GROWING FAITH: CONFRONTING WORRY

We continue our Lent series, “Growing Faith” with the sermon “Confronting Worry.”  All of us have had an increased level of anxiety during the recent weeks.  There is a lot of information, but some of it is contradictory and confusing!  The fear of not getting what we need is at an all-time high.  Many people are arming themselves.  Let’s put a pause on the panic by listening to some of the most reassuring words ever spoken in Matthew 6:24-34.  Jesus speaks to a crowd who lived on basic wages day to day.  They lived on the edge of existence, paycheck to paycheck, but Jesus tells them not to worry!  How can they not be worried?  We are living on a thin edge of anxiety and fear.  How can we hear these simple words of, “Don’t worry!”? Worry is based upon whom and what we trust.  Jesus points us to a big faith that trusts God for our lives.  Matthew 6:24-34 is the culmination of chapter 6.  In this chapter, there are several private disciplines that we can use which pull the plug on panic and find a deep rest for our souls.  As you read Matthew 6:24-34, it is our prayer that your heart will sense God’s care and closeness!  Matthew 6:24-34 “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. 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. (NIV)