TEXT: MATTHEW
6:25-33
Vs 25: Therefore, I say unto you, “Take no thought for your life
what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor yet for your body what you
shall put on. Is not the life more than
meat and the body than raiment”?
Matthew portrays Jesus as our “KING”. In these verses He’s talking about “anxiety
and the kingdom”.
Anxiety according to the American Heritage Dictionary is a state or cause of uneasiness; an
apprehension; worry; intense fear resulting from the anticipation of a
threatening event.
But the Word of God tells us in Philippians 4:6: “Be careful for nothing; but in everything
by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known
unto God”.
And with all that’s going on – wars, rumors of wars, hatred, deception, disease, murders, oppression,
poverty, sickness, greed, discrimination, thefts, just to name a few, it
will be very easy to fall into that category of “anxiousness and worrying”,
unless you have the peace of God.
- Matthew 6:26-34: Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? And why take you thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore take no thought, saying, “What shall we eat”? Or, “What shall we drink”? Or, “Wherewithal shall we be clothed”? For after all these things do the Gentiles seek: for your heavenly Father knows that you have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
God always use the natural things to explain what He is
saying in the spiritual. We have to know
Him by the Spirit. We have to come to the
place that we will allow the Holy Ghost to open the revelation of God’s Word
unto us, because without revelation there will be devastation.
- Ephesians 1:17: That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him.
The illustrations in this sixth chapter of Matthew are so explicit, how
can we not understand how important it is that we know Him spiritually.
- St. John 4:24: God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth.
- 1 Corinthians 2:11-14: What man knows the things of a man, save (except) the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God, knows no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world (that which has been orderly arranged and taught for years by the religious systems of men), but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Ghost teaches; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
Jesus already knew how naturally
minded those were He ministered to and how we are at times. Why?
It’s because we are natural
beings, having a spiritual experience,
and would lean mostly to the things natural.
- St. John 1:1: In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
- Vs 2: And the same (we-the Body of Christ) was in the beginning with God.
- Vs 14: And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father), full of grace and truth.
- 1 John 4:17: As he is, so are we, in this world![Jesus was with the Father in the beginning and so were we]!
Look how wisely Jesus is giving this illustration. He first speaks of the natural and ends with the spiritual.
- Matthew 6:25: Therefore I say unto you, “Take no thought for your life, what you shall eat, or what you shall drink”.
What is He saying?
Supplying the physical needs does not solve the whole problem of hunger
for man, for his hungers are as varied as his interests and desires.
- Amos 8:11: Behold, the days come, saith the Lord GOD, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD.
- Matthew 4:4: Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.
The word “life” in this verse (Matthew 6:25) is from the
root word “psuche”, which deals
with man’s soul (emotions). Jesus said, “Take no thought for your life”: Meaning, don’t be anxious about or have a
distracting care about anything, but yield that “life” (psuche’ – “soul”
– or emotional department) to me and allow Me to help you change that which
is irrational (senseless and unreasonable) and mortal (that which
is liable to die but does not have to) into that which is rational (sensible
and sane) and immortal (deathless) so that you can live!!!
- Ezekiel 18:20: The “soul” that sinneth “it” shall die.
Here in this verse, it did not say, “the soul that sins “he” or
“she” shall die, but “it” shall die!
Why? Because the “soul”
is not actually you, it’s part of the “carnal or fleshy” aspect of a person. It’s the part of humanity that is held captive in the bondages of death that causes the decay process which sends man back to the
dust until God "breathes His breath of life" into him. But the real person that you are
is “spirit”
which never dies!
- Matthew 10:28: (Jesus said) “Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell”.
This destruction of the “soul and body” in hell,
is not down in the center of the earth, but this “hell” is “hades”, which is the “fire
that is unseen”. Hebrews 12:29 “Our
God is a consuming fire”! If we
love and obey God in what He tells us to do, this “fire” which He is will
burn in us for purification to
bring us into the place that God Himself is in, but if we disobey Him that same
“fire”
will burn in us and consume us.
- Romans 8:1: There is therefore no condemnation to them that walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit!
For those of us that “walk after the spirit”, God will
take the “spirit, soul, and body” and make them one like He Himself is one. We become “one”
with Him!
That was Paul’s prayer for the saints and us as well in 1 Thessalonians 5:23: And
the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit,
and soul, and body be preserved blameless (faultless) unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Paul did not say here “until the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ”, but “unto” the “coming” of our Lord Jesus
Christ.
