How many of you believe in God? How many of you believe God is all-powerful? How many of you believe God is all-knowing? How many believe God is all-loving? How many believe He is the Creator of the entire universe? Redeemer, Sustainer, Deliverer and yet still calls you – yes, you – His friend?
We all believe all of that, right? Now, how many of you worry sometimes? You worry about your finances. You worry about your job, your marriage, your kids and I know you worry about your pastor. Carol worries about me. Every Wednesday night she worries I’m not eating enough vegetables. “That’s not a salad!”
If we were honest we would all have to say that we worry sometimes. It’s a bigger problem for some of us than for others but everybody does it and the Bible says that worry is a sin. In Philippians 4:6 God gives us a command. “Do not worry about anything.” To disobey that command – any command of God – is sin.
None of us want to sin. None of us want to worry. We don’t intend to. We try not to but when we try to sleep at night or we get a few minutes alone, our minds start to drift off to a place that, for some of us, is just a little too comfortable. Have you ever known of somebody that just wasn’t happy unless they were miserable with worry?
For several years a woman had been having trouble getting to sleep at night because she feared burglars. One night her husband heard a noise in the house, so he went downstairs to investigate. When he got there, he did find a burglar. "Good evening," said the man of the house. "I am pleased to see you. Come upstairs and meet my wife. She has been waiting 10 years to meet you." William Marshall, Eternity Shut in a Span.
I hope that’s not you. But even if you worry a little bit or every now and then, those are wasted moments that do absolutely no good. It is like a rocking chair. It gives you something to do but doesn't get you anywhere. Nobody wants to worry but how do we keep from it?
The world would tell you any number of ways to keep from worrying. There are libraries full of books that give all kinds of advice and some it might help. You can prioritize your worries. If it’s low on the list you don’t worry about that at all. You can make a list and worry about it all at one time instead of spreading it out. Maybe that will help some people.
You can even hire somebody else to worry for you. I had a friend over to my house last week that I hadn’t seen in a while. I asked how he was doing and he said he was doing real well. He had just lost his job and his credit cards were all maxed out. He couldn’t pay his car payment and his tags were out but he said he was fine.
I asked him how he kept from worrying about it and he said he paid some other guy to worry for him. I said, “Really? How much does that cost?” He said, “$50,000.” “$50,000??? How can you afford that?” He said, “I don’t know. That’s his worry.”
So, there’s that method. But did you know that for all the books and all the self-help gurus that say they can help you not worry, there is one Guru that has a fool-proof method for quitting worrying and He sums it all up in one sentence? If you haven’t already, turn to Matthew chapter 6, verses 24-35.
We are continuing our look through the Sermon on the Mount. Because we are disciples of Jesus, we are hoping to do what disciples do and learn from Jesus and then teach and encourage others with what we learn and there is no better place to learn from Jesus than sitting here on the side of this hill overlooking the Sea of Galilee and hearing the greatest sermon ever preached right here in Matthew 6:25-34.
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothes? 26 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? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? 28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”
How many times have you had somebody tell you, “Don’t worry about it.”? I know they mean well. I’m sure I have said the same thing but if that is all they have to say then it’s not really all that helpful, is it? It’s not like you needed to know that. “Oh! Don’t worry about it. Ok, thanks!” No, what I need is somebody to not only motivate me to not worry but give me an alternative to it.
Here’s Jesus doing just that. If Jesus had just stopped at the first sentence, it wouldn’t be much help would it? “Don’t worry about your life.” Oh, thanks. It’s like that song that was popular a few years ago. “Don’t worry. Be happy!” Ugh! I was worried I was going to hear it again.
But here Jesus tells us more than just don’t do it. He tells us where not to worry, why not to worry and how not to worry. Adrian Rogers said that this passage tells us we shouldn’t worry about these things: finance, food, fitness, fashion, or the future. J That’s where not to worry.
Jesus said not to worry about anything. I started out by asking you if you believed in God and that He was the Creator and Sustainer. Jesus is saying here that, yes, He is the Creator and Sustainer and that if He takes care of the most insignificant details of this planet, how much more will He not care for you?
Troy Pittman told me the story the other day about watching some birds build a nest in his front yard. If you know Troy, you know this story took two hours to tell but don’t worry (don’t worry!). I can tell it much quicker. He said he would go outside every morning and drink his coffee and over the course of about a month he would watch these two birds build their nest. They worked and worked, making it just right. Then they went in their nest. Troy said that for a while he only saw one bird and he thought maybe something was wrong with the other one. But pretty soon, the other came out followed by a little bitty baby bird. Then he watched as that baby got bigger and bigger until it finally flew away on its own.
That’s a scene that I’m sure is repeated thousands of times a day all over the world and we don’t think much about it but it just proves the Creator’s love for His created. He provided everything those birds needed. He provided the instinct, the ability, the energy, the sticks to use, the food to eat, everything. It all came from God. If I provided everything one bird needed for a month, I would never quit talking about it. But God does that and so much more for us.
Jesus said in verse 26, “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?” Then He says in verse 28 to look at the lilies. Have you ever seen anything so beautiful as a lily? It’s a beautiful flower but the closer you look, the prettier it is.
I’m sure Solomon was a good-looking fellow and his clothes were the finest and best and most beautiful but they didn’t compare to the natural beauty of this common little flower. But that was Solomon, not you, right? You have to worry at least a little bit about what you are going to wear and what you are going to eat and how you are going to pay for all of that because you’re not the richest man in the world like Solomon.
It’s different for you. It’s understandable that you worry. Your job, your family, your car are all problems that aren’t going away. But did you know that while you are correct, those problems may be with you forever, that God wants to tell you why you shouldn’t worry about them? He says it is offensive to Him when you worry. Look at the end of verse 30. “O you of little faith.”
