"christ's Answer For Anxiety"

Title: “Christ’s Answer for Anxiety” Scripture: Mt. 6:25-34

Type: Expository Where: GNBC 1-24-22

Intro: The dictionary defines “anxiety” as: “a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome.” The ADAA (Anxiety and Depression Assoc. of America) tells us that anxiety related disorders are the most common mental health issues affecting 40 million Americans annually. This is nearly 20% of the population. A full 25% of American teenagers (13-18yrs) suffer from anxiety disorders manifesting in panic & social disorders, stress, specific phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorders, and generalized anxiety disorders. This, coupled with the past two years of social isolation in schools and society at large, and a constant fixation on individual and community health, as well as the cultural upheaval we have been experiencing has resulted in a skyrocketing increase in cases of anxiety, and the all to often shattering consequences of those take drastic measures to medicate or alleviate their sufferings. Friends, may I tell you that Jesus Christ taught on this tumultuous topic two millennia ago. Christ has the answers that we need today. Will you listen to what He has to say?

Prop: Ex. Mt. 6:25-34 we’ll see 4 Lessons Christ Teaches on Anxiety.

BG: 1. This portion of Christ’s teaching comes out of what’s called “The Sermon on the Mount” (Chapt.5-7), which was a one succinct sermon Christ preached. One of most revolutionary messages ever.

2. Just as applicable today as was 2k years ago. 3.

Prop: Let’s ex. Mt. 6:25-34 to learn 4 Lessons Christ Teaches on Anxiety.

I. 1st Lesson: Life Offers Endless Opportunities for Anxiety. Vv.25-26

A. Life Affords us Endless Opportunities for Anxiety.

1. Life in today’s world offers plenty of opportunity for anxiety: Pandemic in 2nd year, Governmental incompetence, Supply chain shortages, increasing limitations on personal freedoms, seniors worrying as inflation hits 40 year high, China cracking down, Russia appears to be ready to invade Ukraine…

2. Illust: Read selected lyrics “State of Confusion” by the Kinks. Although this song came out my senior year of HS, it’s easily applicable today, nearly 40 yrs. later. We live in a world where there’s a whirl of activities and endless opportunities for anxiety. Presently many are fearing “Omnicorn” the newest variant of Covid, expressly targeting those in Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas. 😊

B. Christ Highlights the Need for Faith When Considering the Necessities of Life.

1. In these verse Christ highlights the basic necessities of life. (Read verses) You see, in 1st century Palestine not a lot of people were stressed about their 401k’s performance, nor their children’s college placement exams, nor their profiles on social media, nor much else of what consumes the modern Western individual’s daily agenda. Christ was addressing the basics of life: food and drink, clothing and all other necessities.

a. Illust: Even in our land of prosperity and affluence we worry intensely about these items today. “Food and Drink, Clothing, Necessities”. Barely are we done with one meal and we are questioning what we will have at the next. Now, think of how much more pressing this would have been in the 1st century with famines, foul water, shortages, and all sorts of uncertainty.

b. What does Christ do in Response? He points His disciples to God’s care of birds. (Read). Illust: I’ve never seen a bald eagle on a John Deere tilling the ground. I’ve never seen a flock of sparrows planting seeds in a field for future harvesting. Yet, they are taken care of by Whom? Jesus says “our Heavenly Father”. (Don’t lose sight of that point. We will come back to it in a bit.

2. What is Christ’s response to having undue concern even for the necessities of life? “be not anxious”, literally “take no thought”

a. Now, I am convinced that Jesus’ pronouncement here was not forbidding making financial plans for our families, it wasn’t outlawing life insurance, but He was saying that when we develop anxiety and an undo attention to these matters in our lives we are becoming distracted and ultimately denying the vitality of our faith in God. We are not to be distracted. At Christ’s time the distraction was from privation, today, ours is from excess!

b. Illust: A few years ago, students at a large university developed a clever way of distracting opposing players during free throws. They placed a “curtain of distraction” in the bleachers behind the basket. Just prior to the opposition’s free throw attempts, the students open the curtain to things like dancing unicorns or a lion wearing a tutu! Once Michael Phelps appeared wearing his gold medals, while pretending to swim! The player missed both free throws!

C. Applic: 1st Lesson we learn is that life in general will afford each of us a multitude of distraction that will cause us anxiety with the intention of making us lose our focus of faith in living for Christ in a fallen world.