Hope Church LV Sermons
Security :: Don't Worry
[ Music ] >> Can I honestly trust God? >> How can I feel safe? >> Where can I go for help? >> Does God genuinely care about me? >> Is security really possible? >> Where can I go to find the answers? Despite what we may hear on television at times, as followers of Jesus, we are not immune from difficult circumstances. I'm afraid that we've begun to preach a gospel in our country that is not a biblical gospel. Let me tell you how I know it's not a biblical gospel because the Bible was not written for a Western materialistic way of life. The Bible was written for the world. And if what we are preaching is not cross-cultural, it's not biblical. And by that, I mean, if what we're preaching does not preach in the villages of Africa and the slums of Central America and the streets of China, then it should not be preached in the pulpits of America. When we preach a gospel that says God's desire for you is to be wealthy and God's desire for you is to be healthy and God's desire for you is to always be moving up the corporate ladder. And if for some reason that's not happening in your life, you got problems. We've begun to preach a gospel that is not a gospel of the Bible. It may sell books and it may raise our TV ratings, but it's not the gospel of the Scriptures. The Bible says of Jesus himself that he didn't have anywhere to lay his head. Let me show you a verse in the Bible that maybe you haven't claimed lately. 1 Peter chapter 4 and verse 12. "Beloved, do not be," what's the next word? All right, everybody, look at me. Give me your best surprise face. Yeah. Listen to what he said. Don't be surprised. Yet how many times difficulties come into our lives and what's our reaction? [ Laughter ] How can this be happening to me? I'm a Christian. God is my father. When I accepted Jesus, didn't that mean he took care of all the problems? Beloved, do not be surprised. And the people that Peter was riding to here, man, they were going through some stuff that makes our troubles and trials look minor. Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal among you, which comes upon you for your testing as though some strange thing. You see, we get on this side of the theological spectrum and we look at those that teach that healthy, wealthy, wise doctrine and we say, oh, that's bad, that's wrong. We don't believe in that and yet when difficult circumstances come in our lives, we act surprised as though it's some strange thing. You know what we've really done? We've bought into the same junk. Thinking that somehow because I'm a follower of Jesus, I'm immune from difficulty. Listen to me, the distinguishing mark of the follower of Jesus is not the absence of difficult circumstances. It is the presence of the peace of God and the midst of difficult circumstances. I'm not immune from difficulty as a follower of Jesus, but as a follower of Jesus, I can still have security in the midst of difficulty. This one, the unbelieving world, looks at the Christian and says, man, they got something I don't have because they got the same problems I got, but they're secure. As we continue our study through the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is addressing this very issue of our response to difficult circumstances. Take your Bible, turn to Matthew chapter 6. If you're visiting with us, we've been studying now for the last year, straight through the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 5, 6, and 7. We're getting close to the end of chapter 6. This morning, we're going to read starting in verse 25. And in this section of Scripture, Jesus is dealing with how we can have security. He writes about the opposite of security, about the issue of worry. Listen what he says. Verse 25, "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 or 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, but they are not so nor do they reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them, "Are you not worth much more than me?" I love Jesus' sense of humor in verse 27, "And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life?" Here's what he says, "And just how's that worry and working out for you?" Verse 28, "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 and all his glory clothed himself like one of these, but if God so closed the grass of the field which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will he not much more clothe you?" A little faith, do not worry then saying, "What are we going to eat? What will we drink? What will we wear for clothing? For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things. For your heavenly Father, he knows that you need all these things. Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be added to you. So do not worry about tomorrow. For tomorrow, we'll care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. We could just close it and go home, amen? Now we're not going to. That's good stuff. I want to ask three questions out of these verses, we're actually going to be in these verses this weekend and next weekend. We're not going to get through everything and what I've read for you this morning, but I want to ask some questions to begin to unpack this. Here's the first one. What is worry? Jesus uses this word over and over and over again in these verses. What is worry? Jesus here is a word that means to care, to be anxious, to be troubled, to take thought of, to be pulled in different directions. In verse 25, he says, "Don't be worried about your life. The word life is a comprehensive term that encompasses all of a person's being, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual." Jesus is saying, "Don't be torn apart. Don't be anxious. Don't worry about life." Now what Jesus is not saying here, he's not saying that I'm not to care at all about the situations and circumstances in my life. He's not saying like Timon and Pumba and the Lion King, Akuna Matata, right? No