WWUTT 1967 Do Not Worry (Matthew 6:31-34)

Jesus said in Matthew 6 33 seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all the things that you need will be added to you as well seek

Christ when we understand the text this is when we understand the text a daily

Bible study in the word of Christ that men and women of God may be complete equipped for every good work tell your friends about our ministry at www .utt

.com here's your teacher pastor Gabe thank you Becky we come back to our study in Matthew chapter 6 in the

Sermon on the Mount and I'm going to read this section again today the same section we looked at yesterday it's good for you to hear it again

Matthew chapter 6 beginning in verse 25 and going through verse 34 out of the legacy standard

Bible here the word of the Lord 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 so nor reap nor gather into barns and yet your heavenly father feeds them are you not worth much more than they and who of you by being worried can add a single cubit to his life span 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 clothes you owe you of little faith 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 for your heavenly father knows that you need all these things but seek first his kingdom seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be added to you so do not worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will worry about itself each day has enough trouble of its own so where would we divide this up yesterday if you had listened to the lesson you notice that I it kind of labeled it versus 24 through 30 or 25 through 30 rather so we would pick up let's do the exposition then in verses 31 to 34 do not worry then

Jesus says 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 now I drew a connection between that statement and something said back in chapter 5 where Jesus said that God causes his son to rise on the evil and on the good he sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous or in some translations the just and the unjust that was back in chapter 5 verse 45 so we have a demonstration there of God's common grace the only people alive in the world today are not just the

Christians God's grace is even upon those that are unbelievers God's grace was on you before you became a believer and it is out of God's goodness and his mercy toward you that he was patient with you and let you come to a knowledge of him through the declaration of the gospel that came to you

God even provided the person that was going to come into your life and show you your sin and rebellion against God and what you deserve for that because you have sinned against God you have gone against what he says in his word what do you deserve for that you deserve the judgment the righteous wrath of God on you because you have sinned against the

Lord that's what you deserve let none of us think more highly of ourselves as if I'm a good enough person and I can escape the judgment of God or the warning that's given in Malachi you have wearied the

Lord with your words how have you wearied him by saying God delights in all of these things and where is the

God of justice like I can sin God still loves me still good with me and where is the

God of justice anyway I'm still alive so he hasn't poured out his wrath on me now as it says in Romans 2

God's kindness towards you is meant to lead you to repentance so you you haven't perished yet because God is patient and merciful so that you have the opportunity to turn from your sin to the

Lord Jesus Christ and be forgiven that's why you haven't been wiped out yet now there are people in the world and God knows are never going to come to receive him they are never going to come to faith in Jesus Christ why does he allow them to live

Romans 9 talks about that is glory will be demonstrated and not only in the fact that he's going to rescue the remnant from the judgment that's going to be poured out on the world but his glory is even manifested in seen in his righteous judgment that is going to be poured out on the ungodly proverb 16 for says the

Lord has made everything for its purpose even the wicked for the day of trouble and 2nd

Peter chapter 3 I believe it is talks about how there is a day on which they will perish no it's 1st

Peter 2 rather than where it talks about how even the wicked are destined for that day they stumble as they were destined to do so that they may come into judgment so God has a reason and a purpose for even the wicked existing in the world today and they bring antagonism against you so that you would learn to trust in Christ and long to be delivered out of this world that God's judgment would be poured out on the ungodly because you desire for Christ righteousness to reign in the world so you have

God's common grace that is upon everybody even the Gentiles are being fed and so we have this statement then in chapter 6 verse 32 all these things the

Gentiles eagerly seek food clothing drink they eagerly seek these things and notice the expression they eagerly seek this this is all they live for all they all the joy that they will ever experience in their existence is in the food and clothing and drink that they go after whenever a

Gentile or a pagan rather because like I said yesterday that word is synonymous with pagan whenever a pagan has a good day that's it that's all they're gonna get is that good day the joy terminates on the experience as I've said before I've talked about this in previous lessons so let's say that pagans get together and they have a day of feasting and a day of drinking unto drunkenness and they look back on that experience with fondness hey remember when we got together as friends and we ate all that good food and we drank until we got sick you know

