Be Not Anxious About Tomorrow

Introduction: The Significance of Christ's Teaching on Anxiety

0:03 Now let us turn together to the sixth chapter of Matthew's Gospel. We will conclude our studies of chapter six this morning, and then the Lord willing, move on into chapter seven.

0:19 And I believe, as I was trying to project a little bit into the future, the Lord spares us that probably on another ten or twelve Sunday mornings we'll be in the Sermon on the Mount. Chapter seven, I believe, we'll be able to get through in about ten to twelve messages, unless we get unusually blessed with certain areas, as I seek to prepare and find drawn out in that area.

0:48 Chapter six, and our text this morning is the last verse of this chapter.

0:56 Take therefore no thought, or better translated, be not anxious therefore for the morrow, for the morrow shall be... be anxious for the things of itself.

1:10 Sufficient unto this day is the evil thereof. Now verse thirty-four is a conclusion, a climax, and so its meaning will not be felt unless we hold before us that which has preceded it. And so I remind you briefly of the setting of this verse. In the sixth chapter, beginning with verse nineteen, down through the text I just read to you, our Lord is dealing with the problem, first of all, of a positive love of the world of things, in verses nineteen to twenty-four, and then in verses twenty-five to thirty-four, the problem of sinful anxiety concerning the world of things. Now it's interesting that no subject is dealt with at such length in the entire Sermon on the Mount. The great biblical teaching on a subject such as divorce and marriage is dealt with in a matter of five or six verses. The whole subject of personal revenge and retaliation is dealt with in five or six verses.

2:21 We'll see in chapter seven that the matter of judging and having a hypercritical spirit is dealt with in a matter of five or four or five verses. But here, when our Lord introduces the subject of sinful love for the things of the world and then moves on to the matter of sinful love, sinful anxiety about the things of the world, He moves all the way from verse nineteen through to verse thirty-four. The most detailed handling of any subject in the Sermon on the Mount. Now this should be significant to us.

2:56 When you're driving down the highway and you come to just a little sign that says danger, curve, well, you figure it's a curve you can negotiate without too much problem. If you're driving a little bit further and you come to a sign that's bigger that says danger, curve, slow down to forty miles an hour, why the bigger sign means you better take a little more caution, and then sometimes you've come, I'm sure, and you're driving to these places in the mountains where you take one of these literal hairpin turns and as you approach it'll say danger, curve ahead, and you get a little closer and there'll be a bigger sign, and then right on that curve, many times I've seen signs that were probably eight by twelve, all in that glitter paint, red and white, the big arrow, and a sign of that nature is an added one, warning that danger's ahead. Now, in the Scriptures, God does the same thing. Everything's important, and every signpost that says to us danger, here's an area into which you may fall, demands our attention. But when we come to a section which our Lord expands and amplifies and deals with in such detail, it's as though God is putting a ten by fourteen sign, lighting it up with bright neon lights, putting glitter, paint on it, and arrows and exclamation points and saying, danger!

4:18 Multitudes have gone shipwreck, or to keep the figure, multitudes have leaped over the bank and over the boundaries and have gone crashing down the hillside because they did not heed the warning about a sinful attachment to things and a sinful concern about the things, of this life. And as our Lord deals with this problem, He does not say, there's one little secret that will help you in this, or one little command. But as we've observed, He gives us many conclusions, many things to consider. So the way of deliverance from this problem of sinful anxiety and the sinful love of things does not come by getting hold of one little simple truth. We've got to behold, our Lord says, behold the birds and consider the lilies. We've got to do some observation. We've got to make some simple and determined observations if we're to be delivered.

5:25 We've got to draw some conclusions. Our Lord asks some questions. Are you not of much more value than they? We've got to do some contemplating on the futility of worry and of frustration about things.

5:41 And the reason our Lord does, this is because whatever holds your mind will mold your life.

5:50 What holds the mind molds the life. And three times in a similar passage in 1 Peter, Peter says, I want you to call these things to remembrance. I want you to be mindful of the words of Christ. I want, he says, after my death, that you should be able to remember what I've said.

6:12 Whatever is holding my mind, as a Christian, is going to mold my life. Now, do you want to be delivered from sinful anxiety about things? Then certain truths have got to hold your mind.

6:26 Truths about your worth in the light of the other creatures God has made. Truths about the futility of frustrating worry and this kind of nagging concern. And only as these truths are held in the mind will they mold and shape the life. Now, all of us by nature are mentally lazy.

6:48 And that's why so many times we are spiritually frustrated. We want God to make a pipeline direct from the throne of glory into our hearts and we want grace to be conveyed directly from that pipeline from the throne of glory to our own hearts. We don't want it to come by way of our minds. But God has no such pipeline.

