Luke 12:22-34

Discussion Questions

• Do you agree that the use of technology (specifically our smartphones) has contributed to an anxious generation? Does this ring true in your own life? What might be a solution to this problem?
• Why does Jesus say we shouldn’t worry or be anxious?
• Is anxiety a sin or just the context for sin? What is the base problem?
• One way to tease out why we are anxious is to ask the question: What can I not imagine life without? Are there things besides Jesus that take His place as your “rock of ages”?
• What is the difference between obsessive fretfulness and a healthy level of mindfulness? Have you ever tended to knee-jerk in response to Jesus’ warning to a completely unmindful posture?
• The way to be anxious about nothing is to be (fill in the blank) “____________________ about everything.”
•  “God, thy will be done” is not simply a weak, faith-deficient prayer. How can we say this prayer and still give our requests to God while not denying what’s going on, but also accepting the gift of lament when appropriate?
• How do we “tune” our hearts to treasure what God treasures and see things like God sees them?

Transcript

We study through books of the Bible here at The Village Chapel. We have extra copies. If you didn’t bring one with you and you’d like one to follow along, just raise your hand up real high and somebody would be glad to drop one off at your aisle, your row. It’s always good to have the text in front of you. Greetings and hello to those who worshiped or studied with us online this past week. From Singapore; Bengaluru, Karnataka, India; Toronto, Ontario, Canada; and good old Redmond, Oregon here in the USA. Glad that you were able to join us. Hope you’re able to be with us today as well. I’ll put the QR code up on the screen. If you would like the notes and quotes in advance, you can just click your camera up there and follow that link and you’ll have access to those.

Our chapter and verses will be Luke, Chapter 12, verses 22 to 34, picking up right where we left off a couple of weeks ago before Palm Sunday, when Pastor Ryan Motta was leading us up through that first section of Luke, Chapter 12. Before I read the text, let me offer this prayer for illumination: Father, You have invited, so we have gathered. You’ve spoken and we are eager to hear. Because You hear, we bring You our prayers, our praises. Because You provide, we can now rest. And Lord Jesus, because You lead, we will rise and follow. Because You died, we have received life. And because You rose again, we have hope. And because You save, we must sing. Grant us this, we pray, a clearer vision of Your truth, a greater faith in Your power, and a more confident assurance of Your love for us. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen and amen.

Let’s read the text then. Set your eyes on the page or swipe there on your devices. Jesus is right in the middle of some teaching that Luke has recorded here. In verse 22, He turns to His disciples and focuses their attention on Him, and His message more on them. “For this reason I say to you, do not be anxious for 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 the birds! And which of you by being anxious can add a single cubit to his lifespan?” A cubit is about 18 inches. In other words, you can’t increase your length of life. If 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 arrays 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.”

This is the Word of the Lord. So, let’s see what we learn here. It’s been a couple thousand years since Jesus gave us this little bit of teaching on the destructive nature of worry and anxiety on the human soul and the benefits of trusting in a sovereign God and resting in His faithfulness. There are lots of reasons people are interested in this kind of subject. It’s kind of timeless, to be honest with you, whether it’s for their own good or for the good of someone else they love or someone in their family. I think that’s one of the reasons why this book became an instant number one New York Times bestseller: The Anxious Generation by social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, some of you are familiar with this book. He lays out the facts about the epidemic level of adolescent mental illness that has hit so many countries in such a short period of time, literally around the world. And the summary statement is kind of on the screen there for you: “My central claim in this book, is that these two trends – overprotection in the real world and underprotection in the virtual world – are the major reasons why children born after 1995 became the anxious generation.”

