Bible Text: Matthew 6:24-34 | Preacher: Pastor Christian Preus
Last year I taught how there’s a difference between worrying and caring. God calls you to care about things deeply, but never to worry. St. Paul says, “Be anxious about nothing, but with prayers and supplications make your requests known to the Lord.” Jesus says, “Do not worry about your body.” But the command is not to not care. The “don’t worry” of the Lord is not the “don’t worry, be happy” of the hippies. It’s instead a call for you to care about big things, and those big things are not what you wear, not your mortgage, not anything that will perish, that moth and rust destroy. It is the true faith. It is knowing God. It is eternal life with Him. And it is people, created in God’s image, who are immortals, who will live forever either in heaven or in hell, whom God loves and so we love. So you care deeply about doctrine, about the truth, which God gives to you in the Bible, and you care deeply about people.
And this is another way to look at Jesus’ command not to worry. The Christian life consists of this: faith in God and love for your neighbor. That’s it. That’s the sum of the Ten Commandments, that’s the Lord’s Prayer, faith in God and love for your neighbor.
When it comes to faith in God, there is no worry. None at all. God, your Creator, the almighty, the holy Trinity, loves you. He has counted the hairs of your head. He knew you in love from eternity. He cares for the birds and he clothes the fields with flowers. He cares much more for you. Our sins will worry us, because we have deserved God’s anger and punishment. We have doubted Him, ignored Him, forgotten to thank Him, loved the things He has given over Him, even though we know He’s the One who gave it all to us. We sin and there is the source of all our worries. But when faith in Christ enters in there is no worry about God. Here is the God who saves, who forgives, who becomes your Brother and lives for you and suffers for you and lays down His life for you and bears all your sin away. Here is the truth that if your sins were on Christ they are not on you, and God declares you righteous, pure, and holy in His sight by faith in His Son. Death may worry you, but Christian faith enters in and there is no room for death, there is only life, because Christ has died and His death has destroyed death, He has risen and His life is your life; you have been baptized into His death and you will share in His resurrection.
If God has so loved you, then there is nothing for you to worry or fill yourself with care about concerning God. There’s nothing you need to do at all. He’s done it. There is nothing that can change what God has already done. He’s already chosen you, created you, died for you, sent His Spirit into your heart. He’s promised Himself to you as your God, your Father, that He will love you as He has loved His own Son from eternity. Trust in Him and you have full access to the God who will never leave you or forsake you and will work everything for your good. There is no worry here.
The only care you have here is to trust in the One who takes all your cares on Himself. To deeply care that you hold to the truth that has set you free. And this will make you willing to sit through a hundred sermons, if only for one minute you hear the Gospel of Christ Jesus and God convinces your soul by His Holy Spirit that you are really pure, really innocent before God, because Christ your Lord has washed you clean in His blood and you have eternal life in Him. That is worth more than churches full of gold; it’s worth more than the world itself.
That’s faith. But when it comes to love, love of your neighbor, love cares for people. It will fill you with care and worry, this love. For the children who need to be fed and clothed, for the wife who is sick, for the friends and family who have rejected the faith or embraced some soul-destroying sin, for the members who aren’t coming to church much or at all because of their love of stuff. And it is your job to care, the divine calling to which God Himself has called you, it’s your job to care for the people in your life.
Jesus is not unrealistic here. He doesn’t say you won’t have worries. It would make no sense for him to say, “Don’t worry,” and he’s saying that to you, to Christians, not to the unbelievers, the entire Sermon on the Mount is preached to Christians, to you who are the light of the world, who are a city set on a hill, the salt of the earth, it would make no sense for your Lord to say “Don’t worry” to you, unless He knew that you do worry. And you do. The question is what the nature of that worry is. We think what causes our worries is stuff, lack of it, loss of job or not having a big enough home or living paycheck to paycheck. We think it’s the stuff that happens to us, that it’s external, that’s why I’m worried. But no, it is all right here, in the heart, that’s the seat and cause of worry.
