the sermon on the mount nt501 lesson

The Sermon on the Mount

Transcript - NT501 The Sermon on the Mount © 2019 Our Daily Bread University. All rights reserved.

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LESSON 07 of 10NT501

The Christian’s Ambition (Matthew 6:7–15)

The Sermon on the Mount

Lord Jesus, we bow before You and give thanks to you for the joy and the privilege that we have in seeking to study Your teaching, to receive it into our hearts, to submit to it in our lives. And we pray that You will continue to be with us and to help us, to illumine or minds and to make us obedient hearers that our lives may be conformed to the ideals which You so clearly set. We ask it for the glory of Your great name, amen.

Our text then this morning or this afternoon is the latter part of Matthew 6:19–34. And I’ve called it “Secular and Christian Goals.” We saw last time or the time before that this chapter 6 is divided into two sections. The first (vv. 1–18) describing the Christian’s private life in the secret place: —his almsgiving, his praying, and his fasting; while the second half (vv. 19–34) describes His public life out in the world and concerns questions of money, food, drink, clothing, and the rest. But although the general subject of the two halves of the chapter are different, there is no dichotomy between the two. Certainly, the Christian has a secret life, and he has a public life. But God is concerned about both. Indeed, we are to live both our private and our public lives in the conscious presence of God. For Jesus said, “Your heavenly Father sees in secret” on the one hand, and “Your heavenly Father knows your need” on the other.

Now in our secular life in the world, which is our subject today, verse 19 to the end, every Christian is conscious of the tension or the conflict of life; —the conflict between material things and spiritual things, between a worldly ambition and a godly ambition. And all of us know very well we’ve got to choose to which to give priority and which is to be our life’s goal. It is, moreover, a question of vital importance because as He says in verse 21, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” So it’s not just a question of our outward ambition and what we’re giving our lives to, whatever we’re giving our lives to is an indication of the state of our heart. So each paragraph in the second half of Matthew 6 expresses the alternatives. There are perhaps four. According to verses 19–21, there are two treasures. There’s treasure on earth. There’s treasure in heaven. According to verses 22–23, there are

Dr. John R.W. Stott, D. D. Experience: Founder of Teach Every Nation



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two bodily conditions: light and darkness, in which we may live. According to the well-known verse 24, there are two masters: God and mammon or money. And according to verses 25–34, there are two preoccupations: —material necessities of food and clothing on the one hand and the kingdom and righteousness of God on the other.

And as we look at these alternatives, in each paragraph it’s quite plain there is a choice to be made. And, however indecisive some men and women may be by nature and temperament, however comfortable we may find it to sit on the fence (usually it’s a very uncomfortable posture to find yourself in), we still have to make a decision. And although it’s only in verse 24 that the actual impossibility of serving God and mammon is stated, yet in each it is obvious that we cannot in the words of the popular proverb, “have the best of both worlds.” You’ve got to decide. So the choice is forced on our attention throughout this chapter, Matthew 6. In the realm of piety, the choice was between Christian piety and pharisaic piety. In the realm of ambition, in the second half of the chapter, the choice is between Christian ambition and pagan ambition. The Pharisees practiced their piety before men. Christians are to do it in secret before their Father. Pagans seek first material things. Christians seek God’s kingdom and God’s righteousness. So you see throughout the chapter, as I said at the beginning, there is this clarion call to us to be different, not now from the nominal church represented by the Pharisees but from the secular world represented by the Gentiles or the pagans.

But how shall we make our choice? Our Lord in His tenderness and understanding helps us to make our choice. He knows that worldly ambition has a strong fascination. He knows that the smell of materialism as we see all around us is very hard to break. So at the beginning of this section, he points out the folly of the wrong way and the wisdom of the right way. And as in the sections on piety and prayer that we looked at last week and the week before, so here He sets the false and the true over against each other as much as to say, compare them and see,; and you’ll be able to make up your mind. So let’s look at the alternatives and firstly, their comparative durability (vv. 19–21). This is the point in the section about treasure. Jesus seems to indicate that there is a sense in which everybody is amassing treasure. And the only difference between us is in the character of the treasure we collect. There are ultimately only two sorts of treasure to collect. One is treasure on earth, and the other is treasure in heaven. Now Jesus says it ought to be easy to decide which to collect. Because if you’re a treasure hunter, presumably you will want to hunt treasure that will last. I mean that’s the whole point of hunting treasure is to get hold of treasure that will last. While treasure on



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earth is corruptible and, therefore, insecure, treasure in heaven is incorruptible and, therefore, secure. So if your object is to lay up treasure, presumably you’ll concentrate on treasure that can be stored without deterioration. See, if you like, it’s a worldly argument. It’s appealing to men of the world, but it’s an argument of common sense, and it’s irrefutable.