worries. That's not what he's saying. I mean, if you're a human being, you're going to have genuine concern about the situations and circumstances in your life. What he's saying is, don't allow that genuine concern to become worry. Albert Barnes said it this way. This statement does not mean that we are to exercise no care about worldly matters, no care to preserve our property, to provide for our families, but that there is to be confidence in God as to free the mind of anxiety and such a sense of dependence on him as to keep it calm. It's okay to have genuine concern. What Jesus is saying here is not to worry. Now let me give you a definition of worry and then I'll explain the difference. The word worry, here's a definition. Fearful concern about the circumstances in my life past present or future. It's okay to have genuine concern about the situations in my life. What Jesus is saying here is, I'm not to develop fearful concern. How do I know the difference, Pastor? Am I okay? Am I genuinely concerned or is it drifted over into that arena of fearful concern? Let me tell you how I believe that we can understand the difference. Genuine concern always results in a burden that drives me to dependence on God and leads me to this question. God, what are you going to do? Fearful concern, fearful concern leads to worry and results in dependence on self and produces the question, what am I going to do? You see, when I have situations and circumstances in my life that are beyond my control and they're difficult and they're painful, it's okay for me to look at those, be concerned, allow those to drive me to intimacy with God and say, "God, I don't understand this, but Lord, I trust you. What are you going to do about this?" That's different than me getting so caught up in these situations that I start looking to myself to understand how I can fix what's going on in my life. You see, genuine concern drives me to Him, worried, drives me to me. Let me give you a second question. Why shouldn't I do this? Why should I not worry? Well, there are a lot of reasons we could give, but I want to, I want to give you five this morning. And the reality is any one of these five is enough. But when you put all five of them together, it's a lot. Here's the first one. You shouldn't worry because worry is sin. Now again, we could close it and be done, right? I mean, that's enough reason to answer the question why I shouldn't do it. Worry is sin. How do you know that? Because three times in these verses Jesus said, don't do it. And He didn't just lay that out as a suggestion. It's an imperative, it's a command. Jesus said, do not worry. Meaning for me to worry is the opposite of obeying Jesus. And we have a word for that. What is it? Sin. Worry is sin. Paul said it again in Philippians chapter 4 and verse 6. Paul said, be anxious for nothing. It's another way of saying do not worry. You see, to worry is to step outside of the boundaries that God has established for my life. How many of you were with us a couple of years ago when we did the series in the summer called Written in Stone, a study through the Ten Commandments? Let me see your hand. All right, so a number of you were here back then when we studied through that together. Every week in that series, we made you say a statement out loud. Do you remember what it was? Of course you don't remember what it was. Here's what it was. God's commands are not given to earn a relationship. They are given that we might enjoy our relationship. God does not give us commands so that we can earn our relationship with Him. God gives us commands so that we can enjoy them. Here's what that means. When God says do something, God's saying, help yourself. When God says, don't do something, God's saying, don't hurt yourself. God says, don't worry, why? Because he wants to rob us of all the joy and pleasure that we can have by wrapping our hearts in worry. No, because God designed life and he knows worry is bad for us. He says, don't worry, it's a sin. And that leads me to the second reason we shouldn't worry. We shouldn't worry because worry endangers my health physically and spiritually. Worry endangers my health physically and spiritually. Listen what John MacArthur says. The English term worry comes from an old German word, meaning the strangle or the choke. That is exactly what worry does. It is a kind of mental and emotional strangulation which probably causes more mental and physical afflictions than any other single cause. And that is not just the opinion of a preacher, John MacArthur, if you go on WebMD and you pull up research surrounding issues of stress and worry, listen to some of the statistics you'll find. 43% of all adults suffer from adverse health effects from stress. 43%. They estimate somewhere between 75 and 90% of all doctor's visits are for stress or worry related ailments and complaints. Now, we're talking about the health care issue in our country today. Listen to this stat. Stress and worry costs American industry more than $300 billion annually in health care expenses. When Jesus said, don't worry. He understood that it was dangerous to my health physically and spiritually. How many of you have ever heard of Dr. Charles Mayo, the Mayo Clinic, right? We've all heard of Mayo Clinic. Dr. Charles Mayo is the founder of Mayo Clinic. Listen what he said, worry affects the circulation, the heart, the glands, and the whole nervous system. I have never met a man or known a man to die of overwork, but I have known a lot who died of worry. It endangers our health physically and spiritually. It's a cancer that eats away at our flesh and our faith. Number three, worry is inconsistent with the character of God. Worry is inconsistent with the character of God. A.W. Tozer is one of my favorite writers. Listen to what A.W. Tozer said, the most important thing about you is what comes to mind when you think of God. You see, worry is a clear, listen, worry is a clear indicator