“UNTO” denoting the point reached or entered
“of place” (being in Christ),
“time” (right now), and “purpose” (we are God’s
representatives in the earth made in His image after His likeness)! The word “coming” means His “appearing”,
or “being present”, or "manifested" and seen in us His Body!
- Colossians 3:4: When Christ (the Anointed One - His anointing), who is our life, shall appear, then shall you also appear with him in glory (in "light"; His excellence of character right here and right now, not out beyond the blue).
- Romans 12:5: So we being many are one body in CHRIST, and every one members one of another.
- 1 Corinthians 12:12: As the body is one, and hath many members and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is CHRIST!
- Ephesians 5:30: We are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones!
- Colossians 1:18: He is the “head” of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence.
John 10:10: The thief
cometh not but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that
they might have it more abundantly.
This “life” is Zoe life, which
is “eternal and everlasting” life.
But there are other areas as well as the “soul” that man has to
overcome and that is his heart (innermost being which may at times lean toward evil); mind
(thought processes that are
irrational); body (which is sometimes
yielded toward selfish desires).
- Romans 6:13: Neither yield ye your members (heart; soul; mind; body) as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.
Therefore, man’s hungers include his thoughts and feelings as well as
his physical needs.
Did Jesus not say in Matthew 4:4: Man
shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth
of God? He also said in St. John 6:57: As
the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eats me, even he shall live by
me.
So you see He was referring to the appropriation of spiritual substance
by man, and not to his eating of material
food.
- Romans 8:6: To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.
We will understand it as we read further. Matthew
6:25: Nor yet for your body, what you shall put on. Naturally we are concerned about the physical
clothing for this body. Everything has
to be matching from head to toe, when
God wants to clothe us in His “robe of righteousness”!
- Isaiah 61:3: To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified:
- Vs 10: I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
- 2 Corinthians 5:21: For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
- Revelation 19:8: And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.
That’s why the Word of God says to
render
your heart and not your garments Joel 2:13.
God wants us to get to the place
in Him that we totally trust that He is Jehovah-Jireh,
our Provider!!!
But how often do we find ourselves
worrying about debts, bills due, what we’re going to eat, how will I do this,
how will I be able to do that! Well, at
the end of the day, do not things work out one way or the other? Because while we are trying to figure it out,
God has already worked it out! When we
finally come to ourselves, we say, “Oh my God, I was worrying needlessly”!
- 1 Peter 5:7: Casting all your care upon him; for he cares for you.
The songwriter says, “What
a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and grieves to bear; what a privilege
to carry everything to God in prayer. Oh
what peace we often forfeit; oh what needless pain we bear; all because we do
not carry everything to God in prayer”!
God is concerned about every
little thing concerning you and me. He’s
concerned about our soul, mind, spirit, and body!
Like any loving parent, He will not do anything to harm us:
- Matthew 7:11: If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?
But He wants to grow us and mature
us from “servant, to friend, to
son-ship, to priests and kings, and GOD-SHIP authority in Him through Jesus the
Christ and the power of the Holy Ghost!!
- John 15:15: Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knows not what his lord does: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you.
- Galatians 4:7: Wherefore thou art no more a servant but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.
- Revelation 1:6: And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father. (Revelation 5:10).
- St. John 10:34: Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your law, I said, you are gods”? 1 John 4:17: As he is, so are we, in this world!
Jesus was God in flesh form:
- St. John 1:1: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God: Vs 14: And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us:so are we: (St. John 1:2): And the same was in the beginning with God.
The word “same” is defined in
relation to personal pronouns
as: he,
she, them, in reference to people! And when God was ready for “a
son” (male & female) to
be born, He sent us forth too at the appointed time.
- St. John 1:12-13: But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God!
- Ephesians 5:30: We are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones!!!
And because God has brought us into this place in Him, we
can now usher others into the kingdom of God or into the revelation that the
kingdom is in them:
- Luke 17:20-21: And when he was demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should come, he answered them and said, “The kingdom of God comes not with observation: Neither shall they say, Lo here: or, lo there: for behold, the kingdom of God is within you”!
- Romans 17:17: For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.
- 1 Corinthians 4:20: For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power.
I believe we can and will come to the place in God where we
won’t even wonder about food, clothing, or shelter because it all falls under
the umbrella of the “kingdom of God”! As we take care of God’s “business”, He will
surely take care of ours.