Let’s look at it a bit more. A) Treasure on earth is corruptible. “Don’t lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal.” Now let’s be clear that the command not to lay up treasure on earth does not mean that we’re not to be provident; that is, to make provision for the future, but that we’re not to be covetous. We’re not to be materialists or misers. I think I need to go into this a little bit more, because the whole teaching of our Lord and of the New Testament on riches and possessions is difficult. And we need to try to be clear what is being said and what is not being said. So what is Jesus prohibiting when He says, “Don’t lay up for yourselves treasures on earth?” Well let me give you a number of negatives. He’s not prohibiting possession or possessions in themselves. Scripture nowhere teaches that mere possession, in itself, is evil. It’s Marxist, not Christian, philosophy to attribute the ills of society to private ownership. It’s not mere possession that in itself is evil.

Next, I’d venture to say it is not even investment of capital. I don’t think He is saying that you can’t be a capitalist in the sense of having any investments and a Christian at the same time. Because the biblical prohibition of usury is something different. Usury and investment, although to some extent they overlap, are not the same thing. Usury is money-lending at exorbitant interest.

Next, it is not saving for a rainy day nor, indeed, life assurance. Because life assurance is simply saving by self-imposed compulsion. That’s all life insurance is. It’s making myself save for the future. For after all, the ant is praised in the book of Proverbs, not only for its industry but for its sensible storage of food for the winter. “Go to the ant, you sluggard, and be wise.” Or again, a man who doesn’t provide for his relatives and especially his own family, as some of us have seen in studying the pastoral epistles, is said to have disowned the faith and to be worse than an unbeliever (1 Timothy 5:8). So there is a command to make some provision for your family lest if you die without making provision, you oblige the community to care for them when you should have cared for them. See, this is a Christian duty. So it’s not a prohibition of saving for a rainy day or making provision for your family.



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Next, it is not a prohibition of the enjoyment of the good things our Creator has given us. Or to put it another way, it is not an encouragement of asceticism, for we’re told in 1 Timothy 6:17 that God has given us all things richly to enjoy.

Well, now a number of negatives. So what is it? What is being prohibited in laying up for yourselves treasures on earth? Well I suggest the following: it is the selfish accumulation of treasure, the foolish fantasy that a man’s life consists in the abundance of what he possesses, it would include extravagant and luxurious living, it would include materialism which tethers our hearts to earthly possessions, and it would certainly include the hard-heartedness which ignores the colossal need of the world’s underprivileged peoples. All that is surely included in laying up treasures for ourselves on earth. Now such earthly treasure (New English Bible) “Grows rusty and moth-eaten, and things break in and steal it.” Now rust, which is the Greek word brōsis (and brōsis literally means “the act of devouring”) may not refer to rust. It may refer to vermin of some kind like mice, —anything that devours anyway. It might be rust. It might be mice, but the idea is the same in either case. What he says in talking about rust and vermin on the one hand or being moth-eaten on the other is that material things may deteriorate gradually through pest, or they may disappear suddenly by theft. Thieves may break in and steal it. Or as we moderns might add, who try to protect our treasure by insecticides, by rust-proof paints and by burglar alarms, our treasure may diminish through inflation, devaluation, or an economic slump. But in either case, it cannot be taken with us to the next life. “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I shall return.”

Now I thank God for Malcolm Muggeridge who is a voice crying in the wilderness against the materialism of the world, the Western world, and indeed of the church today. Listen to this sarcastic, yes, but outspoken comment from Muggeridge. It was actually an article in The Observer at one time, but it’s included in Jesus Rediscovered.