This is what Jesus says, Don’t worry about tomorrow. For tomorrow will worry about itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Those words are so important, sufficient for the day is its own trouble, because it shows you two things – first, that there will be daily worries, because there will be daily troubles. Second, our translation says trouble, but the word for trouble there is actually “evil,” kakia in Greek. Each day has enough evil is what Jesus says. And this gets to where the actual cause of our worrying is – it’s in our own evil. This is so obviously true. Look at the troubles people get into in this life! Look at the losses they suffer! It’s all because of sin, mostly their own sin. What is the number one reason for divorce, for the breaking up of this beautiful holy union of husband and wife, the greatest loss and crisis of our time, that what God has joined together men presume to separate? Love of money. That’s why Jesus starts this talk about worrying with the statement, “You cannot serve God and money.” He is pointing to the heart, the evil of the human heart, and saying there is where the source of your worry is. It’s not in marriage, not even in money or job, the source is right there in you. The source of your worry is that your heart cares about stuff, not God’s Word and not people. We can keep going. What is the number one reason for abortion, the destruction of life and the loss of a good conscience? Love of money. What is the number one reason for civil turmoil, riot, the loss of peace? Think of the Ephesians in the Book of Acts, when they riot because Paul is preaching the Gospel and people are believing it and have stopped buying their statues. They riot because they’re losing money. So when Jesus says, Each day has enough evil, He is saying both, not simply that you will have troubles and losses, that the kids will be sick, that the bills will have to be paid, that you will lose stuff, but that worry and fretting comes from the evil in our own hearts.
And that is the evil that really needs to be answered. Your problem is not that you don’t have enough money. Your problem is not trouble, if trouble means the loss of stuff. That’s obviously not the great evil in your life. You have a roof over your head and shoes on your feet and clothes on your back and enough to eat, and if you don’t, you could ask and you would receive from God through His people. The great trouble, the great evil in your life is your flesh clinging to stuff as if it were the end and goal of life. It is the sin you daily commit, it’s harsh words spoken between husband and wife, lust, gossip, doubt of God, all of which flows from an inordinate love of stuff. That’s what fills you with worry and anxiety. The great evil you face every day is the lie of the devil that tells you that God is not in control. Because your eyes see loss and destruction everywhere and your sinful heart puts its trust in these things that are passing away.
So seek first the Kingdom of God. That is Jesus’ answer. He doesn’t just say. Don’t worry, that’s bad, that’s sin. He gives the answer to all worry. Seek first God’s reign. See that God is in charge. He rules. Over everything you think is out of control, over the country, your family, your own sin, the devil himself. God is in control of it all. He rules. And He rules over you by giving you His righteousness. That means repentance. Every single day. Confessing sin, doubt, discontent, anger, bitterness, confessing that this, and not lack of money or stuff or health, this is your daily trouble. The husband who gets mad at his wife for burning the bread, doesn’t need his wife to be a better baker, he needs first of all to repent for getting angry about silly little things, to love his wife and ask for forgiveness from the God who loves a contrite heart. The couple that covets a bigger house doesn’t need a bigger house, they need first of all to be thankful for what God has already given them. The answer is not great changes out there, it is the change our Father makes in our hearts by cleansing us with the blood of His Son.
When we realize this is our daily trouble then the answer is so beautiful and obvious. Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. All the other things will be added to you. The worries come from you. And you are a Christian. You know how to deal with them. Give them to God. He is your Lord, your Master. Not money, not stuff. They don’t own you. Jesus does. He bought you with His blood. And He will not chide you or throw you off unheard. He has betrothed you to Himself, loves you as His own body. The things that matter, the big things, the true faith, He has planted in your heart and sustains it by His Spirit and by His body and blood given for you. And the people whom you love, He loves more, so don’t worry about them, commend them to Him, and live your life as a Christian, and your God will do the rest. He does all things well. Amen.