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I invite you to open your Bibles with me to Luke chapter 12. Again, this morning, we've been in Luke 12 for a while. Many precious truths here in the example and teaching of Christ. I'm gonna begin at verse 13, and then I'll read down through verse 21. The focus of our study will be this morning on verses 22 through 34, but let's read that in its context. And someone in the crowd said to him, Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me. But he said to him, "'Man, who appointed me a judge or arbiter over you?' And he said to them, "'Beware and be on your guard against every form of greed, "'for not even when one has an abundance "'does his life consist of his possessions.' "'And he told them a parable, saying, "'The land of a certain rich man was very productive, And he began reasoning to himself, saying, what shall I do since I have no place to store my crops? And he said, this is what I will do. I will tear down my barns and build larger ones. And there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said to him, you fool. This very night your soul is required of you. And now who will own what you have prepared? So is the man who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. Here the Lord Jesus in the previous verses to those that we read is instructing his hearers upon weighty, even life and death matters. His disciples would soon be facing for following him. And he's rudely interrupted by a man who's squabbling with his brother over the distribution of the family inheritance. And so this interruption provides our Lord with an opportunity to warn these bickering brothers and the listening crowd against the sin of covetousness. And our Lord reinforces His warning with a parable about the tragic condition and the unexpected demise of a foolish rich man who has much in the way of the world's goods, but is not rich toward God. He has treasures in this world, but he's not laying up treasures in the world to come. Jesus' parable of the rich fool that we considered last Lord's Day, it acts as a transition from his warning against the sin of covetousness to admonishing his disciples against the sin of worry. This man worried much about the great wealth that he had, but his disciples may worry very much about what little that they had. You see, brethren, covetousness and worry are really kindred sins. This is not hard to understand. Covetousness and worry are both expressions of unbelief. You see, the covetous man trusts not in God, but in his riches. And the anxious man fails to trust God to provide for his needs. You see, both covetousness and worry demonstrate a failure of faith. We're not surprised that those who don't know God and don't trust Christ, worry about the meeting of their temporal and material needs. Since they don't know God, they don't trust him as their provider. You see, until God opens our eyes to see his kingdom, we walk by sight and not by faith. Only as we walk by faith are we taught by grace to rest in God's promises that He will provide for us even when circumstances seem to argue to the contrary. Indeed, we just read about thousands of people. They didn't have anything to eat. There were just a few loaves of bread and a few fish. And the disciples were wondering, how can we feed all of these people? And Jesus said, you feed them. And Jesus fed the 5,000 through the hands of his disciples. Indeed, they were involved in the miracle of the feeding of the 5,000. He gave to them, and then they fed all of those hungry people. So right there, the disciples were taught that Jesus has resources that they know nothing about. And if he fed these strangers, will he not also feed his own people? You see, God gave us His Holy Spirit who enables us to confidently pour out our hearts and to plead for our needs to our Heavenly Father through Jesus Christ, our Savior. This blessed assurance is unknown by the world. Only those who can say that this Jesus is mine possess such unspeakable confidence. They know that the God who saved them will continue to provide for them. And then he that began that good work in them will continue that work. He who has brought them to grace will ultimately bring them to glory. And following on the heels of the parable of the rich fool, our Lord presents, as it were, a living parable on trusting God for our daily bread. He instructs His original hearers and He instructs us through our eyeballs, showing us from the realm of nature, God's unfailing care of His creation. And from these illustrations, our Lord exposes the folly of worrying that our heavenly Father will not provide for our needs. I speak of the sin of worry. We might think, yeah, covetousness is sin, but is worry sin? I mean, sin is so natural and normal, we might think that if it's a sin, it's a very minor one. No worrying that God is gonna provide says some terrible things about God that we might not think that we say when we worry whether God will provide. So Jesus follows his prohibition against worry about God's temporal provision of his disciples with an exhortation for us to seek unfailing kingdom riches. Follow with me as I read verses 22 through 34. I will back up to verse 21. So is the man who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. And he said to his disciples, for this reason I say to you, do not be anxious about your life as to what you shall eat, nor for your body as to what you shall put on, for life is more than food and the body than clothing. Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap, and they have no storeroom nor barn, and yet God feeds them, how much more valuable you are than birds. And which of you by being anxious can add a single cubit to his lifespan? If then you cannot do even a very little thing, why are you anxious about other matters? Consider the lilies, how they grow. They neither toil nor spin. But I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory did not clothe himself like one of these. But if God so erased the grass in the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, how much more will he clothe you, O men of little faith? and do not seek what you shall eat and what you shall drink, and do not keep worrying. For all these things the nations of the world eagerly seek, but your father knows that you need these things. But seek for his kingdom, and these things shall be added to you. Do not be afraid, little flock, For your father has chosen gladly to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to charity. Make yourselves purses which do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven where no thief comes near nor moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. They may recognize this teaching. Jesus taught this in another occasion in the Sermon on the Mount, and he teaches this group of disciples and those that are gathered to hear the same truths. Now, this morning, we're going to consider, first of all, Jesus' prohibition against the sin of worrying in verse 22. And then in verses 22 through 28, we're going to consider natural illustrations enforcing Jesus' prohibition against worrying. And then we're going to look in verses 25 through 30, reasons for heeding Jesus' prohibition against worry. And then we'll look at Jesus' prescription for preventing worry in verses 31 through 34. And then I'll come to some concluding applications. How relevant this word is for us, is it not? How often we worry. We're anxious about our lives. were concerned about the future. Now notice those whom Jesus addresses here. It's not the distracted brother who demanded that Jesus settle his family inheritance dispute, but he and his brother would do well to listen since they worried only about increasing things in this perishing world. And it would not have been any Pharisees among them who were lovers of money, though they should have bent their ear toward Jesus, since he is addressing the subject of wealth, which was very near and dear to them. Certainly infidels and atheists were not the primary object of Jesus' application, since they would have found his instruction about being rich toward God to be very whimsical and nonsensical. No, if they're going to be rich, they're going to be rich in this world. There ain't no world to come in their minds. We have to grab all the gusto here. The object of Jesus' instruction here is His disciples. These are those who had entrusted their souls to His care. His message is to his beloved, the ones that are children of God, his adopted children, those under his constant loving care. He's addressing Christians, those who have a saving interest in Jesus, but Christians who worry. Are you a Christian that worries? Then Jesus has a message for you. You see, even God's beloved children, who know they have fabulous riches waiting for them in heaven, are still worried about their daily bread and their ordinary clothing. At times, we are tempted to doubt God's consistent provision. Jesus didn't want his disciples to get the idea that his warning against covetousness and its reinforcement in his parable to the foolish rich man didn't apply to them. Sometimes we shut our ears to instruction that God intends for us thinking that it's intended for somebody else. Though we need to listen to every word of God because it's all intended for us. Now it's safe to say that few of Jesus' disciples would have possessed barns bursting with grain and goods. You see, most of these disciples were on the other end of the economic spectrum. Few may have had any kind of wealth. Levi or Matthew, he left everything behind him. The Four fishermen, Peter and Andrew and James and John, they probably had a good business. They probably didn't live from hand to mouth or paycheck to paycheck, we would say today, but they left everything. We don't know about the other disciples, their backgrounds, but they left everything likewise and followed Jesus. And they're facing an uncertain future in their mind. Though it's certain in Jesus' mind, because He promises to take care of His own. At one point, you may remember Peter with one eye looking back upon his secure past as a fisherman and the other eye toward an uncertain future, bluntly asked Jesus, behold, unlike this man that you just said to sell everything and come and follow him, unlike him, we have left everything and followed you. What will there be for us? Jesus' answer promised him and the other disciples that they would not be the losers for following him. God would care for all of their material needs in this life, and at the end, he would provide them eternal life. In other words, you're gonna be provided for here, and the best is yet to come. And so Jesus urged them to trust God. Indeed, remember Jesus had just fed earlier the 5,000 and in feeding the 5,000, it was an illustration for him to preach himself as the bread of life. If he provided their material needs and they left that meal with 12 baskets, Jesus preached himself as the one, if you feed upon him, you shall live and never die. and yet they still worried how God would supply their daily needs. Jesus warns his disciples against being anxious about God's provision. This word anxious means to worry, to be overly concerned about something, you fix your attention on it, it occupies your thinking, you just can't get it out of your mind, Brethren, this word paints a graphic picture. It suggests something that's being torn to pieces. Jesus uses this word since worry has a way of tearing at our minds. Worry disturbs, it distracts, it destroys peace and contentment. Worry agitates us. We don't have the peace that passes all understanding that guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus when we're worrying. How often we have doubted God's provision, have we not? Perhaps even had ulcers and we've been robbed of sleep worrying about what God is going to do to provide for us. How often we have doubted God's provision, and He has kindly reproved us, saying through a gracious providence, My child, why do you worry? He graciously brings us up short. It enables us to look back at His past faithfulness, His present provision, and His future promises. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Are we going to slip through the cracks? Is He somehow going to forget about us? Brethren, perish the thought. You see, when we worry, we forget who we are. We are children of the King. We are princes and princesses. Will He not care for the members of His royal family that were bought with the blood of His precious Son? He's got an investment in us, and he's gonna carry that on in the present and forever in the future. So that's briefly Jesus' prohibition against the sin of worrying. Notice secondly, in verses 22 through 28, natural illustrations that Jesus uses to enforce his prohibition against worrying. Jesus knows. He knows our frame that we are but dust. He knows that we're easily distracted. And he knows sometimes that just a plain statement of the truth falls heavy upon our ears and we don't understand and we don't retain. He knows that we sometimes more easily learn truth with pictures and with stories. In fact, we like pictures and we like stories even as older people. When we're younger, we like to pick up a book and we like to see the pictures. Well, even as grownups, we still need pictures. We still need stories to reinforce truth. So Jesus used illustrations to reinforce spiritual and eternal truth. In fact, we are captivated. by Jesus' description of himself as the good shepherd. We can visualize that. The good shepherd who seeks and saves lost sheep by laying his life down in their place. Jesus appeals to our need for food and water by picturing himself as the bread of life who satisfies hungry souls and as the living water whose slakes are thirsty souls. He does that so that we can envision the great and glorious truths behind what he's teaching. Indeed, the Lord Jesus is the great interpreter of nature. God has created this world as his world, and he's created it with all of the non-reasoning creation, all the inanimate creation, all of the animals and all the birds and all the flowers to teach us wonderful truths, to reinforce things that we find in the word of God. You see, God's creatures speak to us of their creator. And when he speaks through these animals and through this grass, we ought to listen because his voice is in these things. Job exhorts us in Job 12 in verse seven, but now ask the beasts and let them teach you and the birds of the heavens and let them tell you. So what do the birds and the flowers teach us? What does Jesus say? Notice, first of all, Jesus says, in effect, look to the birds to teach you about God's provision of your necessary food. The command to consider that we find here in verses 24 and 27, it speaks of intensive sensory perception, to borrow language from a Greek dictionary, intense sensory, with our eyes, our nose, our hands, intense sensory perception. It speaks of attentive scrutiny of something, to study it carefully, to examine it. You see, birds are so commonplace that we easily overlook them, don't we? But our Lord didn't. He noted that sparrows that fall from the sky do so under our heavenly Father's watchful eye. He calculated their value to men and to God. Are not five sparrows sold for two cents? And yet not one of them is forgotten before God? I had occasion to be at the cub parking lot recently, and a friend ran in to get something. It was early in the morning, and I was watching these little sparrows flitting about, chirping happily, picking up the food that God provides them. And I thought of this passage. Lord, you're teaching me through these birds not to worry about your provision. Lord, if you provide for these birds, aren't you going to provide for me? Brethren, if God will not forget paltry sparrows, will He forget His precious people? We should argue from the lesser to the greater, from the natural to the spiritual, from the temporal to the eternal. These are lessons God is teaching us. Here Jesus chooses An unlikely bird to underscore God's faithful provision of His people. Look at verse 24. Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap. And looking back to the parable of the rich man, no doubt, for they neither sow nor reap. They have no storeroom or barn, yet God feeds them. How much more valuable are you than birds? These ravens or these crows, they're not farmers. They don't plant, they don't reap, they don't store up grain in barns like the rich man. Crows are humble scavengers. and God feeds them. And furthermore, these ravens, these crows, are unclean birds, and yet God continually cares for them, feeding them every day. When I was laid up with my knee injuries, I would be awake in the morning, and then again in the evening, and I would watch the crows fly by my window, going out to scavenge. And then later on in the day, when the sun's getting ready to set, they would fly back by the other direction and they would come to their roots here in the Twin Cities. They