TEXT: MATTHEW 6: 25-26: Therefore I say unto you, “Take no thought
for your life, what you shall eat, or what you shall drink; or yet for your
body, what you shall put on”. “Is it not
the life more than meat and the body than raiment”?
Vs 33: “But seek ye first the kingdom
of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you”.
Medical doctors estimate that more than twenty five percent of their
patients are what they have called "worried well". Doctors spend a lot of time examining folks
who are not sick. They are only worried.
Worry is the diet of the day. We're plagued by the "what if" syndrome. What
if my car doesn’t start in the morning?
What if, I get laid of my
job? People are worrying about a whole
lot of what ifs.
If we have a good job we worry that we’ll lose it. If we have good health
we worry that we won’t have it long. If our children left the house, we worry
if they’re coming back. Many times we take worry to bed with us we get up with
it, and carry it with us through the day. Jesus doesn't want us to worry.
In our text, HE speaks to us where we live and give illustrations that worry is unnecessary,
unproductive, and outside of God's natural design of mankind.
Prior this teaching, He had told the people not to let money be their
master and they couldn't serve two masters. They would either, hate the one and
love the other. He knew the reason a lot of people let money be their master is
because they were worried about tomorrow. The average person thinks if they had
a large income it would solve their problem, not so. Here Jesus gives them a
better way to handle the problem of worry.
Jesus begins by defining worry in Matthew
6:25, "Therefore, I say unto you, take no thought" meaning,
having a distracting care. The
same word is used in Philippians 4:6
"Be
anxious for nothing". So, worry
is a distracting care resulting from assuming
a responsibility that's not yours and failure to recognize God is bigger than
any problem you might have.
Jesus is not saying, "Don't be concerned about your health, but don't
let it become a distracting care that
it is all you can think about”. That's MY responsibility (God’s
responsibility). He's not saying, don't be concerned about your finances, but
don't let it become a distracting care
that money is all that consumes you. That's MY responsibility. Then Jesus gives a command, "Therefore,
take no thought". In other words, if you're not worrying, don't
start. If you are, stop it right now. Worry is a sin, disobedience to a
God-given command. It's just as much a sin as stealing because God says "thou
shalt not steal".
Often times, we try to justify worrying. Can you believe some folks think worrying
helps. One man defended his worrying by saying, "I find it helps to worry
because the people who worry never get ulcers". One person
responded, “No, they just give them, (worries) to everybody else”. It has
been said that it's not what you eat that cause ulcers but it's what's
eating you that cause ulcers.
Stop worrying because the Bible is clear, worry is a sin.
Two principles relating to worry in Matthew 6:
First: "Don't worry about your life, food,
drink, and clothing”. We tend to get overwhelmed with small things. A study was done by a panel of Psychologists
that revealed forty percent of worries are about things that never happened,
thirty percent are about things in our past, and twenty two percent are about
petty things. For every person worrying about the end of the world, there are a
thousand more worrying about the end of the month. We allow worry over small
things get the best of us. Life is more than food, water, and clothing
important as they are. It's the air we breathe, the ground we walk on. If God
takes care of these things, He will also take care of what you're worrying
about.
Example: In the Old Testament, Moses
led three million Israelites out of Egypt. Can you imagine the amount of food
and water needed for a group that size? There was not one report about anyone
starving. They had to cross the Red Sea in one night, but God provided a
passage way big enough for thousands to cross through at once. At the end of
the day they needed rest and God provided space for them in the wilderness.
Don’t be dismayed, God will take care of HIS Children.
Secondly: Then, Jesus points to
nature.
- (1st): Matthew 6:26: Behold the fowls of the air, for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feed them. Are you not more valuable than they?Birds or fowls are not Farmers. Have you ever seen fowls sowing seeds or harvesting crops? Have you ever seen them handling a John Deere tractor, shovels, or hoes? No way. Yet, your heavenly Father feed them. Problem is, many of us don't see ourselves as valuable to God, but if He takes care of HIS creation and HIS relationship to them is Creator to creation, surely, HE will take care of HIS children.
- (2nd): Matthew 6:27: Which of you by worrying can add one cubit (18") to his statue (life span)? Job 14:5 says, "Before we were born God established length of our days”.Why are you worrying because you can't change it even by the equivalent of “eighteen inches”. So what good would worrying about it do you anyway? God still takes care of HIS creation and HE will take care of HIS children.
- Matthew 6:28: Now, look down: “Why take you thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin”.
- Vs 29: “And yet I say to you even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these”.The word "lily" is from the family of Gladioli and Iris species. They would grow among grain, but would tower above it. A field of them displaying all shades of pinkish purple to a deep blue, yet the Bible says Solomon didn’t have as much glory as the lilies of the field. Solomon was the most magnificent dressed king Israel ever had and his attendants wore purple robes, and gold dust glittered hair. Yet, those flowers were here today and gone tomorrow because they were used to bake bread. God's relationship to them was that of Creator to creation.You are more than HIS creation. You are GOD’S children, HIS Body, HIS mouth piece. Surely, He will take care of you. Jesus teaches clearly there's no need to worry about anything on the basis of the principles laid out.When you worry about food, water and clothing, those are all the things the gentiles seek. Gentiles are unbelievers or people who only ask God for material things for two reasons. They're consumed with material things and they have no relationship with God. Guess what! They have every reason to be worried because God promises them nothing.That's why we have to present the gospel to people. God has all the details and knowledge of our needs. He knows how much a gallon of gas costs. He knows how much groceries will be next week. He knows what our future is and He knows how much money you have in the bank. He knows if you have no money at all. He knows just who to send your way with enough money to meet your very need. Why? That's HIS responsibility.God is Jireh-our- Provider and He takes care of His own. Therefore, you or we ought to live above the level of a non-believer. God expects them to worry, but He doesn't expect you or us (believers) to. If you profess to know Christ, you can live a different life than those who don't. As believers, followers of Christ we need only concern ourselves with our Father's business and He'll concern Himself with ours.What is HIS business? It’s the KINGDOM. HE personally delivered it to us.
