Don't Worry

Matthew 6:25-34

Is worry a sin? I'm not sure I want to put it there since it comes so naturally to me, nor do I want worried people to have one more thing to worry about. But I do think it is easy to take many biblical teachings very seriously and somehow skip over worry. It's strangely easier to be earnest about avoiding lust and yet not even engaged in avoiding worry.

Yet at the heart of worry is distrust. It's as if saying, "Yes, Jesus loves me", but not enough to care for me. The problem is is that we know that life will give us trouble (John 16:33). People we love will get hurt. We will get hurt and so somehow worrying feels like a nice way to prepare ourselves for the trouble.

I like what Dr. Neal Nedley said in his book, The Lost Art of Thinking. He said that there are two possible outcomes for worry: the event that you worry about happens or the event that you worry about doesn't happen. If it does happen, you are already exhausted by the time it occurs. If it doesn't happen, then you just spent a lot of time worrying about nothing.

"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own" (Matthew 6:34).

I once ran into a girl maybe about five or six years old. I asked her how she was and she said, "Worried." I asked her why and she told me that she was starting first grade and she wasn't sure if she would be able to do all the homework. I was both amused and saddened for her. Six feels like an awfully young age to start worrying.

But maybe God sees it the same way for me. "You know, Julie, 34 is an awfully young age to start worrying." He's been around a lot longer than me, and I think I should trust Him when He says, "Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?" (Matthew 6:26).