7:08 And grace is poured into the heart as the mind embraces the truth of God and as faith, appropriates that truth then we know God's grace in those circumstances. That's why Jesus says consider the lilies. That's something you've got to do with your eyes and with your head. Not with your heart.

7:28 That's why he says behold the fowls of the air. That's something you've got to do with your eyes and you've got to make some conclusions. And when he says are you not of much more value than the birds? That's a question directed to your mind and your mind has got to give an answer.

7:41 Now why all these questions? All these observations? Because what holds the mind will mold and shape the life. Now we come in this study to this 34th verse which is a conclusion of all that our Lord has said regarding the subject of anxious care.

The Broad Prohibition of Anxious Care for Tomorrow

8:02 He's shown us that such anxious care is needless, it's senseless, it's useless, it's faithless, and it's heathenish. After all these things do the Gentiles seek? And then he brought us to that wonderful conclusion in verse 33 the positive way of deliverance seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added. If you want to be delivered from anxiety about things then get your heart and life so fixed upon that which is eternal and the Lord says that which is temporal shall be added.

8:39 It's the same principle that our Lord dealt with. He that would save his life shall what? Shall lose it. But he that will lose his life for my sake in the Gospels shall find it.

8:51 If you make the focal point of your concern temporal things you'll not only run the risk of missing them but you'll miss that which is eternal. But our Lord says if you make the focal point of your concern that which is eternal you'll not only gain that which is eternal but you have His promise you'll also gain all that you need in the way of temporal necessities.

9:15 Now verse 34 almost looks like an anti-climax doesn't it? Having brought the teaching up to this fine point in verse 33 this almost seems unnecessary. Take therefore no anxious thought for the moral for the moral shall take thought for the things of itself sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. But as we study the verse I'm sure you'll see it is by no means anti-climactic but it's part of the summary of the entire passage.

9:45 First of all let's just go through and consider a simple outline of the thoughts as we find them here. We have this prohibition of anxious care. Take therefore no thought for the moral. Notice this is broader than the other commands.

10:04 Back in verse 25 take no thought for your life what you shall eat or drink. There's anxious thought particularly related to the necessities of life. We find the same thing down in verse 31. Take no anxious thought saying what shall we eat or drink or wherewithal shall we be clothed.

10:25 But verse 34 is much more broad and general in its application. Notice. Take therefore no thought for anything that pertains to the moral. Here is a prohibition of anxious care concerning anything that I see as a problem of tomorrow.

10:48 It could be material. In its context our Lord has been dealing with food and clothing and with the necessities of life. But it could be political. Some of us who have a little bit of awareness of what's going on in the political scene in our own country we could worry ourselves to death.

11:06 We see the inroads of relativism and that kind of political liberalism that would throw by the boards all of the landmarks of time-proven principles and chuck them out the window. And I tell you it could drive you crazy once you know a little bit of the trends the absolute lack of principle that motivates many of our politicians in high places. Are you concerned about these things? If you have any awareness you naturally would be.

11:35 Now our Lord says take no anxious thought for the moral. As you view not only your material needs but the political scene as you think of your own physical existence. Some of you have a history in your background of relatives who perhaps contracted TB. Others perhaps seem to show a real you see there's a lot of history of cancer on your side of the family.

11:59 Or perhaps when people have reached a certain age they've had mental problems and this troubles you. As you think of the moral great fears well up within your heart well am I going to be next? Now the Lord's dealing with things just as practical. He's saying take no anxious thought for the moral whether it's relative to material provisions political and social and economic problems whether it's physical here's a blanket prohibition of all anxious care relative to tomorrow and then he gives two reasons to support that prohibition.

12:32 Notice them. For the moral shall take thought for the things of itself. What is our Lord saying? Simply this.

12:40 Tomorrow if it comes will not only bring life the sun the moon work responsibility but it will bring its own legitimate burdens but tomorrow never brings them till it comes. You see tomorrow never comes a day early with its problems.

13:00 You might be expecting a letter from someone and oh it comes a day early you say wonderful. You might be expecting some bills the end of the month and when they come early it's not so wonderful but sometimes that happens. You might be expecting a visitor to come tomorrow and they come today. That will never happen with tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow's responsibilities and burdens.

13:18 They are always there tomorrow they never come today. That's what our Lord is saying. He said why are you anxious for tomorrow? Reason number one why you shouldn't be is that when tomorrow comes if it comes it will bring with it its own anxieties its own problems its own burdens its own responsibilities but tomorrow is always on schedule.

13:40 Tomorrow never comes with its burdens today. Then we all realize that and we all realize but every time we fret about tomorrow we've forgotten it. So you've got to get this truth up in your head for what holds the mind will mold the light. See?

