Wealth and Worry
Matthew 6: 19 - 34
19 "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal;
20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.
21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
22 "The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light.
23 But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
24 "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.
25 "Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?
26 Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?
27 Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?
28 So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin;
29 and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
30 Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
31 Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?'
32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.
33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.
34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
Most people have ambitions when they are young, whether it is becoming famous at something, being a doctor, a nurse, a vet or a soldier, etc
Most of these ambitions are stereotypical, we usually want to be like someone we admire.
I think my ambition was not to end up like those around me, I didn’t want to be anything or anyone special, I just wanted to avoid becoming a failure.
I never saw myself as ambitious; however, I must have had ambition to be successful in not becoming a failure.
Personally, I have never been materialistic; I have always been easily satisfied. As long as I could pay my way and stay out of debt, I was happy.
However this is not normally the case. Materialism is widespread, wanting what others have, keeping up with the Jones’s.
We have become a throwaway society. It seems that there is no respect for the things that we buy. If it breaks, throw it away, If we lose something, so what, buy another.
Whatever is new, we want it. It is as though there is a big hole and we are trying to fill it.
The rock and roll group, the Rolling Stones in the sixties put it in an understandable way in a song they sang.
“I can’t get no satisfaction”. Despite the double negative, this statement seems true of our society today.
This is what it seems like; people never seem to be satisfied, the more they have, the more they want.
My favourite saying, all through my life has been, “Learn to be content in whatever state you find yourself in”.
Even before I became a Christian I understood this to be a secret of happiness. I had heard this statement somewhere and it became more real when I became a Christian and found out that it came from the bible.
The Apostle Paul, writing to the church at Philippi said:
Philippians 4:11 Not that I speak in regard to need, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content:
The statement by Mr Micawber in the Charles Dickens novel said it right.
“Annual Income, Twenty pounds,
Annual Expenditure, Nineteen pounds, Nineteen shillings and sixpence.
Result, happiness.
Annual Income, Twenty pounds.
Expenditure, Twenty pounds and sixpence.
Result, misery”.
In our passage of scripture, we are taught that the purpose is not to be too ambitious for material security but rather for God’s rule.
19 "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal;
20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.
It has been said that the only things that are certain in life, are death and taxes.
I don’t know about taxes but I do know, is that we all die.
Hebrews 9:27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgement:
It has also been said, “There are no pockets in shrouds”. In other words, you can’t take it with you when you die.
We came into this world with nothing and it is certain we will take nothing out.
We are encouraged to pay more attention to heavenly things than earthly things, for the heavenly is eternal and the earthly is temporary.
Matt 6:21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
V21 poses an interesting question, “Where is our heart”?
Not our physical heart but our motivation, our attitudes, what is our mind on, the preoccupation in our life. Where do we spend most of our time and our energy?
What do we live for? Is it our house, a car, holidays, material goods or wealth?
All of which will one day will perish.
Or is our heart towards the things of God, storing up treasure that is eternal.
Matt 6:22 NKJV "The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light.
23 But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
What have you got your eye on? It said that the eye is the window of the soul.
The KJV says “But if thy eye be single”. (Greek Haplous)(Clear).
Our eye must be single vision, clear, on the right thing, only then we will choose right.
However if our eye be bad or evil, degenerate, seeing double, on two things at once, as it were.
Then we will choose wrong.
Single vision is what we need, not double vision.
Matt 6:24 "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.
Mammon, (wealth regarded as an evil influence or false object of worship and devotion.)
You cannot have your heart on both. You cannot serve God and money, or what money represents.
The Apostle Paul said to Timothy, I Tim. 6:10a "For the love of money is the root of all evil..." .
Notice: The money is not the root of all evil, the love of it is.
You can have no money and still love it like mad. It is the love of money that corrupts.
25 "Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?
26 Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?
What is worry?
Someone once said, “worry is like a rocking chair; it will give you something to do, but it won't get you anywhere”.
Oswald Chambers said: Worry is an indication that we think God cannot look after us.
R. H. Mounce said: Worry is practical atheism and an affront to God.
A church sign once said: Worry is the darkroom where negatives are developed.
To worry or to be over anxious is to distrust God. It is not wrong for us to be concerned about things or people. We should be concerned about the welfare of others but worry or anxiety cannot change anything.
Jesus tells us why it useless to worry.
V26 The birds of the air. Are you not of more value than they?
27 Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?
28 So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin;
29 and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
30 Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
31 Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?'
All that worry does is shift our attention from the all sufficient power of Christ and makes us focus on our own human insufficiency and insecurity. Ultimately, worry can undermine our Christian witness by making God look impotent and unworthy of praise.
Worry shows up our insufficiency but does not recognise our sufficiency is of God;
2Co 3:5 Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God;
There is a strategy for coping with worry and that is, Identify the worry, work to change what you can and leave what you can’t to God.
32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.
As Christians we profess faith in God through Christ. We are not to be like the unbeliever who has no trust in God.
God is omniscient, (all knowing) and knows our every need.
33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.
34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
Yesterday is gone. We need to have faith for today and we need not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow never comes.
A philosophical proverb positing that it will never "be" tomorrow, because when tomorrow
arrives, it becomes "today."
Three verses from a song by Alison Krauss says it clearly.
I don't know about tomorrow
I just live from day to day
I don't borrow from its sunshine
For its skies may turn to grey
I don't worry o'er the future
For I know what Jesus said
And today I'll walk beside Him
For He knows what lies ahead
Many things about tomorrow
I don't seem to understand
But I know who holds tomorrow
And I know who holds my hand.
God says to us, “My grace is sufficient for you”.
The grace God gives today is sufficient for today. When tomorrow becomes today, God will have new grace for that new day.
Worry is like living tomorrow before it arrives.
Lamentations. 3:22-24 “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. The Lord is my portion, says my soul, therefore I will hope in him”.