It’s a fascinating read, especially if you happen to have children, I highly recommend it to you. And even if you don’t, I think most of us would acknowledge that worry and anxiety are problems. How many of you would admit, yes, I worry from time to time, raise your hand. And how many of you get anxious from time to time? And how many of you worry about getting anxious from time to time? That’s all of us as well. I also have a quote from a guy named Brett McCracken, and he’s the director of communications for an organization called The Gospel Coalition. We went to their conference this past week and really enjoyed a lot of the wisdom that was coming, as well as the worship in the room. And he says in a book that he has written called Scrolling Ourselves to Death, he says, “Heads down. Phones out. Fingers scrolling. This is the humanoid posture of our age. We see it everywhere. Sit in a coffee shop, look around you. All eyes are on devices. We see it in ourselves too. From the rising of the sun to it’s going down, we scroll our way through the day. We scroll our way through life. And we are scrolling ourselves to death.”

I see some heads nodding up and down. That’s either because conceptually you agree, or perhaps personally you feel convicted, like I did when I read that. I admit I literally have turned around after driving away from my house about three, four blocks, whatever, because I forgot this thing. And oh no, I can’t go an hour without it. I can’t go to that meeting. I can’t go to church without it. I think it’s ironic that somewhere or another, God providentially has caused it so that this phone has this – I don’t know what time it happens for you, but for me, my amount of screen time announces, I get a notification, during church. I think that’s just so cool of God. I don’t know who at Apple thought they were in charge of that, but I think God was involved in that more than they were. McCracken goes on to say in his book – and I won’t put all this up on the screen, but I think it’s important – “Researchers have made compelling correlations between smartphone, especially social media, usage, and rising mental unhealth, depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, and loneliness.”

Maybe you? Maybe sometime? He says, “especially that among teens and young adults, consider the staggering rise in suicide rates among US youth and young adults and the dawn of the smartphone age.” Remember, iPhone came out in 2007, not that long ago. Then he goes to, quote, “between 2001 and 2007, the suicide rate for kids ages 10 to 24 was stable. But since 2007, the year the iPhone debuted, it has skyrocketed rising 62% between 2007 and 2021.” That’s still four years ago. What’s it now? It’s had such an impact on all of us, but especially our young. Whether you’re obsessively addicted to scrolling or not, there’s no argument about the negative impact of anxiety and worry and fear that can cripple your soul and your mind. We’re all vulnerable to worry. We all worry about a whole lot of things, social phobias. I love the introvert t-shirt that says, “Introverts just prefer to be at home alone all the time.” I really feel good about that. And that’s great. But introverts of the world unite at home doesn’t work. We have to live in a world where we are all together.

We worry about running out of money. We worry about family life issues. Some of you, the worst thing in the world for you is coming, ramping up to some holiday where you’ve got to eat dinner with those people and getting along with them. And they with you, probably. We worry about friendships, having them, not having them, managing them poorly. We worry about our family members, our parents, and their aging, our children, and will they make it? Have we been good parents or not? We worry about our job performance. We worry about our career advancement. We worry about security in the world and safety in the world. We worry about things like politics, missing an airplane, not waking up on time for that important thing tomorrow.

What’s the Bible have to say about worry and anxiety? There’s a little bit here. This is interesting. There were no iPhones back then. But Jesus knows our hearts. He knows the human condition better than all of us. And look at verse 22, turning to His disciples, what does He say? “For this reason…” What’s the reason? I always ask, for what reason? That’s like a therefore in the Bible. You always ask, what’s it there for? Well, for this reason, what’s the reason? Well, He just gave a parable about a guy who was pretty productive, pretty successful, began reasoning to himself, what shall I do? I’ve no place to store all my crops. And so, He builds all these barns. “And he said to himself, ‘This is what I’ll do. I’ll tear down my old barns and build larger ones. And there I’ll store all my granted goods. And I’ll say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry.” And then Jesus goes on to just say, this guy is like a fool. He’s trusting in himself and what he can do and the treasures of this world. And I read that, and I went, man, that’s me too. And then Jesus goes right in. For this reason, He wants to talk to us about worry and anxiety. We’re all tempted to trust in the treasures of this world. We all have difficulty seeing the greatest treasure is God, is Jesus, and His kingdom. What should we do then with that tension as people who are followers of Jesus? Well, we’ll call this tune my heart, the sermon. And I’m going to give you the outline in advance because it’s one of those beautiful days. Some of you might nod off and I want you to at least get this much.