would go out hungry and they'd come back full. God provided for them. Brethren, Jesus is saying to us, be bird watchers. Not unbelieving bird watchers who don't see God's hand in this, but be believing bird watchers. Look for the lessons that Jesus would teach you. Stimics have a lot of bird feeders outside their house. They are God's hands to these birds' mouths. And the stimics feed these birds. Will not God feed them? You see, Jesus teaches us by looking at birds that worry about God's provision. Provision is as foolish as it is unnecessary. Birds don't worry about where their next meal's coming from. God always provides them enough to eat. Psalm 147, verse nine. He gives to the beast its food and to the young ravens which cry. Are we not much more valuable to God than birds? You see, the God who feeds birds will feed his people. Remember Elijah, the Lord dispatched ravens to feed his prophet in the wilderness. Dear ones, he who fed Elijah miraculously will feed his people providentially. The fact is we all live from hand to mouth, from his hand to our mouth. Think also of Jesus' parable that introduces his instruction. He's contrasting well-fed ravens with worrying men. Ravens croak contentedly while men wring their hands. Life doesn't consist in the abundance of our possessions. Life is more than food. We are fed by the hand of God who owns the cattle on a thousand hills. If he feeds his cattle, won't he feed his people? If he feeds animals, will he not provide for those that are his own? Dear worrying brethren, hear your Lord. How much more valuable are you than birds? Do we really believe the lyrics that we sang just a few moments ago? The birds without garner or storehouse are fed, from them let us learn to trust God for our bread. His saints, what is fitting, shall ne'er be denied, so long as tis written, the Lord will provide. But the problem is our covetousness often gets in the way our greed. You know, sometimes we're feeding upon humble hot dogs when we would be eating a filet mignon. We think, well, God's not providing. Oh, he isn't? He's providing for us to teach us to trust him. But you don't understand. I'm not getting things the way I want them. I'm not getting as much as I want. Well, it's a problem with God or it's a problem with you and me. You may drive a beater and you wanna drive a beamer. Bless God that you have wheels. Secondly, look to the grass, Jesus says, to teach you about God's provision of your needed clothing. We worry about what we're gonna wear. Jesus' disciples worried about what they would wear. The humble grass that clothes the ground preaches a powerful sermon if we have but eyes to see? Will the God who promises to provide food for our table, will he not keep clothes upon our back? Yes, he will. You know, we may not shop at Macy's, we may shop at Value Village, but is God not providing for us? He provides us what we need, never less than what we need, always what we need. And if we have eyes to see, we will say even more than what we need. So Jesus points his worrying disciples from well-fed birds to gorgeously adorned grass. You see, wildflowers don't worry about their dress any more than birds worry about their food. And God attires them beautifully. When I was a college student, I worked at Glacier National Park, Montana for two summers. And the bursting wildflowers out there are nothing less than amazing. One crop comes in as beautiful and it fades away and another crop of flowers comes in. Oh, does it preach the provision of God? God clothes the hillsides with such beauty. You see, flowers are gloriously and gorgeously clothed from the hand of God. Roadside wildflowers are among the most beautiful in God's creation, I would say. Look at verses 27 and 28. Consider the lilies. And when Jesus said this, no doubt they could look around and see them. He wasn't saying try to imagine the lilies. No, look around you. How they grow. They neither toil nor spin, but I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory did not clothe himself like one of these. But if God so erased the grass in the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace for fuel, how much more will he clothe you, O men of little faith? Solomon was the richest man in the world. And likely he was the best dressed man of his day. And what people today would do to sneak a peek into his royal closets to see how he adorned himself. But Jesus said, there's something more beautiful than that. Look around at these common flowers. They're uncommonly attired. Beholding Solomon's grandeur took the queen of Sheba's breath away. And yet the splendor of the king and all of his royal attire could not be compared to the radiant beauty with which God clothed the flowers on the surrounding hills around Galilee. An old Puritan has observed that every blade of grass preaches the goodness of God. Will God clothe the grass and leave you naked? The Lord Jesus says again, perish the thought. You may not dress in Gucci's, but God is going to provide clothing for you. Again, often the problem is our greed and not God's provision. Jesus' point is this, if God gorgeously provides for grass that ends up being fuel for the oven, won't he provide ample clothing for his own people? Notice, thirdly, we've seen Jesus' prohibition, we've seen reasons for heeding Jesus, or natural illustrations for enforcing Jesus' prohibition. Now, thirdly, reasons for heeding Jesus' prohibition against worry. He has lessons for us here. Notice, first of all, that worry is unprofitable and powerless to provide. When did your worrying do you any good at all? Worry can no more provide for our needs than it can make us taller or increase our