that I have an improper view of God. Because if I had a proper view of God, let me tell you what I wouldn't do. I wouldn't worry. You want me to tell you why I worry? I got an improper view of God. You don't need to happen in the American church today. You want me to happen in the American church today? What needs to happen in the American church is a revival of an awakening of a vision of who God is. If we understood the magnitude of God, if we understood the glory of this one who calls us His children, let me tell you what we'd stop doing. We'd stop worrying. But we worry because we have an improper view of God. I want to do a little classroom participation time, all right? I want you to answer by raising your hand. Number one, how many of you believe God's a loving God? Let me see your hand. Hold them up for a second. Don't put them down. Look around. All right, you can put them down. I can't say it with certainty, but it looked like everybody in the building. Number two, how many of you believe God is a wise God? Let me see your hand. Hold them up. Keep them up. Look around. Again, I may not see everybody, but it looks like everybody in the building said, "I believe God's a wise God." You can put them down. How many of you believe God is a powerful God? Let me see your hand. Hold them up. Keep it there. Look around. Look like everybody in the building. You can put them down. Looks like we all said God's a loving God. God's a wise God. God's a powerful God. Hey, did you know it's greater than that? The Bible doesn't just say that God's a loving God. In 1 John, the Bible tells us God is love. The Bible doesn't just tell us that God is a wise God. In the book of Colossians, it says that in him is all wisdom. And the Bible doesn't just tell us that God is a power for God. The Bible tells us in the book of 2 Peter and in the book of Isaiah that God is all powerful. Now, if all that's true, let me give you a summary. Look at this on the screen. Since God is love, He desires only the best for us. How many of you love your children? Okay, even if you don't raise your hand, that's not, it's not, you're going, you're going to cause your children to worry. Hey, we love our kids, right? Because we love them, we want what's best for them, right? Hey, God's not just loving. He is love. He wants only the best for you and for me. Since God is all wisdom, He knows what's best for us. Hey, I want what's best for my kids, but the reality is I don't always know what's best. I want to know what's best and most time I think I do, but I don't always know, right? Hey, we have a God who is love and He wants only the best for us and because He possesses all wisdom, He doesn't just want what's best, guess what? In every situation and circumstance in your life, God knows what's best for you. And since He's all powerful, He can bring about what's best for you. Now, in my life with my kids, hey, I love them. I want what's best. I think sometimes I know what's best, but I sure don't have the power to make sure that only the best things come into their life, right? God knows what's best. He wants what's best and He has all power and authority to make sure that only the best comes into your life. If all that's true, let me ask you a question. Why are you worried? You know why we worry? We have an improper view of God. You see, worry is inconsistent with the character of God. When we understand and know Him, we don't worry. Number four, worry misrepresents the character of God to those around us. You see, when you and I worry, it presents a distorted view of God to the people that we're supposed to be influencing for Christ. I've always found it somewhat, I guess humorous is the right word, but here we are as Christians. How many of you believe when you die, you're going to heaven? Let me see your hand. All right, put them down. How many believe that with certainty? Let me see your hand. Right? Amen. How is it? Those of us who've never died and been to heaven can have complete confidence that this God can take us from this life to the next life like that, and yet we sit around our kitchen table and wonder how we're going to pay the phone bill. When our friends and neighbors and coworkers hear us talk about this God who can take you to heaven when you die, this God who created the world, this God who spoke everything, you can see, taste, touch, feel, or smell into existence, this God that controls everything, and then they hear us around the water cooler, whining and complaining and worrying. It presents a distorted view of God to those around us. Number five, and if all those weren't good enough, this one ought to seal the deal, worry, it doesn't change anything. Jesus said it, how's that worry thing working out for you? How many of you have added one hour to your life by worry, Jesus said? Matter of fact, we're really doing the opposite. If we believe the medical statistics, worry is taking hours away. Isn't that just like the enemy? To offer you something as a substitute, telling you this will bring you satisfaction in actually doing the exact opposite is taking life away. The third question I'm finished with this one, how do I keep worry out of my life? Jesus gives us three steps here to a worry-free living. And there are a lot in here. I'm going to mention three, and that's really all I got time. I don't have time to do that. We're going to do it anyway. Here we go. Number one, remember life is more than things. Jesus said is not life more than food and the body more than clothing. You and I are bombarded every day with a message that says life is what you possess every day. You go home today, you flip on the ball games, and in between the commercials of those ball games, you're going to see some ad that will save you. Just buy this, it'll change your life. If you can just own this, you can really have life. And what's even sadder than those commercials is the reality that we bought in. Jesus said life