We see a prohibition. We see a perspective. We see a prescription and a promise here. And I’ll talk about each of them just for a moment, if you’ll lend me your ears. The prohibition, first of all. He starts right off there with this imperative. The list of things I say to you, do not be anxious for your life. There are– as a matter of fact, in this passage, He’s going to use three different Greek words, talking about worry and anxiety that way on. And it’s as if He’s recorded us as using these three different Greek words. And it’s as if Jesus knows that some of you are not going to think about it the same way. And so, He says “merimnao” in three different times, verse 22, 25, and 26, to be anxious. This is this verb, to be fretful, to be overly mindful, obsessing over. But then “meteoritzomai,” He uses in verse 29. And if you look at that real quick, verse 29 says, do not keep worrying. So don’t live that way. And the idea there is doubtful mind, imagination, run amok, like a ship tossed to sea, wind and waves.

Maybe that’s you. I like it said better this way, writing narratives about what might or might not happen. We one time had a therapist/counselor that we were talking with share that with us. Stop writing narratives. Some of you are really good writers of narratives about what might or might not happen. And most of us have written those narratives and can look back over our lives. And if I were to ask you to put a percentage on it, how many of your narratives became true stories, you would probably say more than – greater than 50% of them did not ever come true. You worried about what? Nothing. You worried about what your imagination told you to be worried about? Or worse, you worried about what somebody online or some institution or some message in the culture told you to worry about. This might happen. That might happen. This could happen to your kids. This could happen to your parents. This could happen to your own body. This might happen to your own life or your own career on and on.

So, Jesus begins with a command. Jesus does not give us commands if He isn’t ready and willing to empower us to keep those commands. That’s why we have the Holy Spirit to enable us to respond to God in loving obedience. Greek, meteoritzomai, is that writing of narratives. And then, “phobeo” is to be afraid, which I love. I love simple verbs like that, too. That’s where we get phobia. You could put together a list of 20 or 30 phobias and probably have a really fun time with it that. You can go online and find a lot of those sort of things, lists like that, all the things that we’re afraid of. But before your feet hit the ground tomorrow morning, and every morning following, Jesus says, don’t be anxious. Don’t be afraid. Don’t keep worrying about tomorrow, about your career, about money, about any of those sorts of things. The phrase that people sometimes use about the world we live in is The Rat Race.

The great philosopher Lily Tomlin once said, “The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you’re still a rat.” Yeah. So, if that’s the race you want to be in, remember the very best possible outcome is you with a long tail, some whiskers, and pointy ears. And that’s not much fun at all. But if you aren’t so worried about running the rat race, as I’ve already established, I think a lot of us are in different ways, the rat race might be the social rat race. It might not be about money, it might be about fame or celebrity or just popularity or just affirmation. Again, not necessarily evil things, but they were just never meant to be the center of your life. And Jesus knows that if you try to make them the center of your life, you will be in the rat race. And you will not be satisfied; you’ll be chronically dissatisfied. I love the way Oswald Chambers said it, “All of our fret and worries are caused by calculating without God.” The one thing that keeps us from the possibility of worrying is bringing God in as the greatest factor in all our calculations.

Jesus did that in the Garden of Gethsemane in His most difficult moment of anguish, where He sweat drops of sweat and blood. And He said, “Father, if it’s possible, let this cup pass.” And then He showed how He is confident to be resolved in God’s will. And He said, “Not my will, but Thine be done.” That’s the prayer of faith. And I know there’s a bunch of those preachers out there that will try to tell you that if you pray like that, you don’t really have faith. You’re not really trusting. You’re not really believing God for a breakthrough or a miracle or a big landslide of cash or 100% positive physical healing or whatever that might be. But I just want to kneel right beside Jesus, and I just want to pray just like Jesus does, much more than I want to listen to those kinds of preachers, who I think are leading us astray. They’re putting us in our imagination and our desires and whims at the center. I don’t think that’s the way we ought to be living our lives.