I don't even understand how anybody thinks that's fun but they look back on that experience and they think of it with fondness if we can only get back to that again let's get my chums together my boys let's all have another day where we can drink and be merry and then there's gonna come a day when everybody's life is kind of passed them by you never get that youthfulness back again we can never be what we once were the days are now so full of trouble that we don't have the same kind of joy that we had back then when we weren't worried about as much so for a pagan this is the best life that they're ever gonna get and even the moments they experience that are good are gonna be few and far between that's all they go after that's their eagerness for clothing the best stuff that makes me look good the drink that makes me feel good the food that fills my belly and then all they have is the memory of it and that's the most joy that they're ever going to experience whereas for the

Christian our joy when we experience things like this like a good meal with friends and family and even giving good gifts to one another and hanging out with each other for the

Christian the joy doesn't terminate on the experience our joy doesn't end when that moment is over because we know that these moments that we experience a good meal with friends and family enjoying feasting and fellowship that kind of an experience is a taste of the glory that awaits us in the kingdom of God that we have been promised in Christ Jesus right because we read about this in the book of Revelation the wedding feast of the

Lamb when we're all going to be gathered together with Christ the whole church for an endless feast in the kingdom of God and all these great experiences of fellowship that we have on this side of heaven there but tastes of an even greater joy that is to come when we go to church and we're together with brothers and sisters in the

Lord praising God rejoicing in his goodness being reminded of the gospel that Jesus died for us rose again from the dead whoever believes in him will not perish but we have everlasting life where our sins are forgiven we now have fellowship with God we are promised an eternal reward a place where there will be no more pain or dying or tears every tear will be wiped away from our eyes the former things will have passed away we've been promised all these things in Christ and when we rejoice together in this in church this is heaven practice we're getting a small taste of what it's going to be like in glory when we're all gathered around the throne rejoicing in him who has saved us and drawn us to himself and given his very life for us so these moments of enjoyment that we have in this life it doesn't terminate on the experience we know there but small taste of an even greater joy that awaits us and even the difficult things that we go through in life and for some of you your life may be full of more hardships than rejoicings yet we know that this stuff doesn't go with us we don't take it with us the difficult things that we go through in life in here and when we get to glory these things will be no more as Paul talks about with the

Romans that the present sufferings cannot even compare to the glory that awaits us in Christ Jesus now a person who's a pagan there is no benefit to difficulty when you go through difficult trials a pagan fighting cancer there's nothing about that experience that's actually going to lead to anything better especially if cancer ends up killing a pagan

I mean that's it their best life was the one they experienced here and it was full of cancer for the pagan for the person who does not know

God for the unbeliever for the un -christian this life is the only heaven they will ever experience but for the believer the one who trusts

God the one who has put their faith in Jesus Christ this life is the only hell we will ever experience we have eternity to look forward to with God in glory and so if these things are laid up for us if these are the promises that have been given to us in Christ then don't worry don't be divided between the things on earth and the things of heaven don't be distracted from pursuing his kingdom and his righteousness as Jesus talks about in verse 33 seek first his kingdom and his righteousness all the things that you need in this life will be added to you when you worry or when you invest yourself in these things that are in this life and you think that this is what you need is so again remember the the the word worry that we're reading here verse 31 do not worry then as I defined it yesterday it's better understood as do not be distracted or do not be divided do not be going after the things of this world that you neglect the promises that we have for God in glory so when you do that when you're distracted when you're divided you go after the things of this world when you worry about the things of this life what you are saying is that the promise of the kingdom is not good enough for me

I still have to have these things in life in order to feel satisfied in order to feel fulfilled and so that is to say to God what you have promised me is not enough and I need this in order to feel good and that thing has become your

God even if you think you're giving 99 % of your attention to the things of God and just 1 % to the things on earth

I don't know how you quantify that or can portion that out but let's say that's your justification it's still the 1 % thing it's still the tiny of the thing that you are calling the tiny little thing that's really your

God because you are not satisfied without that and so Jesus is saying don't be divided in these things

God knows you need these things he'll provide these things for you what should you do seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added to you this is really the statement in the

Sermon on the Mount this is the statement that shows us the righteousness that we should be pursuing

Jesus talked about this in chapter 5 be perfect as your

Heavenly Father is perfect Matthew 548 this righteousness that we should be pursuing is not a righteousness of our own it's not just Jesus simply telling us to be good because you can't be good in the

Sermon on the Mount he calls us evil he said of his own disciples back in verse 30 you of little faith there's these reminders in here in the

Sermon on the Mount that we cannot be good on our own so this is not Jesus telling us do better I hate that expression anyway

