Title: Don’t Worry, Be Sustained
Text: Matthew 6:24-34
Thesis: We make Christ known when our faith comes to life in our experiences and we learn to trust God in and for all things. (We make Christ known by the way we respond to our adversities…)
Epiphany Series: Encountering Christ in Epiphany
• On the Eighth Sunday after Epiphany Jesus teaches his followers that one of the ways we make him known is by seeking Him and His Kingdom and by demonstrating trust in His ability to meet all our needs.
Faith does not fall from the sky. It comes to life in our experiences as we learn to trust God for all things.
Introduction
Statistically, one of the things we worry about most is our health.
A man was running down the hall of the hospital just before his operation. A security guard stopped him before he could leave the hospital and asked, “What’s the matter?” The man said, “The nurse said, ‘It’s a very simple operation, don’t worry, I’m sure it will be all right.’”
“She was just trying to comfort you,” said the security guard. “What’s so frightening about that?”
“She wasn’t talking to me,” exclaimed the man. “She was talking to my surgeon!”
Of course, if not the greatest worry, right up there at the top of things we worry about is money. Alan Alda, who is known for making amusing quips said, “It isn’t necessary to be rich and famous to be happy. It is only necessary to be rich.”
Whether it is matters of health or money, we often have reason to be concerned about things but when we obsess over our concerns and live in an anxious state we probably are not finding our security in God.
I. When we worry we have chosen to serve the wrong master.
“No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Material things.” Matthew 6:24
You may be wondering how I managed to weave the subject of worry into a text that makes no mention of it. However, note the first word of the verse that follows. Jesus begins his next thought saying, “Therefore, I tell you do not worry about your life…”
What happens in our hearts and minds in verse 25 directly impacts how we deal with life in verse 26.
A thoughtful look into verse 24 suggests we hear Jesus speaking in much stronger language than appears in the text.
A. When Jesus spoke of serving the intent is that we understand that to serve is to essentially be a slave to a master.
B. When Jesus spoke of the impossibility of serving or being a slave to two masters the understanding was that a master is not just a boss. A master is an owner.
In the culture into which Jesus spoke a slave was not a person. A slave was a thing. A slave was essentially a tool. And as a tool at the disposal of its owner, a slave had no time. We may think we work like slaves for merciless masters but in our culture we may be tools in the hands of our masters but when the 5 o’clock whistle blows it is happy hour for us and we can go and do whatever we want with the remaining 16 hours of our day. And on Friday we chant TGIF! TGIF! And we cut loose like young calves in springtime, frolicking and kicking up our heels as we dash off into the weekend.
Jesus says that material things are a powerful influence in our lives. It is easy to rest in the security money and material things provide. Money has the power to make us feel safe. However with that security there is a sense of independence and self-sufficiency. We do not need anyone or even God when we have enough money.
I do not leave much to chance when we travel. I would not think of heading off to Chicago without the means to get there and get home. We leave with some cash, a debit card, a credit card and a AAA card in case we need it. The car is in ship-shape or it doesn’t leave the city limits. We know the location of every Holiday Inn Express and every Hampton Inn along the way and we belong to the Hilton Honors and the Preferred Travelers clubs. I even prepare toll way envelopes before I leave knowing I will need four envelopes with $1.80 in them for the I-88 toll way in Illinois, four envelopes with $.80 for when I get to Chicago and two envelopes with $.30 in each for when I exit the 88 upon arrival and when I enter it on our return.
I am pretty sure that I have the resources I need for every trip but I never leave without pausing and acknowledging our dependence upon God for a safe journey.
Bonnie and I know that God is our Owner and Master. We know that we and all that we have is His. We know that we could lose our wallets or the car could die somewhere on the eastern plains of Colorado or western Nebraska. We know that we are ultimately just dust people and that the best laid plans can suddenly come to naught. We entrust ourselves to God’s hands, to God’s plans and to God’s time.
And so it is in our journey through life. We may do our best to be responsible people and to provide for ourselves and those we love and to anticipate our needs along the way but ultimately in all things, we serve God and we trust God.
The ultimate hope is that should we ever experience the ravages of life that Job experienced, we too could look back over a life in which we have experienced nothing but the goodness and grace of God through thick and thin and say, “Naked I came into the world and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord took away; may the name of the Lord be praised.” Job 1:21
Faith does not just fall from the sky. It comes to life in our experiences as we learn to trust God for all things. And we learn to trust God in life by confronting worry for what it is and finding in its place contentment and trust in a loving God.
When we worry we have a distorted belief system that does not reflect dependence upon an absolutely loving and powerful God.
II. When we worry we underestimate the love of God and overestimate the power of worry.
“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? “Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?” Matthew 6:25-27
A. When we worry we underestimate the love of God, essentially diminishing or taking away the power and love of God, and assigning that power to worry.
B. When we worry we overestimate the power of worry.
When we worry we give power to the process of worrying.
1. 40% of what we worry about never comes to pass.
2. 30% of what we worry about happened in the past and cannot be changed.
3. 10% of what we worry about relates to health… ironically worry actually makes your health worse not better.
4. 8% of what we worry about is legitimate, but even then, worry is powerless to change it.
In 2006 the Mayo Clinic “Proceedings” medical journal reported on a study that tracked 7,000 students from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill who took the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory. Of that group 1,630 students were found to be clearly pessimists and 923 were found to be clearly optimists. The rest fell in the middle between the two extremes. Over the next 40 years 476 of those students died from a range of causes.