I think the secret to being anxious for nothing is praying right alongside of Oswald Chambers, and before him right along with Jesus. Keller, I think I quoted this the other week, where he’s not believing God will get it right. “Bitterness is believing God got it wrong.” Sometimes I adapt that and say, “Anxiety is not believing God will get it right and anger is believing God got it wrong.” Are you anxious or angry? Could it be you don’t think He’s in charge? Could it be you don’t think He’s sovereign? See a lot of us will say, “I believe in the sovereignty of God.” But then when it comes to like actually leaning on that, trusting on that, hoping on that, we fail. And I’m so glad He will hold me fast because even as we were singing that song, I was sitting there thinking to myself, going through my sermon in my own mind thinking, “I don’t live all this out.” I don’t have this all right, but I got news for you; I’ve been doing this for 24 years. I don’t get up here and tell you this stuff because I got it all figured out myself. I get up here and tell you this stuff because I think it’s true. And there’s a big difference. And I need to amend my life to this, just like you need to mend your life to this as well. And it will do all of us really, really good.

It’ll do us really well to note that we need the nearness of God, that we need to have the same perspective that God has, which is why the second thing I want to talk about is this perspective, which is really the larger portion of the text, worries waste moments. Why waste your life like that? Writing narratives that mostly won’t come true, won’t ever happen. Why do that? Why burn up the engine of your soul like that, or your mind like that? Jesus is telling us we need to align our perspective with God’s to see things the way He sees things, to treasure what God treasures, to want what God wants, to weep over what God weeps over, to have our heart look just like His heart, to turn our heart over to His is to have that perspective, that eternal perspective. So often, I think for me, when I’m in a time when I’m wringing my hands, and I’m really waking up at two and three o’clock in the morning, can’t sleep, and all that sort of thing, my mind can’t stop, and I’m imagining all these things, writing all these narratives. It’s just that I need to remember how big God is and how small I am – how small this world is, how small the items I’m worrying about are, okay?

Perspective like this, that Jesus talks about, is really important. This is one of my favorite graphics on perspective. [Congregation laughing.] You live there, and I live there with you, on that tiny little speck. There’s a couple billion of us there. And the entire observable universe is balanced in such a way, that you and I are not flying off of this planet because it spins at something like 167,000 miles an hour. And if God didn’t turn gravity on, or if He decided to turn it off at some particular point in time, man, you worrying about your next career move really won’t matter at all. You worrying about whether or not somebody liked your post will be completely out of the picture. I mean, think of it, just get that perspective. And it’s not to say that, I’m not doing this to say your life is so small, it doesn’t matter. In fact, look at this, this is mind blowing. The God that created that sun, which is actually one of the smallest stars in the observable universe, which means our little planet is really one of the tiniest. If size is what matters, we are so insignificant.

But it’s not all that matters. Why? ‘Cause God sent His Son to the dust ball because He loves you and He loves me. And Jesus told all those people that day, do not be anxious, don’t worry, you don’t need to do that. You don’t need to worry about your daily needs, the ravens, the birds of the air. They’ve never driven a tractor and plowed a field and planted seeds and tried to raise a crop so they could have some food tonight. Ah, no. And the lilies of the grass that withered, it’s beautiful grass, I love it. I don’t have much of a yard. We live in a neighborhood with small lawns. I’m pretty proud of the lawn I got. I work really hard at it as a homeowner. I think I might be the one or two of us that cut our grass still. But I like it to look like a little golf course. I like that a lot. But it could wither tomorrow and be gone. It’s beautiful right now. It’s awesome. I take care of it. I do my job as a Harry homeowner, but it could be gone tomorrow. And Jesus is neither sort of species neutral. He says, look at the birds. Your Father loves you way more than the birds.