I hate it when somebody says that like they they bring up a list of wrongs that they think you're guilty of and then say do better oh please all you're saying is like do what

I want you to do I'm the moral superior the superior moral one what would be the better way to say that I have moral superiority here so I have the judgment to be able to tell you to do better than that doesn't guide anybody anywhere this is not

Jesus simply telling us his disciples to do better because again he says you don't have faith you're evil so how do we have righteousness we seek

God's righteousness seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all the things that you need will be added to you as well there have certainly been times in my life that I have been worried

I when I look back on my life I see that I've had it really good there were times when

I certainly complained about my circumstance there were times I thought my parents weren't being fair they weren't giving to me what

I thought I deserved there were times I thought my boss wasn't paying me what I thought that I was worth you know things of this nature or even the opportunities that were afforded to me man if I could have the same opportunities that that guy had

I could do so much more with them than then he's done and I would be jealous of somebody else's opportunities

I should be able to get those opportunities there have certainly been times in my life that I have felt that way but when

I look back over my life I see and realize just how good I had it my parents never had a lot of money

I've never had a lot of money my wife and I struggled our biggest struggles were right when we got married our first two years of marriage could never seem to get into the black any given month we're grateful that we had a good church that helped take care of us and and give us some of those extra needs just to get over that hump at the end of the month because we were not making it and we didn't have smartphones we didn't have cable

TV we had I think one vehicle between us you know all the the things that we enjoy just kind of are like the regular part of life who doesn't have a smartphone now we weren't paying for those things when we were first married and yet we still couldn't get into the black

I was an associate pastor on a very limited salary and it was hard times for us it was difficult and yet looking back on those times and seeing how

God provided for us through the wonderful brothers and sisters in the Lord that were around us our needs were being taken care of I've never had a reason to complain though there have been times in my life that I have complained

I know what it like I know what it's like to be on hard times I do know what that's like I've lived out of my car before I've not known what

I was gonna eat tomorrow I've been there before but yet looking back I can see how the

Lord has dealt bountifully with me even though I wasn't faithful to him he was faithful to me so on 13 ends this way verses 5 & 6 but I have trusted in your loving -kindness my heart shall rejoice in your salvation

I will sing to Yahweh because he has dealt bountifully with me now first and foremost

I trust the Word of God I trust what the Bible says but I I know from experience that God has provided for me and so I'm gonna trust

God with my future and I'm gonna take to heart and I'm gonna do as said in verse 34 do not worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will worry about itself

I mean that's that's Jesus being poetic how does tomorrow worry about itself tomorrow doesn't doesn't have a personality it doesn't have any self -awareness so how can tomorrow worry about itself let those things that are gonna happen tomorrow happen what do you need to be doing today to handle today and is also giving you bright hope for tomorrow seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all the things you need

God will give to you concern yourself with that today think of the things that are stored up for us in glory let your mind meditate on that resist the temptations that are in this world and go after the righteousness that is in Christ the righteousness you've been given by faith in Christ live in holiness today don't worry about tomorrow don't have your devotions divided but seek first these things and God will take care of all the rest

Paul says this in Colossians 3 1 therefore if you have been raised up with Christ keep seeking the things that are above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God surely

Paul is putting into effect here in Colossians 3 what Jesus said in Matthew 6 seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness

Paul heard it and now he's commanding it to the Colossians let me go on to verses 2 through 4 set your mind on the things above not on the things that are on earth for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God when

Christ who is your life is manifested then you also will be manifested with him in glory when

Christ who is your life appears you will appear with him in glory so where should your heart be where should your mind be on the things that are above where Christ is and when that's the longing of your heart you will not worry about the things of this world

Heavenly Father I thank you for what you've taught to us as we've been going through this section

Matthew 625 to 34 this instruction that we hear from Christ do not worry about your life but let our devotions not be divided we are fully committed to Christ with all that we are heart soul mind and strength we seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all the things that we need will be added to us we seek

Christ we look to Jesus we cling to him as it says in Hebrews 12 let us put off every sin and weight that so easily entangles and run with endurance the race that is set before us looking to Jesus the author and the perfecter of our faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross despising the shame and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God let him be what we seek after today it's in Jesus name we pray

Pastor Gabe is the author of several books and Bible studies available in paperback or for your e -reader for titles and more information visit our website at www .utt