13:54 Every one of you sitting here this morning you say well pastor you're not telling me anything new. It's obvious. Tomorrow never dumps its problems on me today and yet every time you're fretting about tomorrow what have you done? You've reached into tomorrow and taken its problems and sat them upon your own shoulder today.

14:11 Tomorrow never did that to you. You did it. And the Lord says this is foolish. Then the Lord says the second reason He gives is this.

14:17 Sufficient unto the day or this day is the evil thereof. Today has its own problems and necessities and these should be enough to occupy your interest and your energies. These are enough to be the object of your labor and of your trust and your confidence in God. Sufficient unto this day are the evils thereof.

14:43 That's the second reason why we shouldn't be anxious about tomorrow. Don't you have enough to do with today? Anybody around here that doesn't have enough to do with today? Come and see me.

14:53 I've got some things I'd like to share that I'd like to have somebody else do. Don't you have enough in each day to keep you occupied? Your thoughts? Your interests?

15:02 Your energies? Well then what in the world are you doing going into tomorrow and begging some more and borrowing some more? The Lord says that's foolish. Sufficient enough for this day is the evil thereof.

The Nature of Sinful Anxiety: Future and Futile

15:14 The burdens, the problems, the responsibilities. So much now for the general thought of what our Lord is saying. And I want in the second place this morning by way of summary and also of application to derive from this entire passage as it comes to its summary in this verse some very practical observations and conclusions about the subject of sinful anxiety. The first one I want us to consider touches the nature of worry or sinful anxiety.

15:48 What is the nature of sinful anxiety and worry?

15:54 Well the first thing we know about the nature is that it's always occupied with the future. Always occupied with the future. We may be tormented and haunted by the past. We may be delighted or made uncomfortable by the present.

16:14 But worry is always futuristic. And it's nature. Let me explain what I mean. You might sit here this morning and say, boy, you know, when I went out this morning I noticed that my left front tire was getting kind of bald.

16:30 And you may not be hearing a word I'm saying. All you're thinking about you're worrying, well what will happen if I get a flat tire on the way home? Today is Sunday and I know Jake's place is closed and I know that that other place will wear it in the world. What do I do?

16:41 I'll be sitting there all afternoon and I won't get my roast to burn and you can be sitting here thinking worried, worried, worried about all this problem. But now, if you're driving home and you get a flat tire you don't worry then. What do you do?

16:53 You get out and change it. If you don't have a spare you go around and you do something. You don't sit there and worry. You get out, knock on the door, can I use your phone?

17:00 You call some friends. You see, that problem of a flat tire as long as it's out here in the future will cause worry but when you actually get into that problem you don't worry. You do something about it. Some of you have to make a trip and you've never flown before and maybe you're afraid to fly.

17:16 And so the day is drawing near and you're worried, well what do I do? Get up in that, get on the plane and suppose the electrical system fails and the engine shuts down and it begins to go and you're just working yourself up into a tither about this thing. Well there you are, 33,000 miles. You're on your plane.

17:31 You had a nice take off. You're going along at 600 miles an hour and all of a sudden everything goes dead. The plane starts to go down. You don't worry.

17:39 Too late to worry.

17:42 Oh, it's too late to worry. That's right. If you're a Christian you just begin to say, Lord,

17:51 I'm going to see you in a minute. See?

17:55 If you're not, you probably scream out in horror like all men do in the face of death regardless of how indifferent they've been to God in the hours of ease and light. But you see, the principle I'm trying to show you is that worry is always out here. And the situation about which you fret so much when you actually face it, you find you can't worry about it. You've got to do something about it.

18:18 And worry didn't do a thing to help you when it comes to actually solving that problem. Worry won't arrest that plane in its downward plummet. Worry won't change your tire.

18:30 Now, if we'll just realize that, perhaps it'll help us the next time we begin to have sinful anxiety about the world of things. To realize that it's always futuristic. It's something intangible out here. And it's absolutely useless.

18:46 Then, that's the second thing I want us to know about the nature of sinful anxiety. When we engage in it, we're always occupied with the future. When we engage in it, we're occupied in that which is futile. Now, the Bible teaches prayer changes things.

19:03 Now, there's some people who've become so absorbed and enamored with the doctrine of the Bible that God is sovereign that they no longer like that little plaque, prayer changes things. Well, I believe it's true. Prayer changes things. How prayer changes things when God has ordained all things from eternity, I don't know.

19:24 My little pea brain, he can't hold those two truths together. But the same Bible that says known unto God are all His works from the beginning of time says ask and it shall be given you. You ask not because you ask not. Prayer will change things but worry never does unless it changes some of your hairs from black to white.

19:45 It changes your face from an unlined, wholesome countenance to a troubled, lined, haggard countenance. But it never changes the circumstance about which you're worrying.

