MATTHEW 6:25-34 - The Sin of Worry

Introduction

I briefly considered titling this sermon, “Don’t Worry, Be Happy”, after the Bobby McFerrin song from the 90’s. But then I remembered reading that in interviews about this song, McFerrin said it wasn’t meant to be the happy-go-lucky anthem that it became popular as, but as a cynical, black humor take on the hardships of life and the insensitivity of people who just tell you not to worry. (In fact, when George Bush Sr. made it the theme song of his 1988 presidential campaign, McFerrin threatened to sue him, saying he had completely misinterpreted the song’s message!)

But I think that song took off the way it did because it seemed to acknowledge a burden that our society was carrying back in the ‘80’s (and far moreso today!)—the unrelenting pressure of anxiety and worry that so many people live under in this day. In fact, statistics say that in one year in the US, 18.4 (B) billion dollars is spent on anxiety medications—the average expenditure per adult taking some anxiety-related medication comes out to $1,374 per year! We are a troubled and anxiety-ridden people.

Not to say that there are never physiological or chemical components to worry and anxiety—the doctrine of Total Depravity, after all, affirms that every single aspect of our humanity has fallen. We are fallen physically, emotionally, spiritually and intellectually. The effects of sin on our race means that there are a whole host of things that can and do go wrong with our bodies and our minds. And part of the common grace of God to us in our fallen condition is that He has enabled us to contrive means to try to address those sorrows. So it is not necessarily or automatically unlawful to look to medications to help address worry and anxiety.

But at the same time, we cannot use those means in a God-honoring manner if we do not begin trying to understand the problem using God’s Word. God has given us crutches for our limping, but we must not turn those crutches into replacements for His deliverance from our crippled state. If we begin to think about addressing the subject of worry and anxiety from man’s perspective (as we saw previously)—a perspective that says the Universe is nothing more than time and chance acting on matter—then there is no reason, if the chemicals in your brain-pan are fizzing in a way you don’t like, that you can’t just introduce other chemicals to stimulate the kind of fizzing you do happen to like.

But we face the world as Christians—we do not start with the materialistic assumptions of the world around us. We begin with what God has said in His Word about our condition. The Scriptures are our first and greatest authority. And so when we are trying to understand what to do about worry and anxiety in our lives, we need to look here first.

And Jesus says something surprising about worry—if not downright scandalous in our day and age:

Matthew 6:25 (LSB)

“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life...

In fact, in these verses before us this morning Jesus says five different times, do not worry. The world around you, Christian, will tell you that you are a mere passive victim of worry—it is something that happens to you. But Jesus describes worry in terms of an action that you perform—something that you can choose to do or not do.

This is downright scandalous in the ears of a people who have been trained by a secular culture’s insistence that we are only at the mercy of our emotions. Man’s worldview says that you are nothing more than a meat-sack of protoplasm that has environmental and chemical variables affecting what you perceive as your “emotional state”. But Jesus says that you are an image-bearer of God who has agency regarding your emotions. You are called to rule your emotional state, not be ruled by it.

Jesus says in this text do not worry. He says it five separate times. Beloved, what do we call it when we do something that God has specifically told us not to do? We call that sin, don’t we? So what I aim to do this morning is help you see from God’s Word that

The sin of WORRY is UNWORTHY of a child of God

Here in Jesus’ teaching we find at least

I. Seven TRUTHS on the SIN of worry:

The first reason the sin of worry is unworthy of a child of God is that

Worry is UNLAWFUL (vv. 24-25a)

Verse 25 says

Matthew 6:25 (LSB)

“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink...

Now, follow Jesus’ line of argument here. He has just said in verse 24 that you must choose your master—will it be God, or will it be Mammon?

Matthew 6:24 (LSB)

“No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.

Christian—you are to have one God, and it is not the god of your wealth or possessions. When you worry, as Jesus says here, about whether or not you have enough possessions (food, drink, clothing), you are making those things your god. And to have any other god before YHWH is a violation of the First Commandment. Worry is a sin because it is idolatry, and idolatry is unlawful for Christians.

The second truth Jesus brings out in verses 25-26 is that

Worry is UNREASONABLE (v. 25b-26)

Matthew 6:25–26 (LSB)

“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? “Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they?