Let’s look again at the word “life” in Matthew 6:25. In the Greek it is “psuche”, as mentioned
earlier. It means breath, the inner
life flow that pulsates through the whole being or the total of
man.
Acts 20:10
[speaks of Eutychus – the man that slept
while Paul preached, he fell out of the window and died]: And Paul went down, and fell on him, and
embracing him said, “Trouble not yourselves; for his life (psuche) is in him). Paul was saying, that the resurrection life (zoe)
that was in Paul resurrected the man and restored his psuche’ (soul) back into him.
This "Zoe" symbolizes “inspiration”. When one is "inspired" he or she is stimulated or impelled to some creative effort motivated by the divine influence of God Himself in one's thought processes on a higher level in relation to spiritual things or the things of God! This is the same “breath” that the LORD
God breathed
into man in Genesis 2:7
and made him (male and female) “a living soul”! The same breath that was breathed in the valley of
dry bones as Ezekiel prophesied in Ezekiel
37! This is the same “breath”
that came from heaven as the sound of
a mighty rushing wind and
filled all the house and those in the house with the Holy Ghost and fire, in Acts 2:1-4. This is the same “breath” Jesus “breathed”
into the disciples in John 20.
- John 20:22: And when he (Jesus) had said this, he breathed on them, and said unto them “Receive ye the Holy Ghost”!Here, Jesus was breathing the very “blood of God” into them. This was Jesus making the “blood deposit on the mercy seat” or the “blood of sprinkling” as mentioned in Hebrews 12:24: And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the “blood of sprinkling” that speaks better things than that of Abel.[Abel’s blood cried for “revenge” but Jesus’ blood said, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do”]!
Remember earlier in John 20:17: Jesus said to Mary, “Touch me
not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father”.
[Leviticus 16] (speaks of the “day of atonement”):
(when the high priest went into the
most holy place to make the blood deposit on the mercy seat):
- [Vs 17]: And there shall be no man in the tabernacle of the congregation when he goes in to make an atonement in the holy place, until he come out, and have made an atonement for himself, and for his household, and for all the congregation of Israel.[That’s why Mary couldn’t touch Jesus]. But from the time He said that to her, and He appeared to the disciples and Thomas was with them:
- John 20:27: Then said he to Thomas, “Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing”!Thomas could touch Him then, because He had made the “blood deposit” in vs 22!And Jesus certainly didn’t have to sail off beyond the clouds to make that blood deposit to the Father or on the mercy seat. He breathed it into those disciples when He said “Receive ye the Holy Ghost”! And all that was at Pentecost in that upper room received it and those that received Peter’s message received the very “blood of God” into themselves. When we received the Holy Ghost, we received the very “blood of God”! No one poured a bucket of blood on us when we received it because it was deposited in us by the Spirit of the Living God!
In Genesis 1:26-27
when God made man (male & female) and created them in
His own image after His likeness, He created them with His own “blood”
in them! The word “man” here is from the
root word Adam or aw-dawm’, that
means “to show blood in the face”.
- Leviticus 17:11 states, “The life of the flesh is in the “blood”.The word “blood” is from the Hebrew word “dam”, pronounced “dawm”! So when God created man and made him (male and female) into His own image and after His likeness, all He had to do was add the “A” to “Dam” and “man” (male and female) became “Adam , pronounced “Awdawm”, the people that had God’s blood in them!
- 1 John 5:7-8: There are three that bear record in heaven (not out beyond the blue, but in the higher realms of spiritual elevation right here), the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one. There are three that bear witness in earth (not the dirt, but our body), the
Spirit, and the water (Word), and the blood: and these three agree in one.
God is saying to us, “Take up your cross and follow me” (Mark
8:34). I know you have need of all these
things (Matthew 6:32), that’s why we must realize that all we need is
contained in the Kingdom of God and that Kingdom is already in us and
Jesus have given us the power and authority to rule and reign in and over the
earth!
- Revelation 5:10: And hast made us unto our God kings and priest: and we shall reign on (over) the earth. [That’s right here and right now]!
So “FYI” (for your information),
we’ve come to the realization that man shall not live by bread alone, but by every
word that proceeds out of the mouth of God: Matthew 4:4!!!
So don’t be uneasy or
anxious about anything, but cast all your
care on Him, because He cares for you (1 Peter 5:7)!
Evangelist Mary Perry