19:58 Work can accomplish something. You get out and get some sweat and do something in a situation and you can change it but worry has no power to accomplish anything. Prayer can change things. Worry can't.

20:12 Work can accomplish things. Worry cannot. Intelligent thought can accomplish things by sitting down and soberly reflecting and evaluating and comparing and analyzing. Much can come to pass as a result of intelligent, unfrustrated, sober, mental contemplation.

20:33 But worry never did that. Worry is absolutely futile because the only place you can live is here and now. And worry is always touching something out yonder over there.

20:54 Now if we'll understand this and the next time we begin to have some sinful anxiety about the future, if we'll just stop and tell ourselves, now wait a minute. Here I am living in the present moment. Jesus said, sufficient unto this day are the responsibilities and the problems and the burdens. And I'm beginning to be sinfully anxious about something out here.

21:16 Why, that's ridiculous because that anxiety is not touching the circumstance. I don't even have any proof that it's going to come to pass and when it comes to pass all this worry is not going to treasure up so much that it's going to meet me there and help me. I'll have to either think through the problem, pray through the problem, work through the problem, but I can't worry myself through worrying ever accomplished a thing. So I'm not going to engage in that which is future and futile.

21:43 I'm going to have more sense than to play the fool. Now you need to talk to yourself like that. Do you do that? Do you sit down and talk to yourself like that?

The Effects of Sinful Anxiety on Ourselves

21:52 That's what the Lord's telling us to do. Now the second observation I want us to make about worry is not only the nature of worry but the effects of worry or sinful anxiety. What are the effects of this sinful anxiety? First of all it has effects upon ourselves and then it has effects upon others.

22:12 What does it do if you as a Christian engage in sinful anxiety? It'll do certain things to yourself. Number one, it will blind you to your present blessings.

22:27 It will blind you to your present blessings.

22:33 We may be surrounded by a multitude of the anxiety and expressions of God's tender mercies and yet if we're worrying and sinfully anxious about something in the future is it not true that we are absolutely blinded by the cloud of sinful anxiety about something out there that we can't see any of the obvious manifestations of the blessing of God to us here? Right?

23:02 It's like the fellow who's got his health, got his wife, and got his children, got his good job but he's worrying himself sick that his wife may die of cancer or that his kids are going to be killed on the playground or that there's going to be a recession and a depression and all the money he's got in the bank isn't going to be worth anything. When he's in prosperity all he does is fret and fuss because he's afraid it's going to come to an end. Then if it does come to an end and he's in straits what does he do? He's frustrated and worrying how's he going to get out of them.

23:34 You see, he cannot see the blessings of God. Now you be honest with me as a Christian. Have you ever had a spirit of praise and a spirit of fretful anxiety in your same heart in the same heart at the same time?

23:51 Never.

23:54 Now you may have fear and praise at the same time. David said, what time I am afraid I will trust in thee.

24:06 You can even have deep sadness and deep joy at the same time. You know what that is if you're a Christian, don't you? Your heart is broken over something that's happened or over something God's shown you but the sense of His presence or His forgiveness has produced joy unspeakable and full of glory and you've had deep sorrow and deep joy in the same heart at the same time. You know what that is as a Christian, don't you?

24:31 Or don't you? You know what that is? But you never had sinful anxiety and praise in the same heart at the same time. One or the other's got to go.

24:40 One or the other's got to go.

24:43 And that's one of the terrible effects of sinful anxiety because it's always occupied with the future. It blinds us to our present blessings.

24:56 Do you realize that's worldliness?

24:59 We talk about Christians ought to be separated from the world.

25:06 You're worldly every time you allow sinful anxiety to blind you to your present blessings for it robs you of the spirit of praise and of the glow of contentment that ought to mark the sons of the living God. When Paul can sit there in a Roman jail and say I have learned in whatsoever state I am I'm in therewith to be content not worrying how am I going to get out of here where's my head going to be next week because in all possibility it was going to be laying on the other side of a guillotine. But no fuss no fuss no worry anybody passes by and sees that little hook-nosed Jew shut up in a Roman prison and his countenance free from the lines of trouble and anxiety and they say I want to know his God.

26:03 But we get blinded to our present blessings. Second thing it does it unfits us for present duties. Sinful anxiety will not only blind us to present blessings it will unfit us for present duties. That's why the Lord said sufficient unto this day are the evils thereof.

26:23 He said if you're projecting yourself out there you're not going to be fit to face the problems and necessities of this day. The scripture says whatever your hand finds to do to do with what? With all of your might as unto the Lord and not as unto men. Whatever I find myself doing today in the will of God I am to do with all of my might is unto the Lord.

26:49 Now to do anything with all your might means you've got to put not only your hands into it but your what? But your heart your mind your mental your psychological your physical emotional aspects everything you are has got to be thrown into that.

