Focused On Our True Treasure

Don’t Worry—You & Your Treasure Are Secure

10.23.22 [Luke 12:22-34] River of Life (20th Sunday after Pentecost)

Heavenly Father, the grass withers and the flowers fall. Open our eyes to see the wonderful things you have done for us and are preparing for us in your eternal Word. Amen.

Why do you worry? It’s a simple question with a laundry list of answers. There are many things that make us worry. Some of the things that cause us to worry are very personal—they don’t trouble other people. There are some things that make us worry that we keep very private—only a select circle of people are even aware of our troubles.

But there are worries that are common to us all. We worry about our friends and family members. We worry about our careers, health, & finances. We worry about the state of our community, country, & world. We may worry about our church and ourselves. We worry about things like making a good first impression or being liked. We worry about maintaining a good reputation or not disappointing people. We worry about inanimate objects like homes & cars & other things. We even stress out about things we have no real control over, like the economy and elections. We fret about future and our legacies.

You may not worry about all those things, but most of your worries fall into those buckets. There are also some things you worry about that I didn’t even mention. We worry much. Too much. To make matters worse, we also worry about worrying. We know it’s not good for us to worry. It hampers our productivity and often leads to procrastination, which then makes us worry even more. Worry puts a strain on our most important relationships, too. When we are saturated with worries, we are miserable to be around. Worry damages us. Worry weakens our hearts. It robs us of focus. It steals away much needed sleep. Worry makes us more prone to getting sick. Worry helps nothing. But we still do worry. We still worry and we worry we will never stop worrying.

Sometimes, when we are overly worried people will compare our list of worries with the lists of those we think of as less fortunate. Suddenly we have a sober and unflattering view of how whiney we look and sound.

Luke 12 does give us some wider & better perspective on all the blessings we take for granted and all the things we don’t have to worry about. These disciples had hand-to-mouth worries. They worried about basic things like (Lk. 12:22) what they would eat and… wear.

They had just enough to live on. So they lived in this precarious position that something might happen and suddenly they didn’t have enough to survive.

You did not go to bed last night wondering if you would have anything to eat today. You may worry about what to eat, but your trouble is a matter of preference and diet not survival. You did not go to bed last night with concerns about your clothes for this morning. You may have woken up and hemmed and hawed over what to wear, but your trouble was having too many options, not none. We are so blessed that we don’t worry about these things. Thanks be to God for giving us daily bread!

But the fact that Jesus tells people who did worry about such things, not to worry ought to make a deep impression upon us. Those are very basic needs. What we worry about—more often than not—are niceties, not needs. Our worries seem greedy and piggish by comparison.

But comparing our list of worries with a list of those less fortunate will not bring our worrying to a halt anymore than telling a kid who doesn’t want to eat their dinner that there are starving children in Africa. Worry and anxiety and stress strike at different levels, but no one eludes them.

We all worry. Some more than others. Some about more important things than others. But we all struggle with worry. So what should we do?

We tend to have four approaches to our worries: the grasshopper & the ant, the turtle & the owl. You know Aesop’s fable about the grasshopper and the ant. The grasshopper spends the summer making music; the ant works diligently to gather enough food for the winter.

Sometimes, we approach our worries like the grasshopper. We look for amusing diversions to distract us from what we are worried about. We try to escape and find some slice of serenity by being entertained. But having a lot of fun doesn’t mean that we don’t still have a lot to worry about.

Other times, we pour ourselves into attacking our worries. If we’re worried about our finances, we pinch every penny & we take every extra shift. Worry can make us work hard. But hard work doesn’t make us worry less. Ironically, it can be the ant-types that worry more than the grasshoppers, even though they seem to be better prepared for the hard times.

The final two approaches are the turtle and the owl. When worry comes the turtle’s way, he curls into his shell. He withdraws and just hopes the thing he was worried about misses him. The owl takes a more intellectual approach. The owl analyzes his worries and looks for a scientific solution.

Do you ever approach worry like those two creatures? Sometimes, like the turtle, we just try to hide from whatever we are worried about. We withdraw from our friends and family, we hide from as many responsibilities as we can. But then we are all alone with our worries.