“Wealth increasing forevermore, and its beneficiaries rich in hire purchase, stupefied with the telly and with sex, comprehensively educated, told by Professor Hoyle how the world began and by Bertrand Russell how it will end, venturing forth on the broad highways, three lanes aside, blood spattering the tarmac as an extra thrill, heaven lying about them in the supermarket, the rainbow ending in the nearest bingo hall, leisure burgeoning out in multitudinous shining aerials rising like dreaming spires into the sky. Many mansions, mansions of light and chromium climbing ever upwards. This kingdom surely can only be for posterity, an



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unending source of wry derision, always assuming that there is to be any posterity. The backdrop, after all, is the mushroom cloud as the Gadarene herd frisk and frolic, they draw ever nearer to the cliff’s precipitous edge.”

Now I pray that those of us who are called to the ministry will have the courage of a Malcolm Muggeridge to lodge our protest against the materialism of the twentieth century.

So much then for treasure on earth which is corruptible, and B) the contrast is treasure in heaven which is incorruptible. Well now, what is it to lay up treasure in heaven? Surely it is to do anything on earth whose effects last for eternity. Now this doesn’t, of course, teach a doctrine of merit, that by good deeds on earth we can earn a place in heaven, because it is spoken to the disciples of Jesus who’ve already received eternal life by grace. No, it seems to refer to such things as these: the development of Christian character, being transformed into the image of Christ, and discipline to that end by a use of the means of grace. It would include increasing in faith, love, and hope, the triad which Paul said all abide in 1 Corinthians 13. It would include growth in the knowledge of Christ whom one day we shall see face to face. It will include the active endeavor by prayer and witness to introduce others to Christ, because they, too, will inherit eternal life. And I think it will include the Christian use of our money;, that is, the use of our money for Christian causes, which is the only investment whose dividends are eternal. John Mott, the pioneer in some ways of the ecumenical movement and the modern missionary movement too, once said,

“Though a man may be living in obscurity, he may become by his gifts a power in the uplifting of a whole nation or race. Money is the lever of all good enterprises. No amount of money can save a soul or build a character or evangelize a city. And yet it is a factor without which these results may not be accomplished. Money has power to multiply greatly one’s opportunities, influence, and fruitfulness.”

So these are some of the ways in which we can lay up treasure in heaven. All these are temporal activities with eternal consequences. And no vermin or burglar can destroy this, because, thank God, there’ll be neither moths nor mice nor marauders in heaven. So treasure laid up in heaven is secure. It’s proof against all attack, and it needs no insurance cover. It’s indestructible. So then, Jesus seems to say, and I think it is a businessman’s argument,. He’s saying, if it’s safe investments you are after, nothing could be safer than this. It’s the only gilt-edged security whose gilt will never tarnish their comparative durability.



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Then secondly, the second argument is their comparative benefit (vv. 22–23). The contrast here is between a blind person and a sighted person and between the light and the darkness in which respectively they live. He begins with (v. 22) the eye is the lamp of the body. It’s the means by which light enters the body. So if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light. If your eye is not sound, your whole body will be full of darkness. Now what that means, surely, is that everything by in large which the body does depends on our ability to see. We need to see in order to run or jump or drive a car or cross the road or do embroidery or cook or paint or even take lecture notes. You have to see in order to do these things with your hands or, in some cases, with your feet. The eye illumines what the body does through its hands and feet. It’s perfectly true a blind person can learn to do all manner of amazing things even without sight, and it’s also true that a blind person’s other faculties often compensate marvelously for his lack of sight.

Nevertheless, I think you’ll agree the principle holds good that a sighted person walks in the light. A blind person is in darkness. And the great difference between the body’s light and darkness is due to this little organ called the eye. When the eye is sound, the whole body is full of light. When the eye is not sound, the whole body is full of darkness. You see the great influence of this little organ. Now what did Jesus mean by that? Well, you know, the eye is sometimes equivalent to the heart in Scripture. So to set the heart on something and to fix the eyes on something are not infrequently synonyms. To give you one example, in Psalm 119:10, “With my whole heart I seek Thee. Let me not wander from Thy commandments.” And in verse 19, “I have fixed my eyes on all Thy commandments.” There you see are parallel expressions; —fixing the heart on something, fixing the eyes on something.

