have been clinging to that was more shallow than Jesus Himself gets taken away. That's what suffering can feel like. But the practice of simplicity is a practicing of life as a spiritual discipline, where we are taking a regular inventory and audit, so to speak. Of where all the time is going, and therefore where our heart is going, so that we do not get so distracted. And Richard Foster, in his classic celebration of discipline, has some important words to say about why this is real different than asceticism, which is a rigid self-denial.
Asceticism renounces possessions, he writes, but simplicity sets possessions in their proper perspective. Asceticism finds no place for a land flowing with milk and honey. Simplicity rejoices in his gracious provision from the hand of God. Asceticism finds contentment only when it's abased. Simplicity knows contentment both in abasement and abounding, according to Philippians four twelve.
And Foster, in that chapter on simplicity in his famous book Celebration Discipline, offers some practical counsel. I think some of these worth mentioning. Just if you're thinking about this in your own life, well, how do we even go about? Escaping the craziness of this culture, and these things are pretty timeless. What he says, they buy things for their usefulness rather than their status.
Like the older I get, like if there's something, it's the name brand, but it's really better and it's going to last a lot longer and work a lot better. Then get that. But if it's really the same and it just has a label on it, just because you wanted the status, then shun that. You see. Reject anything he says that's producing an addiction in you.
Take a take a look at your life. In other words, in a regular way, if you want to practice simplicity, and go well, what's gobbling up my time that I can't seem to stop doing? Pay attention to that. He also says develop a habit of giving things away. That's a great habit.
Like just like there's a thing, you know, and maybe you like it, but you know, just God's leading you. Give it to somebody else. Like this doesn't have a hold on me. He says this: learn to enjoy things without owning them. Go outside and enjoy the park that's free, or at least your taxpayers' dollars paid for it, or something.
Really go. I read this week: Americans spend ninety-three percent of their time indoors.
So if you live to be a hundred, you spent ninety-three years in a box. There is a whole lot outside that you can enjoy that you don't have to own. Just appreciate it. Talking about simplicity, basically getting rid of the stuff that keeps you distracted and keeps you from seeking the kingdom of God. Ronald Rolheiser has said, "Every choice is a thousand renunciations," which is why it takes some courage to simplify.
The narrow gate's not for cowards. Seeking first the kingdom of God does take some reprioritizing. I only wish I could tell you how to want it. I think I could tell you everything about the theology. I could give you these two competing narratives about many choices versus singleness of choice.
I could explain it psychologically and sociologically, as I've done a little bit. I only wish I could lead you there, and I have only to ask the Holy Spirit to do that. I could say. That Jesus is wonderful. If you don't know Him, that you could fall in love with Him.
I could say that living a life in the kingdom of God is just full of delight and joy and challenge and meaning, with the hope that you would become enamored. But I think God does this, creating a thirst. A student once asked his rabbi the meaning of Deuteronomy six, and how how is it possible, and what does it mean, Rabbi, to love God with all your heart and mind and soul and strength? The rabbi was silent, said no words, and took the student down to the river. And there, waded into the middle of the deep river, took the student and thrust his head under the water, and held him there, which seemed for an eternity to the boy, and let him up at the moment that he needed to, as the boy was gasping for air.
And the rabbi said to him, "While you were under the water, what did you want more than anything else?" And the student said, "Air." And the teacher said, "When your soul wants God as much as your lungs wanted air, then you will have come to know the meaning of Deuteronomy six. There is a mystery, but God draws us." And I think we taste and see that He's good, and then we get drawn in further. And next thing you know, you're just seeking first the kingdom of God. As far as the gateway of grace, the spiritual discipline, the practice of simplicity doesn't mean you got to get rid of everything in your life and get rid of all the every busy thing you're doing. It means instead that here are all these things, and they only have their place of minor importance.
And here is the kingdom of God. And somehow, every day we say, "Jesus, you are what matters most to me." And when you don't matter most to me, give me grace that you will, and let the. Lesser desires of this world have their place somewhere on a much lower shelf, because in the end, I really believe the answer is not many things, but one: seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. All these other things that we worry about. They'll be added unto you, and that's the gospel.
Pastor Alan Wright, our good news message, simplicity from the series "The Gateways of Grace." Hey, stay with us. Pastor Alan is back here in the studio sharing his parting good news thought for the day in just a moment. What if growing closer to God isn't about trying harder?
So often, we approach spiritual growth with a list of things we need to do. Pray more, read more, be better, but what if the secret to spiritual transformation isn't found in greater effort, but in experiencing more of God's grace? In his book *The Gateways of Grace*, Pastor Alan Wright invites you to discover a fresh perspective on spiritual growth through timeless practices like Scripture, prayer, meditation, wonder, and rest. You'll discover how to create space for the Holy Spirit to work in your life. These spiritual disciplines aren't obligations that earn God's favor; they're gateways that open our hearts to experience more of God's goodness, peace, and transforming grace.
When you give to Allenwright Ministries, you help share the gospel with listeners around the world. And when you give today, we'll send you Pastor Alan's book, The Gateways of Grace, as our thanks to discover these aren't just disciplines; they're gateways. Step through them and discover the grace that's been waiting for you. The gospel is shared when you give to Allen Wright Ministries. This broadcast is only possible because of listener financial support.
When you give today, we will send you today's special offer. We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Allen Wright Ministries. Call us at eight seven seven five four four forty eight sixty. That's eight seven seven five four four forty eight sixty, or come to our website, PastorAllen dot org. Back here in the studio with Pastor Alan at the conclusion of this message titled "Simplicity." I want to revisit words from Richard Foster about simplicity, to make sure we're clear.
Aestheticism renounces possessions. Simplicity sets possessions in proper perspective. Aestheticism finds no place for a land flowing with milk and honey. Simplicity rejoices in this gracious provision from the hand of God.
So we're not talking about the practice of self-denial or self-flagellation, or no, we're talking about in this confusing, complex world of a million million choices that your heart can center in upon Jesus and appreciate all that you have. And let life get this ordering simplicity of seeking first the kingdom of God, and with that comes freedom. If you only caught part of today's teaching, not only can you listen again online, but also get a daily email devotional that matches today's teaching, delivered right to your email inbox, free. Find out more about these and other resources at PastorAllen dot org. That's PastorAllen.org.
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