When the statistics were collated they found that pessimists had a significantly greater likelihood of dying sooner from any cause than did optimists. The study concluded that the results of that study replicated the results of earlier studies that indicate worrying does not add even an hour to your life and in fact, if you get rid of worry it is likely that you will live longer. (Prediction of All-Cause Mortality by Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory Optimism - Pessimism Scale, http://www.mayoclinicproceedings.com/content/81/12/1541.long)
At the root of pessimism are a shortage of hope and an abundance of worry. When we worry we give it power and it is not the power for good. Worry does not help. Worry hurts.
At the heart of worry is a wavering faith.
III. When we worry we demonstrate a lack of faith in God and appear to be unbelievers.
“If that is how that 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, O you of little faith? So don’t worry saying ‘What shall we eat or drink or wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things” Matthew 6:28-32
Note the examples Jesus cites to illustrate the way a loving God cares for his creation.
A. The birds of the air… they don’t sow or reap or store up their resources in barns. Birds just go out and gather up stuff to make their nests and then they fly around nab unwary earth worms and grubs and find seeds on the ground or suck nectar from flowers or sky-dive for sea food.
B. The flowers of the field… the grasses and flowers of the field just grow and soak up the sunshine. They don’t give a second thought to what they are going to wear on any given day. They just are until they aren’t.
C. The Father in heaven… creates and sustains his creation. Birds and flowers and the like are all examples of God’s sustaining love and care.
The argument Jesus uses is what is called a fortiori argument which follows a logic that suggests a greater or more convincing force or reason. Jesus argues that God takes care of the birds of the air and the flowers of the field, therefore, if God takes care of birds and flowers which are obviously short-lived, how much more likely is it that God will take care of us. After all, he argues, “Are you not much more valuable then birds and flowers?”
Earlier in the Sermon on the Mount Jesus spoke of how those who follow him may distinguish themselves from those who are not his followers. He noted that if you love only people who love you back and if you are friendly only to people are friendly back you are no different than unbelieving pagans. Love for all people is the distinguishing mark of Christ’s followers.
And in our text Jesus argues that being obsessively concerned about the things of this world and living anxiously is the way of the unbelieving pagan culture. The followers of Christ distinguish themselves as Christ followers by their peaceful demeanor and confidence in the care of a loving God.
Once in a while I see a clever ditty on a wall-hanging or plaque. My mother-in-law had a cute one on her kitchen wall in the shape of a bread board that read, “Kissin’ don’t last, good cookin’ do!” This week I read another one that I hope was intended to be taken as “tongue-in-cheek.” It read, “Why Pray When You Can Worry?”
That is the way the unbelieving word thinks… worry first and if all else fails, pray. Only if you have nowhere else to turn, turn to God.
When we worry about our jobs, our health, our kids, our money, our mortgage, our cars, clothes, etc. we are showing that our ultimate hope and security is not in a loving caring Father, but in the things of this world…
Worry need not be the norm for any of us. Jesus see the solution in shifting our focus from the stuff of this life to seeking and serving Him.
IV. When we concentrate on accepting and doing God’s will and living one day at a time, worry will be displaced by contentment and trust.
“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, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” Matthew 6:33-34
So we do not attempt to live in the past or the future but in the present and we do that by:
A. Accepting and doing God’s will
When Jesus invites us to follow him he is asking us to follow him all out. He is asking that we make Him the God of our lives and his will the purpose of our lives. Anything less than that is half-hearted and is reflected by anxious living.
This week I read about a physics professor at the University of Texas who wrote a book about the physics of NASCAR racing. During her research she was given the opportunity to drive a NASCAR race car on the Texas Motor Speedway. With her instructor in a passenger seat she sped around the track at speeds up to 150 m.p.h.. She wrote of how when she shifted into third, she released the clutch and stepped on the gas… the indicator said she was going about 100 m.p.h.. But the car felt like it was chugging. The car was not designed to putter along at 100 m.p.h.. It was designed to flat-out run. It was designed to blister the asphalt. And when she let the horses run the car responded and sped powerfully around the track. The solution to a good ride in a NASCAR race car is to go faster… to give it the gas, to open up the throttle and let ‘er rip. (Diandra Leslie-Pelecky, The Physics of NASCAR, Dutton 2008, Time, 3/3/08, p. 43)
We are not designed to be half-speed followers of Christ. We are not designed to he half-faithed trusters in God. We are designed to follow Christ fully and we are designed to trust God completely. When we do that we will be operating at our maximum capacity for peace and power.
In one of my favorite Calls to Worship I say, “One thing I have asked of the Lord, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life; to behold the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in His temple. And then:
• The Call: Who is it that you seek? And then,
• My Response: I seek the Lord our God. And then,
• The Call: Do you seek Him with all your heart? Do you seek Him with all of your soul? Do you seek Him with all of your mind? Do you seek Him with all of your strength? And finally,
• My Response: Yes Lord, with all of my heart and all of my soul and with all of my mind and with all my strength I seek You.
There is the initial and ongoing commitment to follow after Christ and then there is the commitment to learn to live a life of contentment and trust.
B. Learning contentment and trust
For the third time today I will say, Faith does not just fall from the sky. It comes to life in our experiences as we learn to trust God for all things.
The wisest man who ever lived prayed to God, “Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is my Lord?’ Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God.” Proverbs 30:8-9
The Apostle Paul wrote, “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness in evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:4-7
“But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people eager for money have wondered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.” Timothy 6:6-10
It takes practice and prayer… one thing is certain, when we are worrying, we are not praying!
Conclusion:
Jesus did not speak these words to discourage and defeat his followers. He spoke them to encourage them to live above the circumstances… to find in him a place of powerful faith and personal peace.
Faith does not just fall from the sky. It comes to life in our experiences as we learn to trust God for all things. And we learn to trust God in life by confronting worry for what it is and finding in its place contentment and trust in a loving God.