God says it is a lack of faith that brings worry and Hebrews 11:6 says that without faith it is impossible to please God. During an especially trying time in the work of the China Inland Mission, Hudson Taylor wrote to his wife, "We have twenty-five cents--and all the promises of God!” W. Wiersbe, Wycliffe Handbook of Preaching & Preachers, p. 242.
I love quotes like that. Don’t you? We all want that kind of thing to be said about us, don’t we? I want that kind of faith. I like to say I have it but when it comes down to it and I have twenty-five cents and a mound of debt and my car is broken down and the baby is hungry and needs diapers and the dog is getting skinny, the wife is getting mad and I’m making minimum wage, what keeps me from having that faith that I need?
Oh, I know God took care of Solomon. I know He loved Solomon. But does He love me that much? Does God love me enough to provide for me and protect me and give me what I need? Have you ever had those questions? Oh, we would never admit to that especially here in church. But somewhere deep down all of us have had that thought at least in the back of our minds. I’m a horrible sinner. God doesn’t love me enough to provide for me. What am I going to do?
I know you know the verse. You probably memorized when you were a kid. But I want you to turn to John 3:16. This simple little verse is so powerful and speaks directly to that thought that all of us have sometimes that we are too bad and God surely doesn’t love us enough. Turn there and read with me what it says. That first phrase is “For God so loved the world…” Now if you write in your Bibles, I want you to put your name in there somewhere so that you know it says, “For God so loved…Carol. For God so loved…Samuel. For God so loved…you that He gave His only Son so that you would not perish but that you would have eternal life with Him.”
God loves you enough that He gave the very crown jewel of Heaven to die on the cross so that with your faith and trust in Him that you could have a relationship with the Creator of the universe. He loves you terribly and passionately and created you to have fellowship with Him. I don’t understand all that but I believe the Bible and so when God says He will clothe you and feed you and protect you even more than He does the birds and the flowers, then I have to believe that.
So, we know where not to worry – in our finance, food, fitness, fashion, or the future. We see why not to worry – it is offensive to God who loves us. Now for the really important part. Let’s see in verse 33 how we keep from worrying. What is the alternative? We don’t want to worry. We know we shouldn’t. But how do we keep from it?
Look at verse 33. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well. What does it mean to seek His kingdom and His righteousness? There are a hundred different sermons you could preach on this one little verse but let’s see first what His Kingdom is. Is it Heaven or is it something else? Where is it? How can we seek it and find it? That is basically the question the Pharisees were asking Jesus in Luke 17:21. Jesus said:
“The coming of the kingdom of God is not something that can be observed, 21 nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is within you.” When He says to seek His Kingdom, He’s not talking about Heaven in this instance. He is saying that the Kingdom…is where the King is…inside of you. When you seek to make Jesus King of your life, that is to seek His Kingdom.
When you submit to His will for your life, that is seeking His Kingdom. When you acknowledge your sin, confess and repent of that sin and agree with Him that it was wrong – that is seeking His Kingdom. Not worrying about where the money is going to come from but trusting Him – that is seeking His Kingdom. Using what money you have to store up treasure in Heaven for later – that is seeking His Kingdom now.
Then you combine that with seeking His righteousness. What does that mean? Well, there are two kinds of righteousness that we can have – 3 if you include self-righteousness but we are not told to go after that. The two good kinds are imputed and imparted. Let’s look at imputed righteousness first. When a person puts his faith in Jesus Christ, we are given a status of being righteous. This righteousness is God’s gift to us based on what Christ did for us on the cross. Without that we can’t have the kind of righteousness that we are really told to seek in verse 33. That is imparted righteousness.
Imparted righteousness is when the character of God Himself comes out of us. Because we have faith in Jesus we have imputed righteousness and then the imparted righteousness flows out of us. If you can’t remember that (and who can?) just remember that to seek first His righteousness is to seek after, run after, hunt down, want nothing more than to act like Jesus in every aspect of our lives.
It is, in fact, when we allow the character of God to become, to replace, our character. It is allowing or not being a hindrance to the love of Christ, the purity, the faith, the very nature of Jesus Himself being seen in us. Jesus lives inside of us and He wants everyone to know it. He wants to come out and be seen and heard to everyone we meet and when we allow Him to do that we are seeking first His righteousness.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon was a powerful Baptist preacher in the late 1800’s. Blackmailers once sent him a letter saying that if he did not place a certain amount of money at a certain place at a certain time then they would publish some things in the newspaper that would defame and embarrass him, ruining his ministry. Spurgeon left a note at the certain place that said, “You and your like are requested to publish all you know about me across the heavens.” He had the righteousness of God because He was seeking it first in his life.
Seeking God’s Kingdom and His righteousness is rarely easy. The world has a different plan for your life. Satan has a different plan for your life. The benefit of it though is two-pronged. Not only are you not wasting time and effort worrying about your situation and whether you are going to have what you want and need, but also, Jesus says at the end of verse 33 that all these things will be given to you as well. That’s a pretty good bargain, I think. In other words, ask great things, and little things shall be added unto you; ask heavenly things, and earthly things shall be added unto you. (Adam Clark’s Commentary on the Bible)
So, when you need to be sleeping and Satan brings those things to your mind to worry about; when the bills are bigger than the bank account and the pantry is bare and the job isn’t cutting it, think of it like my friend who hired a guy to worry for him.
Consider God your guy that is concerned about all that. Turn it over to Him. He’s gonna be up all night anyway. You do your part. You be obedient and you seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness and then you just go to sleep, knowing that He loves you more than all of the rest of His creation. There is nothing to worry about when we do that.
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