Jesus is making it clear here that worry is a sin because it is an unreasonable view of who we are. Jesus uses a classic rabbinical method of argument here, called kal va-chomer, literally “mild and severe”—if this lesser thing is true, then how much more is this thing true. If YHWH can feed the birds in the fields and keep them alive, how much more will He keep you fed!?! Worrying that God will not feed you who are made in His image and purchased by the blood of His own Son, when He regularly and abundantly feeds the birds in the fields and woods is an unreasonable worry.

In verse 27, Jesus goes on to show that

Worry is UNPRODUCTIVE (v. 27)

Matthew 6:27 (LSB)

“And which of you by worrying can add a single cubit to his life span?

Jesus even mixes metaphors here—a cubit is a measure of distance, and a “life span” is a measure of time. You are not going to get even one inch further in your life by filling it with anxiety and worry. It’s a lot like riding a stationary bike—it gets you all worked up, but it doesn’t get you anywhere.

And worry is unproductive for another reason—common sense shows us that worry makes you suffer twice, doesn’t it? As one preacher put it, if we live in worrying anticipation of our troubles

...we double them. For if our fear does not materialize, we have worried once for nothing; if it does materialize, we have worried twice instead of once. In both cases; it is foolish: worry doubles trouble.

John Robert Walmsley Stott (English Preacher)

In verses 28-30, Jesus goes on to say plainly that

Worry is UNBELIEF (vv. 28-30)

Matthew 6:28–30 (LSB)

“And why are you worried about clothing? Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. “But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith!

Another rabbinical kal va-chomer argument here—from the lesser glory of the morning glories to the greater glory of Solomon: If YHWH is faithful to dress the grass of the field with beautiful blossoms when that grass is just going to get cut down and burned, how much more will He clothe you who will live eternally in His presence?

Jesus makes the point forcefully here—to worry is to demonstrate unbelief. Worry is to deny God’s goodness, to doubt His ability. It is the fruit of a lack of faith in the sovereignty and kind providence of God; unbelief that says He is not competent or compassionate enough to meet your needs. In the words of Oswald Chambers:

It is not only wrong to worry, it is infidelity, because worrying means that we do not think that God can look after the practical details of our lives, and it is never anything else that worries us.

Oswald Chambers (Lecturer and Missionary)

The sin of worry is unworthy of a child of God. See in verses 31-32 that, simply stated,

Worry is UNCHRISTIAN (vv. 31-32a)

Matthew 6:31–32 (LSB)

“Do not worry then, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear for clothing?’ “For all these things the Gentiles eagerly seek...

Jesus makes the point here that, when you worry and fret and indulge in anxiety over the things you need to prolong and protect your life, you are acting just like an unbeliever. Chasing after (as we said last week) “newer, better, bigger, faster” just as frantically as those who do not know Christ, worrying and panicking over whether you will have enough to live on, becoming just as money-driven or possession-driven as those who do not know God or trust Christ is the equivalent of saying, “I have received Christ and have been indwelt by the Holy Spirit, but it makes no difference in my life! I freak out like any other unbeliever as soon as I am threatened with the loss of my comforts or my sustenance or my protection or my belongings.” God is your Heavenly Father—to worry like the pagans around you is to behave as if you were a spiritual orphan.

One bit of grammar to note here in these verses—in verse 25, the original Greek can be translated stop worrying. Here in verse 31 the tense is different; it can be translated don’t start worrying. So, as John MacArthur points out,

...Jesus brackets our passage with this meaning: If you are worrying, quit; if you haven’t started, don’t.

John F. MacArthur

Jesus says that sin of worry is unworthy of a child of God—it is unlawful, unreasonable, unproductive, it is unbelief, it is unchristian—and at the end of verse 32 Jesus points out that

Worry is UNNECESSARY (v. 32b)

Matthew 6:32 (LSB)

“For all these things the Gentiles eagerly seek; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.

Your worry is unnecessary because God already knows what you need! Do you really think He doesn’t know that you need food and drink to live? Do you really think He hasn’t noticed that you get cold outside without a coat, or that you need water in your well or a car that starts or a body that can work a job to provide for your family?

In fact, since God is all-knowing; since there is nothing that He does not know and nothing that He cannot see or understand or perceive, then it stands to reason that He knows your needs far better than you do, and He is in fact right now (and at any given second) providing for you and sustaining you and upholding your life on this earth in a thousand different ways that you will never comprehend.

