Sermon for Ordinary 8 Year A
By The Rev Eric Royden
Turning to our gospel reading we find we find Jesus making three points.
First that of loyalty; that no person can serve two masters. Secondly, that
there is no cause to worry. Thirdly, that we should live righteously.
Mark Twain was rebuking a Mormon who had two wives and the Mormon said, ‘can
you show me any part of Scripture which forbids polygamy’. Twain answered,
‘certainly. No man can serve two masters’. That was not what Jesus had in
mind however.
In Jesus time there was slavery and Roman law forbade a slave having two
masters. A slave became a possession not a person, and the Master had
complete control of his life. Some Masters were good, others bad, and Jesus
is depicting God as a good Master, and so God should have undisputed claim
on a Christian’s life. At no time can we relax Christian standards.
Jesus says you cannot serve God and Mammon. Mammon was a Hebrew word for
material possessions, and meant that which a person puts their trust in.
These can occupy a place in our life they are not meant to have, and at the
heart of Jesus teaching is that all things belong to God. The Bible saying,
‘the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof’.
Possession of material things is not a sin but a responsibility. But the
question arises, how do we get those things. By honourable means, or foul.
How do we use them, selfishly or wisely, even helping others.
Money in itself is not evil. The Lord Himself commends the good use of money
- stewardship and wisdom as we use our money. As we come to these words of
Jesus today, the Lord is warning us of the grave dangers that are inherent
within laying up money, and indeed laying up any treasures, whatever they
may be. The Lord is not simply speaking about money, He is speaking about
anything that is to us a strength, anything that is a possession that we
prize and that we hold to dearly. It can be money; it can be absolutely
anything
There is the question of priority. A business man once said, “on Sunday my
priorities are God, family business, but on Monday to Saturday the reverse
order.” Jesus is saying, “you love the one which claims your devotion, but
hate the other.”
Then Jesus deals with worry.
A man went to a psychologist and said, "Doctor, sometimes I feel like a
Marquee and at other times I feel like a Wigwam." The doctor thought about
it for a moment and then he said, "I better treat you for anxiety. You're
two tents!"
Anxiety however is no joke. In our world, stress is a way of life and so
many people are filled with anxiety about so many things. Health, children,
mortgage, work, keeping up with friends. I am sure the list could go on and
on. There may be anxiety in most of your life with unresolved issues,
nagging problems, worries over finances, work, and relationships. What
success have you had in dealing with these kinds of problems? Have you
perhaps accepted worry and anxiety as a natural part of your life?
Many Christians can take the things which worry them to God in prayer and
find that God responds, whilst others seem to put little trust in praying
when things get hard. From personal experience I have learned He really does
answer.
Of course, we are not the first people to experience stress and anxiety,
although we may think that ours is greater than anyone else's. Anxiety,
however, has been around for a long time. And it has been afflicting us for
centuries. In Jesus' day, anxiety was everywhere, as it is today. The people
standing on that mountainside when He delivered the Sermon on the Mount were
no different than you or me. They had to deal with the problems of paying
their bills, feeding their families, pleasing their employers, raising their
children, paying their taxes and saving for the future just like we do.
What would Jesus say to them to help them deal with the pressures and fears
of living? Jesus did not avoid the issue nor did he give them soothing
words. . He dealt directly with the cause and cure for the worried, anxious
heart.
He is telling us that God gave us life so if we truly belong to God surely
we can trust Him to care for all our needs, and goes on to prove that worry
in any event is useless because we cannot alter anything. All it will do
give us ulcers, heart problems and even death.
Have you ever seen a gravestone with the epitaph yet it could be written on
many gravestones. Doctors never cease to tell us today that many of the
illnesses that we have with us are directly, not just the symptom, but are
directly related to the problem of anxiety, the problem of fear and the
problem of worry. Now we're all guilty of this Indeed, most of us worry
sometimes, some of us worry a lot of the time,
A woman worried for many years that she was going to die of cancer, and many
years after she died of something totally different so wasting years of
worry about the wrong thing.. What we're doing is trying to take
responsibility for our own lives rather than leaving them in God’s hands.
