Matthew 6 has given us the following lessons:
It also gives a lesson in Worry. Here are a few interesting finds about worry:
- Only 8 percent of our worries are actually over legitimate troubles
- 40 percent of the things we worry about never happen
- 30 percent of our worries concern the past,
- 12 percent of our worries are needless worries about our health,
- 10 percent of our worries are insignificant or things that will really not make much of a difference in our lives one way or another
- We spend 92 % of our emotional energies over things that won’t happen or things we can’t change
- Damages your health
- Disrupts your productivity
- Negatively affects the was you treat others
- Reduces your ability to trust in God.
The Bible tells us in Matthew 6:25-34:
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 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? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Jesus knew that worry would become an issue so he gave us these words above so that it might help us along the way.
Planning for tomorrow is time well spent, worrying about tomorrow is time wasted. Sometimes it is difficult to tell the difference. Careful planning is thinking ahead about goals, steps and schedules and trusting His guidance. When done well planning can eliminate worrying.
When you are worrying you are being consumed by fear, you allows your plans to be interfered with your relationship with God
How may ill effects are you experiencing?
Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow. It empties today of its strength.
Corrie Ten Boom
*adapted from the life application bible
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