At the moment you are worrying about the one thing you do know about, He has already provided for a thousand things that are far more crucial to your life that you will never know about! The sin of worry is unworthy of a child of God whose Heavenly Father sees and knows and provides for every need you ever will have or can have.

The last verse of the chapter shows us one more reason that the sin of worry is unworthy of a child of God:

Worry is UNRIGHTEOUS (v. 33)

Matthew 6:33 (LSB)

“But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

As one commentator says about this verse:

The alternative to worry is seeking God’s kingdom and His righteousness. You can’t do both. Jesus portrays these two options as mutually exclusive. Either you worry and slight His righteousness or you pursue His righteousness and give no room to worry. Think of the time, energy, money, etc., that you spend when you worry, all of which could have been devoted to the kingdom of God. (Storms, S. (2016). Biblical Studies: The Sermon on the Mount (Mt 6:33). Sam Storms.)

Consider also how the sin of worry is a seed-bed for other sins—anxiety over money can lead to greed, covetousness, stealing; anxiety over relationships can lead to self-defensiveness, withdrawal, bitterness; anxiety over others’ opinions of you can lead to lies, hypocrisy, envy (Ibid.)

In all of these ways, then, Jesus demonstrates for us that the sin of worry is unworthy of a child of God. Jesus says if you are worrying, stop worrying. If you are not worrying, then don’t start!

But it is not enough just to point out how sinful worry is—there can be no good come out of a sermon about battling sin unless there is some recommendations on how to fight that sin. We see plainly here in our text that we must fight the sin of worry; but what does Jesus say we must do in order to successfully battle this enemy of our souls? What does the fight for holiness look like in the battle against worry? Here I want to set before you from this passage and elsewhere in God’s Word

II. Five STRATEGIES for FIGHTING worry

First, look again at Jesus’ words in verse 33—you fight the sin of worry when you

Set your heart on the KINGDOM (v. 33)

Looking back earlier in this passage we are reminded that this world with all its worries will have no hold on a heart that is set on Heaven—so much of our worry is triggered by the frailty of this world’s treasures: We worry that we will lose our jobs, we worry that we will lose our health; we worry that we will lose our friends; we worry that we will lose the things that make us happy. But when your heart is set on Heaven, when your heart is set on seeking God’s will to be done as immediately and righteously and joyfully in your life as it is in Heaven; when your greatest happiness coincides with God’s greatest purposes on this earth, then worry about what you will eat or drink or wear or how you will live will inevitably fade into the background.

Verse 34 is perhaps Jesus’ most practical (and often quoted, if not often heeded) instruction on fighting worry:

Set your focus on the PRESENT (v. 34)

Matthew 6:34 (LSB)

“So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

Hear what your Savior is telling you here, worried Christian: “Each day has enough trouble of its own...” Consider the way Jesus words this verse, and you will begin to trace the Hand of His good Providence once again: Think of those pill boxes with one compartment for every day of the week. Each day has its own dosages of medicine—each day, take the pills that fill that day’s compartment. Because taking them all at once is a recipe for disaster, right?

Christian, what Jesus is telling you here is that your Heavenly Father has portioned out all your troubles so you don’t go through all of them at once! He knows your frame, that you are dust; He knows exactly how much trouble you can go through in a day, and His loving faithfulness has determined the exact measure of trouble ordained for you in a given day so that you do not break down under it (1 Cor. 10:13). So by trying to pull tomorrow’s extra trouble over to today by worrying is like taking two days’ worth of medicine all at once! God has measured out just how much challenge and difficulty He knows you can bear on a given day. So fight the sin of worry by taking this day’s troubles today,and leaving tomorrow’s troubles in their place!

The sin of worry is unworthy of a child of God. And so fight that sin, Christian—set your heart on the Kingdom, set your focus on the present, and

Set your mind on the PROMISES (Heb. 6:18)

that God has made to you. Make it your practice that, whenever you are hounded by worry, you run back to the promises of God for you. In his commentary on the Sermon on the Mount, Sam Storms offers a list of promises you can run to when you are tempted to worry:

— When you worry about what people might do to you, recall Rom. 8:31

Romans 8:31 (LSB)

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us?