- Luke 17:20-21: The Kingdom of God comes not with observation: neither shall they say, “Lo here” or, low there”: for behold, the kingdom of God is within you.
- Colossians 1:13 For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought (or translated) us into the kingdom of (His dear Son), the Son he loves.So our business is to recognize it, believe it, and live in it.Many think of the Kingdom of God as something abstract, but your Bible reveals that it is a genuine world-ruling government, led by Jesus Christ, in which today's Christians are subject to HIS rule.How important is the Kingdom? Our very life depends upon it because it is through the Kingdom and HIS righteousness that we are able to avoid worry and anxiety.What is the Kingdom to you? I was taught at a young age that it’s a place one goes to after death (where you go to be with God in heaven). This heaven, according to religious teaching, is a location beyond the blue sky. Heaven is from the Hebrew word shamayim, meaning lofty (height; skyscraping; place where the clouds move; as well as the higher ethers where the celestial bodies revolve). It's also from the Greek word Ouranos, meaning elevation; happiness; power; eternity.I was led to believe that heaven is where we would meet our love ones gone on before us and there were streets paved with gold. The place where there’s no more crying, no more pain. There I can put on my long white robe and shout all over God’s heaven. That’s what I was led to believe. But in March of 2004, I was beckoned, summons, or issued a subpoena by the SPIRIT OF GOD to enter HIS Kingdom. He later whispered to my heart the word “Kingdom” repetitively. I became curious and began to investigate, to probe, to examine, to study the Word thoroughly seeking its meaning. It brought me to a new level of thinking, a spiritual awakening, a recovery from spiritual blindness. In other words, I was seeing things naturally when I needed to see spiritually. I would like to share some of my findings.
- In Luke 17:20-21, the Pharisees asked Jesus when God’s Kingdom would come, not knowing that it had already arrived. He was standing in their midst talking to them. They were looking at HIM with their natural eyes, but couldn’t see (discern-see spiritually) the Kingdom (Jesus Himself).
-
Why? Because the Kingdom of God is not like an earthly Kingdom with geographical boundaries, instead, it begins with the work of God’s Spirit in people’s lives and relationships.Still today we must resist looking to institutions or programs for evidence of the progress of God’s Kingdom. Instead, we should look for what God is doing in people’s hearts because the Kingdom of God is within you. It’s a spiritual reality, “They that worship God must worship HIM in Spirit and in Truth, John 4:24. The Truth is the kingdom of God is right here in our midst so we need not look for it anywhere locally. It’s an inside power of God working in His people.Had it been a city of golden streets, in the skies, Jesus could have easily located it. He didn’t do so. He didn’t speak of it as situated anywhere particular, nor did He say it could be obtained quickly. Matter of fact, Jesus gave illustration again and again to show it was a desirable condition brought about among men through power of the Spirit.Understand the word kingdom is made up of two words king and dom/dominion. The Creator’s first declaration of man’s purpose for creation is hidden in this word dominion.The Hebrew definition is (mamlakah’) and the Greek word is (basileia) both meaning “to rule”, “sovereignty” “to reign” “to master, “power”, “to be king”.
- Luke 17:21: The kingdom of God is within you.
- Romans 14:17: The kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.
- 1Corinthians 4:20: The kingdom of God is not in word, but in power.Kingdom is the realm over which the king rules with complete sovereignty including the seen and unseen. God is the King of both the invisible and the visible realms and the physical universe. Man (male & female) was created with a dominion mandate over earth, giving him responsibility for representing the kingdom government of God on earth. And that same dominion mandate is given to us the Church.
- Genesis 1:26: Let “US” make man in our image and after our likeness: and let them (male/female) have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth”. “Hallelujah”.
- Exodus 19:6: And you shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.
- Revelation 1:6: And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father.
- Revelation 5:10: And hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on (over) the earth.We are not here to do our own thing. We embody the nature of God on earth and serve as His divine representatives in this world right here. We’ve been summoned to “Go into all the world and teach all men/make disciples”, Matthew 28:19.Understand the creation and commissioning of man was the first introduction and establishment of the Kingdom of heaven on earth!Now, can you better see that the kingdom is not out beyond the blue? It’s right here in you and all around you waiting for you to open your interior eye (single eye, one eye, spiritual eye), not your two natural eyes, but that single eye, Matthew 6:22 talks about: “The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light”.When that eye is single your body will be full of light. That light is not the light of the sun or the moon, but the light of the Father. That single eye, inner consciousness, when taken over by the Father you are one with Him, meaning you’re seeing things the way He see them (one way). “Praise to our God”.Basically, Jesus has given us the principles for worry and anxiety. First, don’t spend our time worrying about food, water, and clothing. That’s His responsibility. Secondly, God takes care of His creation and He surely will take care of His children because that’s His responsibility, not ours.Our responsibility is to seek first the “Kingdom of God”, which is His rule over our lives, and His righteousness, which is His character worked out in us in a way that we reflect Him. When we make this our top priority, to acknowledge Him as Lord and Savior, walking obedient to His ways, God promise to supply all the things we will need. I encourage you to leave worrying, frustration, and anxiety to God. That’s His responsibility. AMEN.Evangelist Brenda Hansley