Okay, in our world today, there are people that write laws because they want to neutralize all the species and make them all the same. I have got a problem with that. That’s just not the way of God. He created you and me and every other living human being in His image, in “imago dei.” And that’s the only part of creation he said that. Do we get arrogant about that? Is that to give us some kind of right to be all puffed up? No. He made us vice regents in His creation and told us to care for it. He gave us not only privilege, but responsibility. And we have both of those. And this is wonderful that on the dust-ball-sized planet, you and I have the dignity of caring and bearing the image of God, as well as being able to tend for the rest of His creation. There’s no reason for us to be upset when we know God is caring for everything from the birds to the grass itself, to the lilies and how beautiful they are.

The question is, do I look to the Lord and treasure Him and want to have my heart transformed to be like His, so I see things the way He sees things? Spurgeon, that prince of preachers, 19th century, Baptist preacher from over in England: “Our anxiety does not empty tomorrow over its sorrows but only empties today of its strengths.” You see, you’re literally burning up the engine of your soul, your heart and your mind by allowing yourself to fixate on the things that make you anxious. And I love this: “I have learned to kiss the wave that throws me against the Rock of Ages.” There was one more I wanted to put up there, it just doesn’t fit all on one slide. And it’s him talking about the sovereignty of God being the pillow upon which he lays his head at night. Oh, what a great image.

I was talking with a friend yesterday for probably about an hour, there’s lots of changes going on in his life and stuff like that. And we actually got to talking a little bit about anxiety and worry. And we both kind of settled in on this thing about the restlessness at night, you can’t sleep and all that sort of thing. We talked a lot about different things that we do when that’s the case. It’s like, do you stay there in bed? Or, I’m going to sleep. Or do you get up and read a book? And we talked a lot about prayer; we talked about praying. We talked about sometimes just the simple prayer, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me as sinner. You know, just repeating that, the power of a repeated prayer like that and just turning to the Lord. And just as these are ways in which we turn or tune our hearts to the Lord.

Cornelius Plantinga’s written a book called Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be. It’s probably one of my top 20 books of all time. He says, “Anxiety is only the context for sin, not its cause. Our base problem is unbelief. Failing to trust the infinite God, we live anxiously, restlessly, always trying to secure and extend ourselves with finite goods that can’t take the weight we put on them.” So, if you find yourself repeatedly anxious, repeatedly worrying, sort of chronically dissatisfied, upset, tense, all that sort of thing, it might be good to ask some questions about what’s at the center for you.

What are you so worried about that if it’s taken away, your life will have no meaning? Or if that happens, that’s going to be the worst outcome in the entire world. I just can’t imagine life without that not happening. Keep that from happening, God. Or this over here. If this doesn’t happen, my life is just going to go down the tube. No, those things were never meant to be at the center. If we’re worried, if we’re always anxious all the time, we would do really well, I think, to take stock about what we are considering to be our rock of ages. Spurgeon said it up there. “I kiss the wave that has pushed me up against the Rock of Ages.” And who’s the rock of ages, church? Christ. So, if something has moved you to all of a sudden look to and depend on Jesus, I just keep hearing the question in my mind, oh, has it come to that?

We have got to trust God now, do we? And yet every single day I trust Him for gravity, for a heartbeat, for my next breath, for the glimmer in your eye when we see each other and greet one another on Sundays, for the love of God that we see in each other, that we experience in each other, there’s so much there. Thirdly, the prescription, I gotta move on. And this is so important. Here we are in Music City, so I want to find a way to say this. The prescription is to see things the way God sees things and to trust and hope in God. And so, for all you musicians here, Jesus is the human soul’s A440. We have to have A440 to have a melody or any kind of harmony at all.

There needs to be something that’s the thing. And Jesus, for human beings, Jesus is the example of human flourishing. He’s the example of human being trusting in his father, trusting in God, laying down his life for others. Jesus is the ultimate example of everything, but there’s more because you and I don’t just need another example, we need a savior. And so, He calls us to His kingdom, and that’s our true North, we’re headed for His kingdom. We sing, I am bound, I am bound, I’m bound for the promised land. And the figurative interpretation of that is, we’re bound for God’s kingdom, it’s the promised land for us. That’s where this is all leading. We have an answer to the question; do we have a destiny? We have an answer to the question; is this going anywhere? Seems like we get up, we go to sleep, we get up, we go to sleep, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat. How boring is life? How many meanings, we start to ask after the 150,000th time we’ve asked that question. Is it going anywhere? Yes, it is, yeah. And He’s transforming and changing each and every one of us. And He is the one that is drawing us to His kingdom.

