Matthew 6:25-34
New International Version (NIV)
Do Not Worry
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 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? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how 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—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Day 4
Don’t Worry
So we have just started out on our journey and we are feeling pretty good. We know we have a long way to go before we make it out of the wilderness and crossover to our promised land, nevertheless we are still optimistic.
So we are traveling along fine and then what happens? We are sidetracked by the problems of our daily life. We remember that the electricity bill, the gas bill, and the mortgage or rent is due. We also remember that just like last month we are going to have work hard to scrape up the money to pay all of these things to avoid them being cut off or being evicted.
So we decide that we are going to camp out in this area of the wilderness for the next couple of days. Just long enough for us to take care of these things and then we will pick up where we left off.
We must not let the cares of this life halt our progress, because the enemy is constantly attacking. We must continue to move forward pushing to become closer with God.
This is not to say that this life stops, because we all know that it doesn’t. While it would be wonderful for bill collectors and landlords to say to us they are going to take a break from charging us, we know that most likely this is not going to happen. (I say most likely with hope that one day this will come true *smiles*)
So we since we know that life isn’t going to stop and we know that we have to keep moving forward, the question is how do we balance both and be successful? Jesus tells us how in the scripture. He says it simple and clear, do not worry.
Worry is defined by the dictionary as to be or to make anxious. If we were to think back to a time when we were anxious, we would remember that during that time we could not think about anything other than the thing that was the cause of our anxiety. This is why Jesus tells us not to worry because when we do our focus is shifted off of Him. He says seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and then all of these thing shall be given to us as well. So when we have our focus on Him we can rest assure, because like Allstate says we are in good hands.
Does this mean that we live in this world care free? The answer is no, in my humble opinion. This means only that we have faith that God will provide for us throughout our days. However, remember what the author says in the book of James, Faith without works is dead. This means that while we have faith that God is going to provide for us, we utilize the opportunities that he gives us. In other words we cannot sit around all day waiting for God to put food on our plates and clothes on our back, we must use the abilities that He blessed us with to obtain these things.
So as we continue to move forward remember not to let worrying halt our journey, for God has promised us an abundant life and we can’t let anything stop us from reaching it. Like the songwriter said if His eye is on the tiny little sparrow, then I know he watches over me.
Tomorrow is a day of rest, but I encourage you to go to church if you had not already planned to do so. If you are looking for a church to attend I invite you to attend my church Faith Memorial Baptist Church. The pastor is Dr. John W. Peoples. And we are located on 3117 North Kelley Ave. Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
Until Monday, God Bless
James Anthony Love
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