is more than that. When I was in the youth group growing up in our church, I had a youth pastor, used to always say this, it's really a good thing. He used to say the main thing is to keep the main thing, the main thing. The main things to keep the main thing, the main thing. When it comes to life, the main thing is not what you possess, the main thing's relationships. You see, God made life to be enjoyed in the context of relationships. He created us first and foremost to live in a relationship with Himself, to live in fellowship with Him. But then that relationship to spill out in our relationships with others, life is all about relationships. Let me give you a reality this morning, and I hope this sinks into your soul. You can lose everything you have and still have life. The last 13 or 14 years of my life, I've made at least one, sometimes two and three trips a year to the continent of Africa. Let me tell what Africa has taught me. You can lose everything you have and still have life. I have seen in Southern Africa poverty like I did not even know existed. We brought an African brother here last year, Jabalani Modena, some of you met Jabalani. What a man of joy. When Jabalani smiles, the whole room just lights up. Jabalani, when he was here, called home on one of our cell phones to talk to his family. When he called home and finally got them on the telephone, you know, sometimes you go visit a place and you call home and you tell them about where you are. Here's what Jabalani said. Jabalani said, you won't believe it. In America, they eat every day. And yet joy. One of my favorite parts of our conference there every December is the laughter of those people. Man, they have life. Now they don't have a lot of stuff. You can lose everything you have and still have life. Jesus said life is more than things. Number two, we need to cultivate our faith. Right in the middle of this passage, Jesus draws a direct line between worry and faith. He talks to them about all of their worry and then he condemns them almost by saying you of little faith. You of little faith. You see, worry is fearful concern about the circumstances in my life past, present, future. Let me tell you what faith is. Faith is confidence in God for everything in my life past, present, future. Worry and faith do not coexist. Faith drives out worry. Worry is fearful concern about the circumstances. Faith is confidence in God for everything in my life. Now how do I cultivate faith? How do I grow my faith? How do I nurture my faith in God? Well think about it in terms of just personal relationships. How do you develop confidence in somebody? You got to get to know them, right? Now we don't, my wife and I don't plan to go off on a trip and the day before we leave go out in the street and just say hey, anybody out here want to come stay with our kids? Why are we going on this trip? Why don't we do that? Because we're not just going, if we did that and some stranger came up and said I'll take the gig and we just put them in the house. We get in the car, pull out of the driver and listen, let me tell you what's going to consume us before we get out of the driveway. Worry, you know why? We don't have any confidence in that person. Why? Well you don't know them. Now if you play out that same scenario and you invited someone to your home that you know well and you have confidence in that, you know what you don't have when you leave? You don't worry. You got confidence. We worry because we lack confidence. We lack confidence because we don't know them. You see when you know somebody well, you have confidence. We don't know God. Now I'm not saying we don't know him at all. We hadn't been saved but the gospel is just the beginning of knowing God. That's step one of knowing about him. God's given us an entire book, 66 chapters that tells us about him that reveals his character, that displays his glory and the more we know God, guess what happens? We develop confidence. And when you have confidence, you don't worry. You don't worry. Jesus tells us here we need to spend time with God because the only way to get to know him is to spend time with him. Jesus tells us in these verses two ways that we need to spend time with God to deepen our understanding. First of all, we need to spend time with God to deepen our understanding of God's relationship to creation. Jesus gives us a couple of examples. He talks about the birds and he talks about the lilies. If I was going to say there's one word that describes God's relationship to creation, it's the word sovereign. You hear what he's saying here? Hey, there's not one bird out in the wilderness anywhere that's worried. God is so sovereign that every bird on planet earth today has got plenty to eat. God is so sovereign that every lily of the field, there's not one of them that is not cold and beauty and glory. God is sovereign. Now we have a hard time wrapping our heads around that. Let me show you why. You ever been in your house and lost the remote control? Yeah, we have, hadn't we? You know what's so frustrating about that? You can know what room it's in and still not be able to find it. I mean, you know it's in the room with this television. It's not like it got up and walked out. It's somewhere in this room and I cannot find it. You know why I can't find it? Let me give you the scientific answer. Here's why I can't find it because I'm limited by four dimensions. Three space dimensions? One time dimension? Because of dimensional limitation, I cannot find the remote. Well, what does dimension mean? Here's what four dimensions mean. Because you and I live inside of the context of four dimensions, I can only be in one place at one time. Because I'm going to be in one place at one time? I don't know where the remote is. I don't know who put it where last. I wasn't there. I couldn't be there in where I was, right? If I could be in all places at all times, I'd know where the remote is. But because