27:07 Now you can't obey that command when sinful anxiety is seething within your breast. Why? Because sinful anxiety is always out there in the future and you cannot do with all your might that which your hand is doing now because you've got a divided heart and a divided mind troubled about this situation out here. Worrying makes us half men just as the person is sick in body cannot give himself to do his daily task as a full man or woman so the person who's sick in mind and spirit by sinful anxiety can't do a day's work whether it's in the home in the shop at the factory I care not wherever it is we become half men and half women.

27:53 Someone has well said men and women are worn out and enfeebled and aged more by corruption loading care than by hard labor. A merry heart goes all the day whereas a sad one tires in an hour. That's true. That's true.

28:18 Someone else has well said worry does not empty tomorrow of its trials but it does empty today of its strength and its comfort. It does not enable us to escape the future trouble but it unfits us to cope with it when it comes. That's a tremendous statement. I want to repeat it.

28:39 Listen carefully. It's worth memorizing. Worry does not empty tomorrow of its trials but it does empty today of its strength and its comfort.

28:53 Worry never alters that situation out there but it does alter my situation here. It empties me of the strength and comfort of this day. Worry does not enable me to escape the future trouble but it unfits me to cope with it when it comes. And that brings me to the third aspect of the effects of worry upon ourselves.

29:17 It blinds us to present blessings. It unfits us for present duties and it cripples us for future responsibility. The man who robs Monday of some of its due rest is robbing Tuesday of some of its legitimate labors. That's why the only reason I have a watch night service is because some of you like it.

29:41 I'm shocked for the next two days.

29:45 You see, when I rob Friday night of an hour or two of its rest, I've robbed Saturday of an hour or two of its labor in the study. And so I had to try to take a nap yesterday instead of studying. See? Now, what's true in the physical realm and you've proven this time after time.

30:06 Maybe you sat up talking too late with company. You said, oh, it's only today. And you robbed that day of two hours that ought to have been spent in the sack. You robbed the next day of some of its energy and its sweetness, too.

30:20 You were like an old bear not fit to live with.

30:24 Now, what's true physically is true emotionally and spiritually when it comes to sinful anxiety. When I'm fretting about something out there, what am I doing? By taking tomorrow's care upon me today, I'm robbing tomorrow of being my best for that. And I come to it haggard and drawn out and fretful.

30:47 And I did the cheating on Tuesday when I fretted on Monday.

30:54 It cripples us for future duties.

30:59 Someone said, we get our feet so tender from treading over imaginary thorns that we have no ability to tread over the real thorns when we actually face them for our feet have become tender. Walking on the imaginary ones. And that's true. For you see, whatever evils we face, the Lord said, sufficient unto every day is the evil thereof.

31:23 Whatever evils we face, we need to be our best not only physically but emotionally, mentally. And if we are to face that problem and be our best, we cannot rob ourselves by fretting and fussing and worrying today of that which we need to face that circumstance. And so we rob ourselves of the strength for future duties. Now, this matter of fretful care has effects not only on ourselves but on others.

The Effects of Sinful Anxiety on Others

31:57 Two very terrible effects upon others. First of all, it makes us insensitive to the needs of others. And secondly, it chokes off the rivers of blessing that should flow to others. It makes us insensitive to the needs of others.

32:14 Do you know that as a Christian, I'm talking as a Christian now,

32:19 wherever you go, people are sending out signals all the time. All the time.

32:27 They're sending out signals, distress signals,

32:32 letting us know that they've got problems. Oh, they don't have the honesty or the boldness or whatever is needed to actually come and stand in front of them and say, look, you're a brother or sister in the Lord. I've got a problem. Will you help me?

32:45 No, but they're sending out signals that are just as real. Just as real.

32:50 Looking for someone who'll catch that signal and sit down and be available to share the burden and listen to the problem and then take it to the Lord in prayer. But listen to me. When you and I have a heart full of sinful anxiety about the future, we become insensitive to the signals that people are sending out about their own needs. I'm convinced the world is full of people.

33:18 Who are not looking for God. Not looking for salvation. But in the midst of their problems, they're looking for somebody who'll lend a sympathetic ear. And that can become the wedge and the opening for a proclamation of the Gospel.

33:35 And if the devil can get us just so sinfully anxious about the world of things and tomorrow, he's made us deaf to the danger signals. He doesn't need to get you out in a booze hall somewhere. He doesn't need to get you out shooting up with heroin. Just gets you so sinfully anxious about how you're going to get your kids through college and how you're going to pay the bills and how we're going to do this that you're no good to a world of hopeless, helpless sinners confused, blind, and stumbling about but sending out signals continually that only we were free from that sinful anxiety we'd catch the signal.

34:18 We'd catch the signal. We'd catch the signal. We'd catch the signal. We'd catch the signal.