So Jesus here passes from the importance of our heart being in the right place (v. 21), “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,” to the importance of our eye being sound and healthy (v. 22). So the argument is that just as our eye physically affects our whole body, so our ambition, where we fix our eyes, where we set our heart or our mind, affects our whole life. Just as a seeing eye gives light to the body and a blind eye darkness, so a noble ambition to serve God and man is wonderfully uplifting. It adds meaning and purpose to life. It throws light upon everything you do, whereas an ignoble ambition, a selfish ambition like laying up treasure on earth for myself, is degrading. It makes us intolerant, inhuman, ruthless; it deprives life of meaning, and it plunges us into spiritual darkness. So, you see, it’s all a question of vision, whether physical or spiritual. If you’ve got physical vision, you can see what you’re doing and where you are going. So if you have



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spiritual vision, if our spiritual perspective is correctly adjusted, then our whole life is full of significance and full of drive. We know where we’re going. But if our vision becomes clouded by the false goals of materialism, then our whole life is plunged in darkness.

So here Jesus gives us a second reason, you see, for laying up treasure in heaven. The first concerns the comparative durability of the treasure that it will last into the next life. The second is the resulting benefit in this life, now. If you have a proper ambition now, your whole life while life lasts will be full of light instead of darkness. So first, their comparative durability, and second, their comparative benefit.

And third, is their comparative worth in and of themselves. That is, the ultimate choice between two treasures (where we lay them up) and between two ambitions (where we fix our eyes) is a choice between two masters whom we serve. It’s a choice between God and mammon. That is to say, it is a choice between the living and personal Creator on the one hand, God, and a thing, a creature called money. The mammon is a transliteration of the Hebrew word for money (or Aramaic).

Now even in ordinary life, as Jesus says, “Nobody can serve two masters.” Well, actually, of course an employee can be employed by two employers. But you must realize that this is talking of slavery and not employment. The background is slavery in the Greco-Roman world. And as Professor Tasker puts in his commentary, “Single ownership and full-time service are of the essence of slavery.” So although, if I may quote another commentator McNeil in his commentary on Matthew’s gospel, “Men can work for two employers. But no slave can be the property of two owners.”

And therefore, there are only two alternatives and not three. Many people, you see, imagine that they’ve got a three-fold choice. They can serve either God and not mammon or mammon and not God or God and mammon together. And most people have got no wish to make an outright or exclusive choice, so they opt for the third, imagining that they can serve God on Sundays and mammon on Monday through Saturday, or God with their lips and mammon in their hearts, or God with half their being and mammon with the other half. And this is the popular compromise that Jesus says is impossible. No man can be the slave of two masters. You cannot serve God. Note the repetition. This is an impossibility. A person, therefore, who supposes he’s dividing his allegiance between God and mammon has actually given his allegiance to mammon. God can be served only with our entire and exclusive devotion. “I am the Lord” He says. “There is no other, and My glory I will not give to another.” But this is simply because He is God:, our Creator, our



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Lord, and our Judge.

Now Jesus seems to be saying here in putting God and mammon, God and money, so obviously over against each other, that when the choice is seen for what it is, between the Creator and a creature, between the personal, living God and a thing, between God and money, it seems inconceivable that anybody could make the wrong choice. The question now is not of their comparative durability or comparative benefit but of their comparative worth, the intrinsic worth of God to whom we give our worship. And worship as you know means “worth-ship.” He deserves to be honored and acknowledged, the intrinsic worth of the One and the intrinsic worthlessness of the other.

Now then we come to the fourth and last paragraph (vv. 25–34). And what Jesus seems to be saying now is that, having grasped the comparative durability of the two treasures, corruptible and incorruptible; and the comparative benefit of the two eye conditions, —light and darkness;, and the comparative worth of the two masters, the intrinsic worth of the One and worthlessness of the other, and having made our choice to lay up treasure in heaven, to have a sound and a single eye, to be the slave of God and not mammon; therefore (v. 25), I tell you, this is what we must do. In other words, our basic choice of whom we are going to serve will radically affect our attitude to both. We will not be anxious about the one, but we shall concentrate upon the other. That is the theme of the rest of the chapter. Verse 25, you see the beginning point is negative. “Do not be anxious about your life.” Verse 31, again, “Do not be anxious saying this and that, for the Gentiles seek those things. “But seek:” that’s positive. Don’t be anxious about the one, but be preoccupied and seek with your whole heart as the great good to which you devote your lives, the kingdom and the righteousness of God.