This is why this leads me to some of what the apostle Paul would say, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God.” The invitation is for you to bring every bit, just like Tina said in our video. It’s not that we deny what’s going on. The Lord has given us the gift of lament. A third of the psalms are laments. There are the psalms, the songwriters saying to God, this world is so broken; I’m so lonely. Help me. And being honest about all of that, I’m fearful, I’m trembling. And the lament is a gift to us; we’re invited to sing that, or to pray that lament to Him. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God. My God will supply all… how many? All your needs, not your greed, all your needs, according to His riches in glory. How big are his riches in glory, people? He has all of them. All of the glory there is belongs to God. All of the glory there will ever be belongs to God. And His riches in glory are massive.

And when you start to get that perspective and that that glory is in Christ Jesus, then I think with our old buddy D.A. Carson, you might find yourself agreeing with him. “The way to be anxious about nothing is to be prayerful about everything.” Yeah. Is it really that simple? Yeah, it is. The question is, will I do that? And not prayer as I define it. Here’s my list of things for You to do today. God, check the boxes or I don’t believe in You anymore. Do it in my timing, in my sequence, or I won’t believe in You anymore, and I’ll be upset with You. No, that’s not prayer. That’s not surrendering to Him. It’s not bowing before Him. It’s not saying Your will be done. All of this comes with this beautiful promise. Look at verse 32. I want to read that again. I’ll put this up on the screen for you too. “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has chosen gladly to give you the kingdom.” It’s a breathtaking promise. It’s a one-verse gospel in miniature.

Look up there. Little flock is so beautiful. Fear not, so beautiful. We’re so often afraid. Little flock. We’re weak, vulnerable, sheep-like and sheepish, if you want. Your Father, not a distant deity, but the Father. Not some distant deity, not just an impersonal force at the universe, the battery of the universe, whatever. Not that, no. Your Father in heaven who loves His children. You belong to Him? I hope you do. Are you in relationship with Him? I hope you are. Jesus has made that possible for you and for me. Literally, everything in the universe belongs to God by right of creation. But He wants more than just ownership for you and for me. No matter who you are, no matter where you are, what you’ve done, He wants to be your Father. He wants relationship with you. Do you know Him like that? I pray that you do. And if not, why not? Jesus has done everything necessary for you to come to Him and know Him as Father, and He will delight in you.

And He will, verse 32, give you the kingdom. It’s a gift not wages earned. It is grace lavished upon you. And I’m so glad for that. Colossians 1.13, I won’t put it up on the screen, but it says, “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transformed us into the kingdom of His beloved Son.” That’s awesome. He’s transferred us from one kingdom into the other. It’s like, no charge. You’re not trying to balance out the moral skills. God has done this as a gift to you. Moved you from the kingdom of darkness and transferred you into the kingdom of His beloved Son. That’s a promise that invites trust, rest, joy even. That’s a promise that erases worry and anxiety. Because it’s not just something I stopped doing. It’s something that’s so beautiful that it draws me away to see it, to look at it, to look at Him. He is so majestic, so beautiful, so sovereign. When my eyes are fixed on Him, these shadows fall behind like that.

Just a few quotes, and I’ll let you go. James Hudson Taylor, he founded the Midland Mission to China – 51 years there in China. He says, “The branch of the vine does not worry and toil rush here to seek for sunshine, and there to find rain. No; it rests in union and communion with the vine; and at the right time and in the right way, is the right fruit found on it. Let us so abide in the Lord Jesus.” It might be, that’s the simple message you need to hear today. Again, I can’t know where everybody’s at, but I need to hear it today. And I need to hear it over and over and over again to abide in Him. I’m just a branch. He’s the vine, though. My life is found in Him.