— When you worry about being too weak, recall 2 Cor. 12:9

2 Corinthians 12:9 (LSB)

And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast in my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.

— When you worry about future decisions, recall Ps. 32:8

Psalm 32:8 (LSB)

I will give you insight and teach you in the way which you should go; I will counsel you with My eye upon you.

— When you worry about whether God will fulfill his promises to you, recall Heb. 6:18

Hebrews 6:18 (LSB)

so that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge would have strong encouragement to take hold of the hope set before us.

— When you worry about your loved ones, recall Mt. 7:11

Matthew 7:11 (LSB)

“If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give what is good to those who ask Him!

— When you worry about getting old, recall Isa. 46:4

Isaiah 46:4 (LSB)

Even to your old age I will be the same, And even to your graying years I will bear you! I have done it, and I will carry you; And I will bear you, and I will rescue you.

— When you worry about failing and falling, recall Phil. 1:6

Philippians 1:6 (LSB)

For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.

(Storms, S. (2016). Biblical Studies: The Sermon on the Mount (Mt 6:33). Sam Storms.)

The sin of worry is unworthy of a child of God. You fight the sin of worry when you

Set your resolve on PRAYER (Phil 4:6-7)

The Apostle Paul exhorts you wonderfully in Philippians 4:6-7:

Philippians 4:6–7 (LSB)

Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Once again, see that the Scriptures do not portray anxiety or worry as something that you are a mere passive recipient of—like getting wet in the rain. God’s Word says that anxiety and worry is something that you choose to do or not. The Greek grammar of “be anxious for nothing” conveys a command: “STOP being anxious”. And instead of anxiety or worry over your troubles, let your requests be made known to God”—tell Him your troubles. And how are you commanded to do so? Your prayers and petitions are to be characterized by thanksgiving—to come to God with gratitude for how He is going to answer your prayers.

And see again here the promise God gives you—that when you turn away from your worry and bring your troubles to Him with gratitude for His lovingkindness, He will respond with the incomprehensible peace for your heart and mind in Christ! Prayer will drive out your worry—or else your worry will drive out prayer. You fight the sin of worry when you set your resolve on prayer, and you fight the sin of worry when you

Set your hope in GOD (Lam. 3:22-24; 1 Peter 5:7)

The Old Testament prophet Jeremiah was known as “The Weeping Prophet”—his prophecy was one of the doom and destruction of his beloved Jerusalem, and he wrote a five-chapter song called “Lamentations” as he mourned the loss of his home and his nation. In verses 19-20 of the third chapter he cries out to YHWH:

Lamentations 3:19–20 (LSB)

Remember my affliction and my homelessness, the wormwood and gall. Surely my soul remembers And is bowed down within me.

And then in verses 22-24 come some of the most beautiful verses of hope anywhere in the Scriptures; verses that form the basis of the powerful hymn Great Is Thy Faithfulness:

Lamentations 3:22–24 (LSB)

The lovingkindnesses of Yahweh indeed never cease, For His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness. “Yahweh is my portion,” says my soul, “Therefore I wait for Him.”

Christian, when you are swallowed up by the anxieties and worries of this life, you can cast yourself on the faithfulness of God—not just the faithfulness of YHWH the God Who keeps His covenant with His people throughout all generations, but the faithfulness of your Heavenly Father. If He apportions each day with its measure of troubles, Christian, see here that He also fills each day with an overflowing portion of His new mercies and compassions towards you!

YHWH God, the Creator and Sustainer of all the cosmos, the God Who cannot lie, the God Who keeps His covenant from generation to generation of His people, this God is your Father when you belong to Jesus Christ. His faithfulness cannot fail any more than the Sun can stop rising in the morning—because it is His faithfulness that calls the Sun to rise every morning.

You can cast yourself on His faithfulness, Christian, and you can cast all your anxieties on Him:

1 Peter 5:7 (LSB)

Casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.