I'm limited by space and time, there are things I can't know. And because of my limitations, I have a hard time understanding God. I think about this God who can keep track of everything everywhere. How does that happen? Listen, I learned a phenomenal term in seminary and it's the term dimensional beyond this. And here's what it means that God is I'm not dimensional. Here's what that means. God is everywhere all the time. I can only be in one place at one time, but God, He's everywhere all the time. And if I grow to understand that about God, I don't worry. Listen to the way Mark Batterson said it. He said to finite human beings, time and space seem infinite. But that is because we're on the inside looking out. God is on the outside looking in. Time and space are finite part of His creation. God is all around us all the time. He's right before, right after, right ahead and right behind. God has no dimensional limitations. If we could wrap our minds around that truth, it would transform our outlook on life. We need to get to know Him. Jesus uses creation. We need to get to know Him in His relationship to creation. But then Jesus says we need to spend time with Him so that we can know Him in His relationship to us. Jesus said for your heavenly Father, He knows. He knows. You need all these things. If there's one word that describes God's relationship to you and me, it's the word intimate. God knows you. The word knows that Jesus uses here. There are several words in the Greek language that we translate K-N-O-W-N-O. This one is a word that means knowledge which comes from one's state of being. It means you know without being informed, you just know because of who you are. It's intuitive knowledge. Because of who I am, I just know. The Bible says about God, He knows what you need not because you informed Him, not because He just woke up and realized it today, but He knows what you need because He is God. Again, we struggle because we tend to view God through the lenses of who we are. And let's be honest, we don't even know what we want, much less what we need. If you don't believe that when you leave here, drive straight to the grocery store with no list, walk in. How many times you've been in the grocery store, gotten right in the middle and realized I don't even have any idea why I'm here. Hey guys, thank God for cell phones, amen. I can't tell you how many times I've had to call my wife and say, babe, what did you send me to the grocery store to get? I don't even know why. We don't even know what we want much less what we need. We can stand in a grocery store aisle and freeze like a deer in headlights because we just don't know what we want, especially when we're hungry. It all looks good. We're just filling the buggy. And because we view God through the lenses of how we see ourselves, we have a hard time understanding the depth of the knowledge of God. But look at what the Bible says in 1 Thessalonians 5, faithful is He who calls you and He will also bring it to pass. Faithful is He who calls you. He calls you to Himself to be His child. But I love the last part and He will also bring it to pass. Listen, here's what that means. God didn't bring you to Himself as His child. Say, okay, now go figure it out and do the best you can. I'll see you in heaven. He'll bring it to pass. Whatever it is you need, He's got it. Listen to the way Henry Black would be said in a devotional I read this week. Listen to it. This is so awesome. When Christ lives in you, He brings every divine resource with Him. Every time you face a need, you meet it with the presence of the crucified, risen, and triumphant Lord of the universe inhabiting you. If we get that, what are we worried about? The last thing Jesus says is we need to walk in integrity today. Jesus closes this passage in verse 34 by saying, so do not worry about tomorrow. For tomorrow we'll care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Here's what Jesus is saying. If you and I are going to live worry free, if you want to have security tomorrow, here's the best thing you and I can do. Obey Him today. And if we just walk in obedience, walk in intimacy with Him today, He says tomorrow, it'll care for itself. I wrote this down this week. Integrity in this moment leads to security in the next. I don't control tomorrow, but I know the one who does. And if I'll trust Him today and humble myself before Him today and honor Him today, here's what He said, I'll take care of tomorrow. You don't worry about tomorrow. You just trust me today. Let's pray. Jesus, speak to us, have your way in us today. God, give us a fresh glimpse of who you are. Help us to understand your character. Lord, I pray all over the building this morning there are people experiencing the freedom that comes from trusting you, the security that we can have when we trust in you. I want you to just sit quietly before the Lord now and just ask God to continue to speak into your heart. But if you're here today and you don't know Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior in just a moment, we're going to stand and we're going to sing a song of worship to God. When we stand to sing, we've got some pastors that are here at the front, some prayer volunteers at the back. If God has spoken to you today and you want to give your life to Christ, as soon as we begin to sing, I want you to slip out of where you're sitting, come to one of these pastors or prayer volunteers and say to them, I want to give my life to Christ and they'll show you how you can be saved today. Maybe you're here and you're worried, you've got some burdens and some cares in your life and you just need somebody to pray with you. When we stand to sing, you go to one of these pastors or prayer volunteers and they will pray for you, they'll intercede on your behalf and help you to lay this burden before the Lord. God, have your way in us today. Have your way through us. It's in the name of Jesus, we pray.