Jesus assumes that every man is to some extent a seeker. Everybody’s got a goal in life, and the only difference between us is whether our goal is material or spiritual. So now we have to look at that. Ultimately, He says there are only these two possibilities. One is food, drink, and clothing for ourselves; that is, to be preoccupied with our own material needs, and the other is God:, His kingdom, His rule, and His righteousness. But the Gentiles seek the one;. Christians are to see the other. Once again, it’s the call to be different.

So let’s look at them both. A) the wrong ambition. Now I’ve already mentioned that most of this last paragraph is negative. Three times He says, don’t be anxious. Verse 25: “Don’t be anxious about your life, what to eat or drink or your body, what to put on.”



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Don’t fill your life with anxiety about food, drink, and clothing. Verse 31 again:

“Don’t be anxious saying what shall we eat? What shall we drink? What shall we wear?” Verse 34: “Therefore, don’t be anxious about tomorrow.”

So what is not to be our preoccupation is what Spurgeon calls “the world’s trinity of cares:” food, drink, and clothing. And yet if I may pause a moment, it’s very evident isn’t it that this is still today in the twentieth century what it was in the first, the main preoccupation of secular man. And you’ve only got to look at the glossy magazines in the bookstore, not maybe at Trinity, but next time you go to the station or the airport or somewhere, you’ve only got to look at the advertisements or the billboards and you see that they’re about food, drink, and clothing.

About a year ago, I was sent a complimentary copy of a new glossy magazine that’s being published in Britain called Accent. Its full title is Accent on Good Living. Why they did me the honor to select me as one of the people to receive it, I don’t know. But it has certainly given me a good illustration for sermons, which I guess was not the intention. Anyway, I read it from cover to cover. And there were enticing advertisements for champagne, cigarettes, antiques, and carpets. There was a description of an esoteric weekend shopping in Rome. There were articles on how to have a computer in your kitchen, how to win a luxury cabin cruiser or 112 bottle cases of Scotch whiskey instead, and a fascinating article on how fifteen million women can’t be wrong about their cosmetic choices. And we were promised in the following month’s issue alluring articles on Caribbean holidays, staying in bed, high fashion, warm underwear, and the delights of reindeer meat and snowberries—food, drink, and clothing. And that was all.

Now, I don’t want any of us to misunderstand this. Don’t imagine that Jesus Christ denies or despises the fact that we have a body and that our body needs food, drink, and clothing. What He is saying is that these things are unsuitable and unworthy to be a Christian person’s preoccupation. They are not the supreme good to which we are to devote our lives. A man’s life does not consist in these things. That’s what he’s saying. So he says, “Don’t take any anxious thought.” Now you know, of course, that the King James Version is mistaken here. And it’s not a prohibition of thought but of anxious thought. It doesn’t mean take no thought. It is take no anxious thought. That is what the Greek word means. He is not prohibiting either thought or forethought but anxious thought, worry, preoccupying, distracting, self-centered worry. And He gives two arguments. Now it’s very interesting that His first



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argument is that anxiety is incompatible with Christian faith, and his second argument is that anxiety is incompatible with common sense. And it’s very interesting, and, I think, for preachers very important, that our Lord was quite willing to appeal to common sense as well as to biblical arguments and the nature of God and so on.