Fight the sin of worry by bringing every one of them to God and leaving those worries with Him. The wording in this verse literally means to hurl your anxieties on Him, to throw them forcefully on Him. When you are plagued with anxiety and worry, when you are tempted to sin by doubting God’s faithfulness or mistrusting His ability to keep His promises, then do this: Go outside for a walk somewhere remote—somewhere there aren’t houses or roads nearby. Look around for something you can pick up—pebbles, pinecones, sticks, whatever—one for every worry that is tempting you to sin. Take a pebble and say, “This is my anxiety over whether I’m losing my job this month”—and throw it as far as you can. “God, this is my anxiety over the test results coming from the doctor--” and throw it on God. (This is why you don’t want to be standing near anyone’s house or car!)

Of course this is not some superstitious ritual or magical rite that forces God to hear you—this is to force your wavering, worrying soul to say I am throwing my anxieties onto the shoulders of my Heavenly Father who loves me! Christian, you can throw your anxieties on God and leave them there, because He “cares for you”—literally, you are the special object of His concern and interest; you are His child, and like any earthly father, He delights to take all of His child’s worries and cares and distractions away from them.

The sin of worry is unworthy of a child of God. What does God’s Word reveal in you this morning? Are you behaving like a spiritual orphan, like someone who has no one to look out for you? Or are you resting in the love of your Father in Heaven, Who knows what you need and will never fail to bring it to pass at exactly the right moment?

Are you behaving as if your treasure is here on earth? Are you making an idol of your possessions and your wealth and your relationships, worrying more about losing them than rejoicing in the treasure you have in God? Or are you delighting more and more in the promise that

Ephesians 2:7 (LSB)

...in the ages to come [God] might show [you] the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward [you] in Christ Jesus.

Are you trying to overload today with tomorrow’s troubles with pointless “What if...” questions? “What if I get laid off? What if the test results are positive? What if I fail my class? What if I Kamala Harris gets elected?” (By the way, the only correct answer to “What if I get laid off”, for instance, is, “What if I don’t…?) Or are you content with the fresh portion of troubles that each day brings you because you are trusting fully in the promise that each new day also brings fresh portions of your Heavenly Father’s unfailing lovingkindness and compassion and mercy!

If God’s Word has uncovered in your heart a growing tendency to worry and doubt and question God’s faithfulness to you, you cannot deal with it by denying it (“It’s not worry, it’s just being realistic...”); you certainly cannot deal with it by blame-shifting (“Well, if I didn’t have all these things going on in my life, I wouldn’t have to worry!”). The only way to deal with worry is to name it for what it is—sin—and then repent of it.

Bring all your anxiety to Jesus, show Him all of your unbelief, all of your doubt, all your refusal to believe the promises He has made to you in His Word, and then leave them at the foot of His Cross. Because only the blood of Christ shed at Calvary can wash away the stain of the sin of worry from your life; only by His death and resurrection can you be free of your unbelief and free to rest in the faithfulness of your loving Heavenly Father who knows what you need and will never fail to keep you safe.

And if you are here this morning and you have no share in Christ—you do not acknowledge Him as your Savior and do not believe that you are a sinner in need of repentance—then there are no promises here in this passage that will be any comfort to you when the anxiety and worry of the pressures of this world come for you. Those worries and anxieties and troubles and pressures that you carry, you must carry alone. If you will not give them up to Christ, there is no one else that will carry them for you. Some may try—parents, siblings, spouses, friends, therapists, counselors—they may try to carry such a load of your troubles as they can, they may try to alleviate as much of your worry and doubt and fears and anxieties as they are able. But no one can lift all of your anxieties from you—there is no therapy, no counselor, no self-help course, no drug that will eliminate your anxiety.

There is only One Person Who can truly free you from your worry; because He is the One Who died under the curse of God for your sin of worry; He is the One Who offers you total and complete forgiveness for your unbelief; and He has promised that everyone who calls on His Name will be saved. So stop trying to find deliverance from your worry and anxiety from people and places that cannot accomplish it; come to the only One Who can take away the guilt of your unbelieving anxiety and give you the New Birth of peace and freedom and rest—your Savior, Jesus Christ!

BENEDICTION:

Hebrews 13:20–21 (LSB)

Now the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, our Lord Jesus, equip you in every good thing to do His will, by doing in us what is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION: Write down something you learned from this morning’s message that is new to you, or an insight that you had for the first time about the text? ____________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________ Write down a question that you have about the passage that you want to study further or ask for help with: ____________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________ Write down something that you need to do in your life this week in response to what God has shown you from His Word today: ____________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________