Maybe, we approach our worries like the owl. We seek out help, which is a very wise thing to do. But where you find help is crucial. The solutions our modern world offers are deficient because they don’t recognize how deep the problem of worry really runs. Psychiatrists say that the problem is a chemical imbalance and prescribe an anti-depressant. Psychologists say that the problem is your thought patterns. They'll suggest ways to identify & manage stress and anxiety. They teach you how to live with your worries.

Here’s the problem. You are more than your physiological flesh. You’re more than just a vial of chemicals that needs to be correctly balanced. You are also more than a cognitive machine. Teaching you how to identify and manage stress still leaves you living with worries.

The solution to be weighed down with worries is not to live carelessly like the grasshopper, or work tirelessly like the ant, or hide like the turtle, or rely upon human wisdom like the owl. The solution to being weighed down by our cares is to be certain that you are cared for by a powerful, wise, and loving Father who is pleased to provide for your whole self, heart & mind, body & soul. So don’t fret, because God is faithful. Don’t panic, God is compassionate. Don’t agonize over tomorrow’s potential troubles, God is gracious today.

Jesus tells worry-warts like us to investigate God’s power, wisdom, and love and to anticipate God keeping all of his promises. He tells us to look at the rest of creation—to the ravens and the wild flowers. Neither were particularly valuable to these disciples. But they are to God.

You never see a malnourished raven. Even though nobody is sitting on a park bench feeding ravens, your heavenly Father is making sure they have enough. And look at the wildflowers. They don’t need to be pretty to be functional. But our loving God made them to be beautiful. Many times, we don’t even know the name of those flower, but God does.

That same God knows you. He knows what you need & loves you more than either of those creatures. He (Ps 139:14) fearfully and wonderfully made you and all the systems of your body and blessed you with an unseen soul. He knows you need more than food and clothes for your body and life. He knows you need him.

So he came to deal with our greatest worry: Am I good enough? Do I matter? On our own, we are not. On our own, we would never measure up to the standard of righteousness. But you do matter to God. You were important enough for God the Father to send his Son into this world to be good enough for you. Jesus placed himself under the requirements of the Law and lived a life that was more than good enough. He was perfect in thought, word, & deed.

Then Jesus gave you his righteousness as a gift and he took your sin, your guilt, and your shame and he made it his own. He carried it to the cross and he put it to death on Calvary so that you don’t have to worry about those things any more. Because of Christ, you are not just good enough, you are holy and precious. Because of Christ, your life is of eternal significance. You matter to your Maker.

But there’s more. (Rom. 8:32) The God who did not spare his own Son, graciously gives you so much more. Look at how God feeds you! He gives you daily bread and (Jn. 8:35) the Bread of Life, his Son Jesus to sustain and strengthen you. Look at how God clothes you! He dresses you with (Is. 61:10) the robes of Christ’s righteousness. Jesus has given poor miserable sinners like us the treasury of his righteous obedience. Satan cannot steal that away. God’s love for us will never fail us. We don’t need to worry about our life, because Jesus has given us life to the full.

We don’t need to worry because we have a powerful, wise, and loving heavenly Father who is always providing all we need for body and life. But we do need to be regularly reminded of that reality.

Because the worries come at us from all angles. When they do, we must (Lk. 12:31) seek his kingdom. We need to return to the treasure of God’s unconditional love. We must not withdraw from time in his Word. We must not retreat from being renewed alongside our brothers and sisters in Christ. When worries assail us, we must not withdraw from church-life. You may need time off from work when you’re feeling off, but not from worship. Because there is a fundamental difference between the two. Your employer recognizes that you won’t be very productive if you’re muddling through some mental health issues. So good companies take a short-term loss for a long-term gain. But church is not your employer. Your primary reason for worshipping is not to add value to this team, but to be assured of God’s unconditional love for you, regardless of what you may be struggling with. You don’t come here to do something great, but to be reminded that God has done everything necessary for your eternal salvation.

Jesus demonstrated that for us in his final moments with his disciples. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus was preparing his disciples for the moment they were most worried about—his death. He told them exactly what would happen to him and why. He told them exactly how they would react and why. But more than that, he spoke to their worried hearts. (John 16:33) “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” In this world, we will have troubles and worries, but in Christ we have unconditional love and eternal peace. So we’ve got nothing to worry about. Amen.