34:19 We'd befriend them and we'd find we had an opening to witness for our Lord Jesus.

34:31 You see, the man who's got a bad problem stuttering doesn't come to another man who's stuttering and ask him, how can I get better?

34:41 You got my illustration? A man who's got a problem with stuttering doesn't come to another stuttering man and say, I've got a stutter. Can you help me? Because all he knows is he'll just get back the stutter.

34:56 Now, that's not to make light of anyone who may have a problem with stuttering but I want you to see the illustration. He'll come to the man whom he knew once was troubled with stuttering and now speaks with fluency and says, tell me, listen. You were like I am. How did you get where you are?

35:12 See? Now listen, the world about us is full of this sinful anxiety.

35:20 The time payment plan has produced a generation of neurotics for all the time fretting about how they're going to keep one creditor off their back and keep the one that's barking the loudest quiet long enough to shoot a little something to this one over here and just enmeshed in a world of concern about things.

35:44 What do they need? They need to be able to look at me as a neighbor and say, look, he was probably like I was but there's something different about him. They need to look at you and say, she was like I was. I can remember she used to fret all the time, fretting about this and worrying about that.

35:59 It's strange. Over the past few months I haven't seen that. They'll come and say, look, you were like I am. How'd you get where you are?

36:08 This is being a witness. You don't learn this in a book on personal work but this is New Testament witnessing. Chapter and verse, alright. Sanctify the Lord God always in your heart and be ready always to give an answer to every man who asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you.

36:30 1 Peter 3.15 Should be so manifest that people ask me and then I declare what great things the Lord has done for me. But sinful anxiety will have this terrible effect. It'll make you insensitive to the needs of others and then secondly it will choke off that which the Lord said should be rivers of living water flowing to others.

36:54 John 7.37 Jesus said, If any man thirsts let him come unto me and drink. As the scripture saith, he that believeth on me out of his innermost being will flow rivers of living water. But you see those rivers of living water which are not forced.

37:09 This is not somewhere when trying to be spiritual. There's nothing more distasteful than someone who's determined at any price they're going to be spiritual and let everybody know it. All you're conscious of when you get around them is that they're trying to be spiritual. You're not conscious of the Lord.

37:24 You're conscious of a forced artificial spirituality and it's sickening. Sickening. Now you can have sympathy with it when it's done out of a false sense of really it's a form of asceticism. It's what makes monks if you carry it to its right extreme.

37:40 They don't have to go we don't have time to go on with that. But you can be fairly sympathetic with that because I'm sure anyone who wants to go on with God has passed through that stage and so you can have sympathy. When people are doing it just to make an impression why then it's a bit more difficult to have sympathy. But be that as it may this business of rivers of living water isn't somebody going around determined that everybody they meet they're going to be a blessing to them.

38:04 And so they're trying like crazy to be a blessing. No. It's talking about the person Jesus said to believe. It's on Him.

38:13 The person who in the present moment regardless of what he sees on the horizon as the possibility or probabilities of his life he knows his life is in the hand of his God. His God has promised to supply his need and he's free. Free from nagging fretful anxiety about the future. Free to live in fellowship with his Lord.

38:36 Free to hear the danger signals. Free to be sensitive to the needs of others and without trying to be rivers of living water flow out. And wherever that person goes there's either blessing conviction illumination a word here an action here and that person becomes a perpetual instrument of the blessing of God to others. Now who's that for?

39:02 Jesus said he that believeth. That's God's desire for each of his children.

39:08 But you can't know that if you're bound up in your heart and spirit with sinful anxiety. That's what's so terrible with this thing.

The Cure for Sinful Anxiety: Daily Problems, Daily Grace

39:20 Hence our Lord says take no thought. Well we move quickly now having considered the nature of sinful anxiety. It's always future. It's always futile.

39:29 The effects of sinful anxiety upon ourselves blinding us to blessing unfitting us for the present unfitting us for the future. The effects upon others deafens us to the danger signals distress signals chokes us off the rivers of living water. Now what's the cure for sinful anxiety?

39:53 What's the cure? Well our Lord gives us many hints to it here in our text several very practical ones. The first aspect of the cure for sinful anxiety is this recognize that each day has its own quota of problems parceled out by the hand of a sovereign God. John Newton used an illustration that was very helpful to me as I was preparing for the message this morning.

40:19 He said that if we were to look over the year as God looks at it we'd see that the year had a bundle of problems that could be likened to a bundle of sticks. He called them faggots. We don't use that term anymore because we don't build fires we just kick the thermostat up. But back in the days when you kept your house warm by carrying in logs and he said the problems of the year let's make it contemporary the problems of 1966 365 logs all in a bundle as far as God's concerned but God in his grace only parcels them out one for each day and he says now for this day here's the measure here's the quota of evil of problem of trouble of necessity that I want to lay upon you.