lifespan, depending on your translation. Worry attempts the impossible. Look at verses 25 and 26. If then you cannot do even a very little thing, why are you anxious about other matters? You can't add any length to your height. Which of you, by being anxious, can add a single cubit to his height or to his lifespan? We can't do any of that. Only God can do that. What is our Lord using by this bizarre illustration? What's he saying? He wants us to know that fretting and stewing about our needs not only is unnecessary, we shouldn't be doing it, it's unprofitable, it's not going to change anything. In fact, it's only going to worry us more so. It may increase our desire for such things and only compound our anxiety about them. Worry cannot provide our knees. Let us learn to trust God. Only He can provide, and He will, hasn't He? So worry is unprofitable and powerless to provide. Notice secondly, worry destabilizes us spiritually. Verse 29, and do not seek what you shall eat and what you shall drink and do not keep worrying. There's the word of focus, worrying. This word worry was sometimes used of being tossed to and fro like a ship upon a tempestuous sea. It paints a picture of being lifted high up on the crest and then being thrown down into the trough of a storm. Such is often the emotional and spiritual impact of worry. It destabilizes us. Distrusting God leads to distracting cares that unsettle our soul. And really it's hard to overestimate the relevancy of Jesus' command. His warning suggests in the form that it's given, that his disciples were presently worrying. And what he's saying there is literally, stop worrying, stop being tossed to and fro by your concerns of your temporal and material needs. Now brother, let's not misunderstand our Lord. He is not urging us to live a life of denial of our needs. He's not commanding us like ostriches to stick our heads in the sand. We are to face facts, crucial facts. Worry blinds us to one crucial fact of life, and that is that it worries us that God has continued to provide for us in the past, and he will continue to provide for us in the future. Look at your own life. Why should you worry right now? Hasn't God provided for you in the past? Isn't he providing for you in the present? Do you think that he's somehow not gonna provide for you in the future? Again, Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Brethren, we need to look away from our need to the God who feeds, birds, and clothes the grass. Will he not care for us? Jesus is not asking us to play mind games with ourselves. He isn't asking us to deny reality, but he is urging us to quit worrying about our material needs by keeping the eyes of our soul fixed upon the one that feeds the birds and clothes the grass. We need to continually argue from the lesser to the greater. If God provides for inanimate and for unreasoning creation, like the grass and the birds, won't He provide for men, especially those that are His own? Won't He provide for us? Doesn't God have deep pockets? And those pockets never become empty by providing our needs. He's never going to run out someday and tell us that we need to go into town with the 200 denarii and buy food. He's going to provide for us. Psalm 146, verse 5, How blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, the God of his covenant people, whose hope is in the Lord his God. Thirdly, worry displays an unbelieving pagan spirit. Verse 30. For all these things, these things that God has promised to provide, food and clothing, for all these things that Gentiles or the nations of the world eagerly seek, it's job one for them. Their minds are fixed on it. They're constantly running after it. But your father, your author knows that you need these things. Why should We be anxious when God is meeting our temporal needs. Jesus says that when we worry, we act no differently than the people of the world. We act no differently than pagans. Now, unbelievers, they don't honor God, they don't give him thanks, they live as if he doesn't exist. And we're in danger of living like them when we doubt God's provision. Unbelievers know nothing of pillowing their heads comfortably upon the bosom of God's promises. And so they continually fret and stew about who and how or what is going to meet their temporal needs. You see, worry tells lies about God. Worry denies God's omniscience. Brethren, we live in His world. He knows our needs. He knows them better than we know them. And worry denies God's love. It denies His consummate care. He daily cares for us. A worrywart Christian, Jesus says, is a contradiction in terms. We cannot both trust God and worry that He won't provide at the same time. You see, the one excludes the other. Worry is unbefitting of a child of God. Hebrews chapter 13, verses five and six. Let your character be free from the love of money, being content with what you have. For he himself has said, I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you. So that we may say confidently, the Lord is my helper. I will not be afraid. What shall man do to me? In all the changing scenes in life, God is the same. He's going to provide for us. We just need to trust in that provision. And happy will we be if we do. Indeed, why should we worry like those who don't have this God as their Heavenly Father? And fourthly, notice very briefly, Jesus' prescription for preventing worry in verses 31 through 34. You see, Jesus here, he issues a corrective for worry. If we wouldn't worry about our temporal needs, let us make God's concerns our concerns. Let us not seek the things of this world, but rather seek the things of God's kingdom. And when we get our eyes off of ourselves by