And you say, “You don’t know what my life is like. You don’t know what’s going on in my life. You don’t know the wreckage and ruin that’s going on in my life.” That’s true. I don’t. I just know about the wreckage and ruin in my life. I just know about the stuff in my life that Christ has saved me from and continues to hold me fast through. And so, I keep saying, I have to turn to Him. I have to lift up the empty hands of faith before Him. And I have to know and trust that He is wise. He knows what is best in all things. And Tozer said, “While it looks like things are out of control, behind the scenes, there’s a God who hasn’t surrendered His authority… A frightened world needs a fearless church.” I think that’s true.

I think that I think the church could be that group of people, that city on the hill that can’t be hidden, that group of people that somehow or another in the midst of all the acrimony of an election year, all the fear of a pandemic, might still find themselves so trusting God, so hoping and keeping Jesus at the center that they’re able to rise above their own differences and even find in Christ that refuge from the storm and that strength to rise again from Psalm 46. He’s both our defense and our offense. We can trust in Him. No matter how a storm rages, no matter how big the giants we must face. Let’s turn to Him. “Here now was a God who does not want our goodness but our trust. All the struggles and all the anxiety could be replaced with massive confidence and simple faith, receiving the gift.” of the kingdom. Verse 32, so said Michael Reeves here.

Let’s pray: Lord, help us to believe that it is Your delight to give us Your kingdom. To find ourselves living in the place where You are king, You are sovereign, You are Lord, and we can arrest our heads on the pillow of Your sovereignty. Lord, quiet our anxious hearts and minds. I know that in this room within the sound of my voice, there are all kinds of things that are distracting us and trying to derail our faith and trying to defeat our faith and cause us to be afraid. Teach us, Lord, to treasure what You treasure, to delight in what You delight in and tune our hearts, Lord, to sing Your praise. May our lives reflect the joy and generosity of the One who gave everything to make us His own – Jesus. Amen and amen.

Songs, Readings & Prayer

Songs

“His Mercy Is More“ by Matt Boswell and Matt Papa
“Anchor Of Hope“ by Brown Bannister and Ellie Holcomb
“Psalm 23 (Surely Goodness, Surely Mercy)“ by Shane Barnard
“He Will Hold Me Fast“ by Ada Ruth Habershon and Matthew Merker
“Doxology” by Thomas Ken and Louis Bourgeois
All songs are used by Permission. CCLI License #2003690

Call To Worship: Steady Dependence

Compose our spirits to a quiet and steady dependence on your good providence, that we may not be anxious for anything, but by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, still make known our requests to you, our God. Help us to pray always and not faint; in everything to give thanks, and offer up the sacrifice of praise continually; to rejoice in hope of your glory; to possess our souls in patience; and to learn in whatsoever state we are, there to be content. Through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen!

Source: John Wesley, edited

Confession of Faith: “He Suffered Under Pontius Pilate”, The Apostles Creed

Leader: Why did Jesus suffer?
People: Jesus suffered as a sacrifice for our sins so that we could have peace with God, as prophesied in the Old Testament: “Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.”

Leader: In what ways did Jesus suffer?
People: On earth, the incarnate Son shared physically, emotionally, and spiritually in the temptations and sufferings common to all people, yet without sin. In his agony and desolation on the Cross, he uniquely suffered in my place for my sins and, in so doing, revealed God’s love and compassion for fallen and suffering humanity.

Leader: How do Jesus’ sufferings help you?
People: Jesus has experienced our sufferings, understands our sorrows, and is able to sympathize with our weakness. Therefore, I should bear my sufferings with perseverance and hope, for my Savior is with me in them, and through them I will come to know him more fully.

Source: ACNA, Q. 59, 60, 61

Curate’s Prayer: Abraham Kuyper, 19th c.

It is good for me, it is my blessed lot “to be near unto God,”…only and alone when the soul has found its highest good in God, can the germ of the personal life in us revive from its withered estate, and begin to develop and to unfold, until from the half-opened bud expands the blossom of everlasting life. May it be so our gracious Father.

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