41:05 Now with the parceling out of that day's portion God stands ready to parcel out that day's grace but he's not promised grace if we are determined to pick up the things to pick up some of the logs from yesterday and also to snatch some of the logs from tomorrow and why are Christians having nervous breakdowns? Here's one of the reasons not all but one of the reasons they're carrying the logs of yesterday and the logs of tomorrow when the Lord has only put before them the log of today and promised grace for today. That's not the only reason. Sometimes there are just pure physical problems involved but this is one of the great reasons I'm convinced why God's people are having nervous breakdowns and all kinds of nervous disorders and frustrations. It's because they fail to recognize the first step to cure sinful anxiety is to stop and realize each day and only one day has its own quota of problems parceled out by the hand of a sovereign God. That's what our Lord meant when he said sufficient unto this day to be able to do this. is the evil thereof.

42:21 Second thing that we must recognize if we're to be delivered from sinful anxiety is to recognize that each day has its own supply of grace dispensed in that day alone. You see, you can't store up food in your body and say, well, you know, I'm going to be so busy the next week. I think being today Sunday, Sunday being the day of relaxation and rest, I think I'll eat for four or five hours this afternoon and I'm going to eat I'm going to be so busy next week that I won't bother to eat Monday through Friday because if I total up Monday, half an hour at breakfast, half an hour at lunch, half an hour at supper, that's an hour and a half. So three times an hour and a half is four and a half hours so I won't need to eat from Monday to Wednesday.

43:05 So I'll eat for four and a half hours today and that means I can well, you say that's ridiculous. I've got more sense than to do that. Listen, you can't do it physically and you can't do it spiritually.

43:16 You can't store up God's grace. We've got to recognize that just as each day brings its own dispensing of responsibilities and problems and concerns from the hand of God, so each day brings its own supply of grace for that specific day. Now why did God do it this way? Well, I don't know all the reasons but I think I know one of them.

43:43 It's because God wants His children to be pressed to His bosom with a sense of their absolute helplessness and He wants them to be in that place where at the close of each day they feel like, well, Lord, there was just enough grace to get me through. See? So that when you come to the next day you know you've got nothing left over and you've got to come early in the morning and say, Lord, here's a new day. Without You I can do nothing.

44:11 Isn't this what the word means when it says, as Thy what? As Thy days, not weeks or months, but as Thy day, so shall Thy strength be.

44:25 As Thy day, so shall Thy strength be. Isn't this what the prophet meant when he said in Lamentation 3.22, Thy mercies are new what? Every morning.

44:37 Not the beginning of every week, but every morning. Every morning. With each morning, new mercies, new supplies of grace, but only for that day. Because see, if God were to give it to you for two days, then there'd be none for the next morning and the Bible wouldn't be true.

44:52 It says every morning. God would have to say every other morning. So why are you trying to see if you have enough grace for Tuesday when all you can live is Monday and Monday's grace is available?

45:05 You see, we sit here this morning and it all seems so obvious and stupid to do anything else. But now next time you get in that situation, sit down and tell yourself it's stupid. That's growth. That's spiritual growth.

45:18 So the first way of deliverance is recognize that each day has its own problems parceled out by God. Each day has its own supply of grace dispensed for that day. And thirdly, in recognition of these two principles, be fully occupied with the concerns and the grace of today and restfully commit the future to the hands of God. Knowing that this day has its own parcel of problems, its own measure of grace, I refuse to be dabbling in the areas where God has not given me a promise.

Application to Unbelievers: Be Anxious for Eternity

46:04 As I close this morning, I would like to draw one or two final applications. First of all, to those of you here this morning who are not the children of God, you have never seen yourself as a lost sinner, absolutely destitute of anything that can commend you to God. As we read in Romans this morning, there is no righteousness which we can work out that's acceptable to God. And the Jews were so foolish to think, that they could work out their own righteousness.

46:35 Therefore, they never submitted to God's righteousness offered in Christ. And so God's judgment fell upon them. And I know there are people here this morning who have never seen themselves lost and fled to Christ in repentance and faith. Does this verse have anything to say to you?

46:50 Take no anxious thought for tomorrow. The morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. I believe this verse does say something to you.

47:02 For there is one great exception to this verse. There's only one thing in the future about which God has told us to be terribly anxious. You know what that is? It's our future judgment and eternity.

