Sermon Category: Anxious-less

If we are not careful the fears and anxieties of tomorrow can steal the joy of today. Jesus’ antidote for a life burdened by the shame and guilt of our past and the fears to tomorrow is the discipline of mindfulness. A mind and heart set on living today with the confidence that our past mistakes have been atoned for and our future provided for by a loving God. But make no mistake, this is no wishful thinking. There will be trouble ahead, but with the trouble, God will give us his all-sufficient grace to face it one step and day at a time.

There is a difference between what we seek and what God knows. In this passage Jesus tells us the nations anxiously seek what God already knows we need. To live in the light of our loving Father’s providential care is to be free to make his kingdom and righteousness the main priority of our lives. Everything else will find its right place in our lives if we make the main thing the main thing. For the follower of Jesus, the Kingdom of God is the main thing.

Eating, drinking, and clothing are all basic necessities that we must all procure to survive. Working to secure the good that cover these needs is what the world’s economic engine is all about. For Jesus, however, life is so much more than just securing the goods that meet these needs. Life is about discovering its true meaning in a good, true, and beautiful God that provides for his creatures. A grateful heart that realizes that we are at the mercy of a good, true, and beautiful God is the antidote to an anxious, faithless heart.

In the Bible, it is not wrong for us to own things but it is very wrong for things to own us. Oftentimes, in our cultural context, we compartmentalize the spiritual and the material in different spheres but in the biblical worldview, God demands our undivided devotion and affections. Money can be a touchy subject when we isolate this part of our life from our spiritual life. God reveals that, for him to be Lord, he must be Lord of all or not at all. We cannot serve God and money at the same time. When we don’t surrender our possessions to God, we end up surrendering our life to our possessions and in turn they end up becoming our god.

Proverbs 29:18 says “where there is no vision the people cast off restraint.” A visionless life is a life driven by the capricious and disorderly forces chaotic forces of this world. Jesus’ antidote for the purposelessness of the unintentional life and the anxieties that it breeds is a life of single-minded commitment to God’s revealed word. God brings hope to the heart that believes his promises.

Anxiety feeds on perceived threats. When someone or something we care about are in danger whether in real life or in our imagination, the possibilities of these threats can send our blood pressure through the roof and sometimes place us in spiraling descent cycles of unhealthy and risky habits and behaviors. The antidote to an anxiety-controlled heart, Jesus tells us, is to make sure our ultimate heart’s affections are not controlled by the temporary and insecure nature of worldly treasures. Only when we invest our lives in God’s eternal purposes because our heart is set on him, we can experience the peace and security that only he provides. Afterall, wherever our treasure is, our heart will be also. When God is our treasure, our heart is his.