Sermon Central
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7 Reasons Not To Worry
Contributed by Brian Menear on Mar 31, 2007 (message contributor)
Summary: It does no good to worry about tomorrow. We may not have a tomorrow. If you are worrying about the problems of tomorrow, you will miss out on the blessings of today.
7 Reasons Not To Worry
Most of us worry unnecessarily about too many things.
It’s almost as though we search for problems to give ourselves stress. The amazing news is that much of what we worry about doesn’t matter at all! Take a look at these statistics about worry:
40% of all things that we worry about never come to pass.
30% of all our worries involve past decisions that cannot be changed.
12% focus on criticism from others who spoke because they felt inferior.
10% are related to our health, which gets worse when we worry.
8% of our worries could be described as "legitimate" causes for concern.
Isn’t that remarkable? Fewer than one "problem" in every ten that we worry about is a real concern. All the others are things that we can learn to see differently or eliminate.
God does not wish for us to spend our days worrying. Not about the future, not about money or need. He will provide for all those who have trusted and believed him. Worry has been defined as “a small trickle of fear that meanders through the mind until it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained. Here are 7 reasons why you should not worry.
1-The same God who created life in you can be trusted with the details of that life.
MT 6:25 "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 important than food, and the body more important than clothes?
We are the most valuable of all Gods creatures. In all that we face in this world we can trust God – even in the bad times. But we must make the choice to let go of our worries and trust him. I think that is why Matt Redman writes that he is going to choose to say “Blessed be your name”
Blessed be Your name,
When the sun’s shining down on me
When the world’s "all as it should be"
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be Your name,
On the road marked with suffering
Though there’s pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name
… You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord, blessed be Your name
2-Worrying about the future hampers your efforts today.
26 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?
3-Worrying is more harmful that helpful.
27 Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?
ILLUS-Death was walking toward a city, and a man stopped Death and asked “what are yo going to do?” “I’m going to kill 10,000 people today” Death said. The man ran ahead to the the city. He warned everybody he passed that Death was coming and what he was going to do. At then end of the day, he again met Death. He said “you said you were only going to kill 10,000 people and now 70,000 are dead” Death said “I killed only 10,000. Worry and fear killed the others”.
4-God does not ignore those who depend on him.
MT 6:28 "And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 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, O you of little faith?
We may worry about things but we have a lot to be thankful for to God.
If you have food in the refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof overhead and a place to sleep, you are richer than 75% of this world.
If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and spare change in a dish someplace, you are among the top 8% of the world’s wealthy.
If you woke up this morning with more health than illness, you are more blessed than the million who will not survive this week
If you have never experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of torture, or the pangs of starvation, you are ahead of 500 million people in the world.
If you can attend church meetings without fear of harassment, arrest, torture, or death, you are more blessed than three billion in the world.
And if your parents are still alive and still married, you are very rare, even in the United States.