Jesus words may sound too easy. He says, do not be anxious. How can He
expect us not to be anxious considering the many things with which we have
to deal?
He tells why we should not worry and how anxiety really only makes things
harder. He is trying to point out that there is more to life than
possessions. He goes on to say even if we do worry none of us can add a
single cubit to his life's span. In other words, anxiety is futile because
life is more than things. It is more than the material. It is more than the
physical. It has an eternal dimension to it that is beyond us.
Jesus then points to the birds and lilies to tell us that God cares for them
with the observation that they don’t worry and yet get by so why should we.
God cares for us to is the message.
Many Christians wonder about these words as to how literally we are to take
them. Some would say if you really believe that God is in charge, and that
He loves you and will meet your needs, then you can relax in faith. If you
for some reason do not believe that God will take care of you, then you will
be unable to relax. You will feel that it is up to you to take care of all
your needs, physical, emotional, and even spiritual.
I realise there are many people these days who are well prepared to sit back
and let everyone else provide for them but they are not necessarily
Christians and do not mind who provides for them. The message Jesus is
giving is that we should not let the provision of our necessities dominate
our thoughts, God will indeed care for us, but we must also make effort to
help ourselves. Elsewhere in the Bible we are told a man has responsibility
for his family, and Paul stated clearly that if a man shall not work he
should not be given food. There would be a lot of starving people today if
this was adhered to however.
Many of us here grew up when our first priority in life was to have a house
to live in, care for our children, sufficient food and clothing and if we
could then afford some luxury we would either get it or save up for it. That
philosophy is considered to be really old-fashioned now and a source of
amusement to many young people. That it may be, but there were less people
on valium and other anti-depressants, and families were happier and stayed
together.
Many now measure their life and happiness in terms of those things that
surround them. But those things are deceptive in nature. While they may
appear to have lasting value and worth, they are by nature temporary.
Consider how many are worried over savings and investments, house prices
etc. In a moment they could be gone. Furthermore, they are not nearly as
important as so many other things. Husband, wife, children, family and
friends all have a higher priority (or should have) than things.
Today people are so influenced by television advertisements. They want to
copy celebrities and live like them without the means to do so, which why so
many are in financial trouble,
Virtues like honesty, integrity, kindness, mercy, patience, faithfulness and
love are all far more important than material goods. Life is far more than
things. The reason so many people are on drugs and alcohol is because of
their hedonistic lifestyle.
There is a piece of music called ‘one day at a time Lord Jesus’ and Jesus
here tells us not to worry about tomorrow for we can only live one day at a
time. Each day has troubles of its own and worry can be defeated when we
live one day at a time.
It was Jesus contention that worry is banished when God becomes the
dominating power of one’s life.
In verse 33 Jesus tells us to first seek the Kingdom of God and His
righteousness and all things will be given you. If we do, our minds will
have something to think of rather than ourselves, for it means our attention
is given to see more people turn to Christ, and doing what we can to see the
Church grow. This means we have to live our lives in a way that brings
credit on Him, and reveals a superior lifestyle to that of so many of our
friends. If we profess to be Christians and then act in a way which is
contrary to Christian teaching, then we are not advancing the Kingdom of
God.
Jesus told us to make this a priority, the first intention, and we do this
by depending on Christ daily. If God is looking after our interests we can
get on and make it our priority to seek His Kingdom. He is in fact
challenging us to put Him first and when we do He will respond and meet our
needs
The choice is ours. We can choose to borrow trouble from tomorrow and live
life as if God is not there, or we can trust Him and seek Him with all our
hearts.
This is the challenge for all believers - to practically trust Christ. It is
to live out what you say you believe. It is to make Him Lord over your life
in practical ways. (1824)