Anxiety is incompatible with Christian faith (vv. 25-30). In verse 30, He dubs those who get heated up over food and clothing, “Men of little faith.” And the reasons He gives why we should trust God and not be anxious are two-fold. Here’s another subdivision. Both of them are a fortiori arguments, that is how much more arguments. The first is from human experience, an argument from the greater to the lesser. And the second is from sub-human experience, birds and flowers. And this is an argument from the lesser to the greater. I think it will become plain as we go on. First, from human experience the end of verse 25. “Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?” Life, in other words, that is our actual living, life is more than the food and the drink that sustain it. Of course, we need food and drink to sustain our life, but the life itself is more than the food and the drink that sustain it. Again, the body is more than the clothing that covers and warms it. We need clothing to cover our bodies and keep them warm, protect them from the elements, etcetera. But the body is more than the clothing that covers it. And the life is more than the food and drink that sustain it. Now the argument is very simple. If God already takes care of the greater;, that is, He gives you life and He keeps your body alive, if He already takes care of the greater, can’t you trust Him to take care of the less? It’s so stupid, this lack of Christian faith. If God looks after your body, can’t you trust Him to give you the clothing that you need to cover the body? If He already gives you life, can’t you trust Him to give you the lesser—the food and the drink that sustain your life? It’s really unanswerable logic.

But if His first argument is from human experience, the second is from subhuman experience, birds and plants. Birds are taken as an example of God’s supply of food (v. 26) and plants of His supply of clothing (vv. 28–30). And in both cases, Jesus says “Look at the birds. God feeds them. Look at the flowers. God clothes them.” Now some of you know that I happen to be a rather fanatical bird watcher. And I know very well that bird-watching is regarded by many with quizzical and patronizing amusement. But I claim good biblical warrant for it. And our Lord’s command in the King James Version “Consider the fowls of the air” in basic English means “watch birds.” Now if you do watch birds and flowers or take an interest in natural history, as incidentally I think all Christians should, because most of us have a better doctrine of redemption



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than we have of creation. That’s another subject. But if we do take an interest in these things, we shall learn that although birds, as our Lord says, neither sow, reap, nor garner, our heavenly Father feeds them. Incidentally, notice it’s our heavenly Father not their heavenly Father. He is our heavenly Father, which is another reason why we should trust Him all the more. I mean, He is related to us as Father, whereas He’s only related to them as Creator. And although the flowers neither toil nor spin, our heavenly Father clothes them and, indeed, more gorgeously than Solomon in all his glory. So how much more will He feed and clothe us, because we are of far greater value than the birds and the flowers. So here, you see, is an argument from the less to the greater. If He looks after little sparrows and so on and two of them are sold for a farthing, as He says in another place, can’t you trust Him to look after you? I mean, you are much more important than sparrows.

Now at this point, although the time is flying, I want to allow myself a digression to comment on three problems that will arise, if they haven’t already in your mind, as you think about all this. They are big problems, and I can only touch on them lightly. But they all arise from Jesus’ basic promise that our heavenly Father can be trusted to feed and clothe us. And I’ll put them in a negative form.

1) This promise does not exempt us from earning our own living. That is, we can’t sit back in an armchair and twiddle our thumbs and say “My heavenly Father will feed and clothe me. Isn’t it wonderful?” And we can’t simply wait for clothing and food to descend by parachute from heaven. Now Jesus uses the birds as His example of God’s ability to feed us. But have you ever considered how God does feed birds? Any birdwatcher can tell you, and that is, He doesn’t feed them. They feed themselves. Have you ever thought of that? Now Jesus was an acute observer of nature. He knew that perfectly well. He didn’t imagine that God went around with a sort of divine handful of food saying “Come on little birdie. Have something to eat,” you know. He knew perfectly well birds feed themselves. Some of them are insectivorous. Some of them are scavengers. Some of them are carnivores. Some of them are berry eaters, seed eaters, and they all feed themselves.

So the way in which God feeds them is not by this sort of miraculous way. It is by providing the wherewithal by which they can feed themselves. And it is the same with human beings. Faith is not inconsistent with the use of means. But the fact that we have to earn our living and provide ourselves with food is not incompatible with trusting God to feed us. God does not cast all His children in the role of the prophet Elijah and supply our food miraculously through ravens or angels. So that’s the first thing.



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This promise does not exempt us from earning our own living.

2) It does not exempt us either from responsibility for feeding and clothing other people. We cannot just say, well He promises to feed and clothe them. There are hungry people in the world. There are naked people in the world. God says He’ll clothe them, then let Him. No, no, it does not exempt us from responsibility for others.