47:18 God says, prepare to meet thy God. God says, flee the wrath to come. And I would say to every one of you this morning, visitors, friends, members, young people and adults, whoever you be, if you're not in Christ, Jesus in a true work of His grace, repentance and faith, born of His Spirit, then I soberly urge upon you this morning to get anxious about the morrow. But not the morrow comprised of bread and food and kids and clothes and bills, but the tomorrow that will issue or will cause you to stand in that day where you will give an account of your life in the presence of the living God. It's interesting that in the fourth chapter of Mark, where our Lord is giving the parable of the sower and the seed and the different kinds of soil, He says that in one case, the seed of the gospel doesn't spring forth into mature fruit because the cares of this life choke out the word. Now, some men hear the gospel and because they're so determined to go out and live to the hilt, in obedience to their own depraved lust, they completely drown out what they've heard. And so they live wicked, profligate,

48:42 openly immoral lives. But there are some, Jesus said, who come like you come this morning and you hear the gospel like you heard it last week and the week before. You hear that you're a sinner and Christ died for sinners and He urges you to come, that He receives all sinners who come unto Him. And what happens?

49:02 Oh, you don't go on out and get drunk. You don't go on out and curse God. You just go back and you get so busy. Listen now.

49:10 You get so busy putting in your eight hours a day, making a living, keeping the home up, taking care of the kids, clothing them, the cares of this life, you don't have time to sit and soberly reflect upon your relationship to God and seek the Lord until you know that He's yours. And what happens? The word is choked. That's a terrible thing.

49:35 So God would have you get anxious about tomorrow, but not the tomorrow made up of things, but that tomorrow when all things are past and eternity dawns upon us. Some of you say, well, if I repent and commit my life to Christ, I might lose my job. So what? So what?

49:57 Well, the nature of my work is such, I know if I became a Christian and took the stand I ought, I might run the risk of losing my job. So what? Far better to lose your job and then have the promise that God will provide your bread, for He's promised it. And to say I can't run that risk and refuse to repent and submit to Christ and therefore be lost forever.

50:19 Some of you say, well, if I repent and turn to Christ, I might lose some of my closest friends. I might have to sever romantic involvement with a certain young lady or a certain young man. Far better to lose earthly friends and gain the friend that sticketh closer than a brother. But the cares of this life, you see, can choke out the word.

50:40 Others say, well, if I repent and surrender, I don't know whether in the midst of this world and having to make a living I can hold out. Suppose the thief on the cross reasoned that way and said, well, if I call on the Lord for mercy, maybe He'll take me down from the cross. And if I go back and face my old cronies, I'll never be able to stand up and stand the gaff. And he could have reasoned himself right out of calling on the Lord for mercy if he'd been looking out into the other tomorrows.

51:08 But he just said, Lord, remember me. That's the cry that God wants to hear from your heart. Today is the day of salvation. Today, if you hear His voice, harden not your heart.

Application to Believers: Freedom from Anxiety for Service and Worship

51:20 And then there's a final word to those of us who know Him. Where are you today? As you sit here this morning, are you free? Or you say, nobody forced me to come.

51:31 Maybe some of you kids can't say that. You know, Mom and Dad made you come. But I'm free, you say. Yes, you're free.

51:41 Nobody going to be waiting on your doorstep when you go home and tell you where to go and what to do. But I want to ask you something. Are you free, really free, Christian? Are you free this morning?

51:51 Free from the chains of sinful anxiety about the future? Free so that you can be sensitive to the signals that are being put out by others? Free so that rivers of living water can flow? Free so that you can give yourself to this day and all that God wants from it?

52:14 Are you free enough that you can get on your knees and worship the Lord and praise Him? Are you free without having a thousand and one things? Draw your thoughts away and render your time of prayer utterly ineffective? Oh, if not, may you hear the Word of Christ today.

52:33 Take no thought for the morrow. For the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto this day is the evil thereof. May God make us an assembly of people, blessedly free from sinful anxiety about things and wonder of wonders, the Lord will add things to His glory and to our good.

52:59 May this passage be often studied and read and pondered over.

53:06 I'm sure I've not done anywhere near the justice to it that ought to be done, but I know this much. I hope that all the hours of mental sweat and prayer will not be wasted because you as a people pray to do what the Lord says we're to do when sinful anxiety would come. Consider, think, behold, look at the birds, ask yourself the question, look at the futility, the stupidity of this kind of anxiety, then look up into the face of your Redeemer God and lay hold of Him for the grace that He offers for that particular day. Let us pray.

53:49 Blessed Lord, we're thankful for Your Word. We thank You that knowing us as You know us and that we're so prone to become enmeshed in this curse of sinful anxiety that You gave us such detailed instruction as to how we may face this temptation. Lord, grant that these truths may not prove to be mere words to us, but may they be directed and instruction which will help us and keep us in the days ahead. Now dismiss us, we pray, with Your blessing, those among us who know You not. Lord, make them anxious about that future hour when they'll be ushered out of this life and into eternity. O God, make them anxious enough to call upon You for mercy and for Your people. Set us loose, we pray, that we may be used to minister to others. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.