seeking God's kingdom, indeed, we will look beyond our own needs to helping others with theirs. This the anxious rich fool did not do. Indeed, in this way he showed that he was not rich toward God, either for time or for eternity. But seek for his kingdom and these things will be added to you. Do not be afraid, little flock, for your father has chosen gladly to give you the kingdom. Yes, he's going to provide for your food now and he's going to clothe you, but you have something far better waiting for you. He's going to provide for you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to charity. Make yourselves purses which do not wear out an unfailing treasure in heaven where no thief comes near nor moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Notice first, seek God's kingdom and he will provide for all your needs, verses 31 and 32. You see, if we would not worry about God meeting our needs, we need to focus our attention upon serving him and his kingdom. Is God not gonna provide for his servants? Brethren, when we look to God and seek to do His will, we'll never fear. We need to remember who we are and whose we are. Should children of the king worry about their needs being met? Did Solomon clothe his children? No doubt. And even the grass in the field is more gloriously clothed than Solomon. Brethren, let us walk with eyes of faith fixed upon our heavenly king. You see, faith banishes fear. How can we be afraid when we look to the generous hand of our heavenly father to supply our needs? If he has chosen gladly to give us his kingdom and one day he will receive us into that kingdom, will he not supply our present temporal needs? He's going to get us there. If he will one day receive us into his kingdom, that kingdom of glory, will he not take care of us now in the kingdom of grace? And though we may be small in number, and though we are a little flock now, our shepherd king will keep us until he brings us safely at last into his heavenly kingdom. Secondly, Provide for others' needs even as God provides for yours. We see this in verses 33 and 34. This shows that where our treasure is, our heart will be and our hand will be here helping others, even as our heart is in heaven. Since we serve a generous king, shouldn't we be generous with what he provides? Doesn't he give to us that we may give to others? He's made us to be conduits of his blessing, however much or however little we have. If our treasure is where our heart is, and our treasure is in heaven, one day we will follow our heart to glory. But if our heart's treasure is here, heaven will never be our home. It is precisely on this point that the covetous rich man proved that he was not rich toward God. Now, what does it say to us by way of a few concluding applications? If you happen to have a handout, they're not on there. I pencil these in later. First of all, there's four. When we are in doubt about God's provision, let us look to his constant care of his creatures. Let us be gracious, glorious naturalists. Saying, oh, we see the glory of God in His care in this world. There's birds that are flying around that are testifying with their chirps that they're happy because God provides. Secondly, let us keep ever in mind whose we are when we are tempted to worry about God's provision. We are God's precious little flock. We are to God what that little lamb was to David's bosom in his heart. We're precious to him. Is he gonna leave us wanting? And we are children of the king. He takes care of his own. And we are heirs of God's eternal kingdom. Let's not worry about his provision for us today. Thirdly, let us be as generous with others as God is generous with us. Let us invest God's blessing in the lives of others, and in this way we show that we are rich toward God. We trust him. We give to others knowing that God will give to us. We can't out give God. And finally, let us live with our eyes upon our gracious heavenly home. If heaven is in our hearts here, we will be there hereafter. Let us live with one foot in glory and the other foot in this world, knowing that we are going to make the transition one day, knowing that God is going to provide for us here and he will receive us there in mansions of glory. Now we may have a very humble life here. We may not be rich and well endued with goods. Brethren, let us be thankful that most of us are not rich and endued with goods because we can place our hope and our happiness on those things. The more we have in this way of this world, often the less we have of God and preparation for the other world. But if we have God here and we seek to serve Him in His kingdom here, we're proving ourselves to be rich toward God. And may God make us fabulously wealthy. Let's pray. Our Father, You know our hearts. But we are like the disciples. Indeed, they worried and we worry and we have no reason to worry. It's foolish. It's impotent. Let us fix our eyes upon Jesus, who is not only the author of our faith, but the finisher of our faith. And he who is our savior will be our supplier of every needed thing in this world. Lord, if you spared not your own son, but delivered him up for us all, how will you not also with him freely give us all things spiritually and materially, things for time, and ultimately the glory in eternity? Help us to fix our eyes upon Jesus, who is also the finisher of our faith. We pray this in his name, amen. you
Jesus' Lessons from nature on trusting God for our provision
Series Studies in Our Lord's Parables
Sermon ID | 317241712187918 |
Duration | 51:51 |
Date | |
Category | Sunday - AM |
Bible Text | Luke 12:22-30 |
Language | English |
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