Well you may say, “But how is it that there are ill-clad and undernourished people in the world when God says He’ll feed and clothe them?” Surely the answer, although I know it’s an over-simplified answer, is that the cause of their lack is not an inadequate divine provision but an inequitable human distribution. God has provided ample resources in this rich and wonderful world, but men hoard them, squander them, and don’t share them. And to me it’s very significant that it is in this same gospel of Matthew that Jesus, who here says our heavenly Father feeds and clothes His children, later says that on the last day we shall be judged according to whether we have fed the hungry and clothed the naked ourselves. So, how important it is to interpret Scripture with Scripture. The fact that God feeds and clothes does not exempt us from responsibility for others.

Thirdly, this promise does not exempt us from experiencing trouble. True, He forbids us to worry. But to be free from worry and to be free from trouble are two different things. He commands us not to be anxious. He does not promise us immunity to all misfortune. On the contrary, the God who clothes the grass says here, through Christ, that it is cut down and burned. And although God feeds the birds, some do die of cold and starvation every winter. And although God protects the sparrows, Jesus specifically said sparrows do fall to the ground. What Jesus said is not that sparrows never fall to the ground but that they never fall to the ground without your heavenly Father; that is, without His permission and knowledge. So that although we are not to be anxious for tomorrow, the reason in verse 34 is not that tomorrow will bring no trouble but that tomorrow’s trouble will be enough for tomorrow. And He actually mentions trouble in verse 34. So this is no exemption from trouble. God’s children are promised freedom neither from work nor from the responsibility to share with others, nor from trouble and misfortune, but from worry. That is what is forbidden us. So, that is that anxiety is incompatible with Christian faith.

Now I’ve only got a couple of minutes, I think, in which to conclude. But anxiety is also incompatible with common sense (v. 34). Notice the references to today and tomorrow. “Don’t be anxious


Christ-Centered Learning — Anytime, Anywhere

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The Christian’s Ambition (Matthew 6:7–15)Lesson 07 of 10

about tomorrow. Tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Let today’s (or the day’s) own trouble be sufficient for today.” So all worry is about tomorrow or the day after tomorrow or the day after that. It’s all worry about the future. But all worry is experienced today. However, our fears about tomorrow, which we feel today, may never be fulfilled. The advice “don’t worry, it may never happen” is perfectly true. You worry that you may not pass your exams or graduate or find a job or find a pastorate. You may worry that you will remain single and not find a life partner, that you will fall sick or be handicapped, and all sorts of things. But all these worries are fantasy. Fears may be liars, and they often are. Many worries never materialize. So, Jesus says, worry is a waste. It’s a waste of time. It’s a waste of thought, and it’s a waste of nervous energy. Learn to live a day at a time. The New English Bible:“Each day has troubles enough of its own.” So why anticipate them? If you do, you double them. If your fear does not materialize, you’ve worried once for nothing. If it does, you’ve worried twice when you need only have worried once. So in both cases, it’s foolish. Worry doubles trouble. Worry is a waste.

So you see, Jesus is simply saying that this is a silly, false ambition, to be preoccupied about food, drink, and clothing. It’s incompatible with Christian faith, and it’s incompatible with common sense. That’s what pagans do. It’s an unsuitable ambition for Christians. I’ve only time to mention the right ambition (v. 33) “Seek first God’s rule and God’s righteousness, and all these things will be yours as well. Material things will look after themselves.” If you put first things first, spreading the rule of God - yes, in your own life, but in the life of others through evangelism and witness - spreading His righteousness as well, which is the Christian’s social responsibility, and seeking justice in the community; so ultimately, the two ambitions are: first to be self-centered, to be obsessed with my glory, my interests, my welfare, my security; or to be God-centered, to be obsessed with God’s glory, God’s name, God’s kingdom, God’s righteousness. And there’s only one object that is worthy of a Christian’s ambition, and that is God Himself. And for the Christian, it is God, His kingdom, and His righteousness that should be our magnificent obsession.

Just a moment of prayer. We ask Your forgiveness, our Father, for our unworthy ambitions, our worries, and our preoccupations with ourselves and our own securities and material welfare. Grant that all of us may set before ourselves of the supreme good to which we devote our lives—Your rule and Your righteousness, for the glory of Your name, amen.

the sermon on the mount nt501 lesson

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