Let Worry Go Now!
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Let Worry Go Now!
Let Worry Go Now!
Let Worry Go Now!
The opposite of worry is hope. Hope is filled with love, joy, peace, and faith. True hope is confident in the promises of God over all of our abilities. Jesus knows that we worry. In fact, He knows our worries before we can even consider them. Jesus completely understands the cause and the solution of our anxiousness.
[.text-color-blue]7 Causes of Worry and The Solution for Each[.text-color-blue]
AI does not worry. It just takes the task it is given and completes it to the best of its ability.
Ben Sasse is not worried even though he is dying. In his suffering, Ben has offered the world some of the best ideas — economic, historic, and deeply theological — for the future of our country, for our communities, and for our families. His clarity in suffering is miraculous!
Jesus says, "Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” - [.no-reftag]Matthew 6:34[.no-reftag]
The Worry Problem
Worry lacks purpose.
Worry lacks proper self-identity.
Worry lacks action.
Worry lacks trust in God.
Worry lacks humility.
Worry lacks confidence.
Worry lacks joy, peace, hope, and love.
Worry is being anxious about who you are and what you were made to do. The anxious person is almost always aware of the right move. The problem isn’t information — worry makes the discomfort of acting feel more immediate than the cost of waiting.
“Worry feels like responsibility, but it’s really just pride in disguise. It takes humility to admit we don’t have all the answers, to trust that when life isn’t going our way, there’s a bigger plan at work.” - Tim Keller
Worry is a weakness. Worry is futile. Worry can be overcome.
Do Not Worry
The opposite of worry is hope. Hope is filled with love, joy, peace, and faith. True hope is confident in the promises of God over all of our abilities.
Jesus knows that we worry. In fact, He knows our worries before we can even consider them. Jesus completely understands the cause and the solution of our anxiousness.
Jesus is calling us into a life of peace, purpose, and power as we work with Him in building the kingdom of God, on earth as it is in heaven (Matthew 6:10).
To equip us as partners, Jesus tells us exactly how to get rid of worry and anxiety.
[.indent]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 than food, and the body more than clothes? 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? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?[.indent]
[.indent]28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers 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—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’[.indent]
[.indent]32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own."[.indent] [.indent]Matthew 6:25-34[.indent]
7 Solutions to Let it Go
Jesus wants us to be free of paralyzing worry, so much so that he gives us 7++ reasons to let worry go. The advice of Jesus is incredibly practical for our everyday work.
1. Know your life purpose — Jesus starts the solution to worry in verse 25 with “Therefore” because He has just explained why “you can not serve God and money” and “where you treasure is there will your heart be also.” It’s not that He is saying you don’t have to eat or get dressed. He is saying life and work are vastly longer and more significant than your temporary life on this earth. Your work is to believe and to store up treasure in heaven where you will live forever.
Ben Sasse is faced with his death and he knows that to live is Christ and to die is gain (Philippians 1:21). Ben is spending his life so that more people will know this saving truth and the most important reason to do all of your work well.
Aim your life toward heaven. Do everything for one thing!
2. Know your identity — you are incredibly valuable to God. Look how He takes care of the birds (v26). How much more is God taking care of you? He always provides what is needed. As God’s dearly loved child (Ephesians 5:1) and as a co-heir of Christ (Romans 8:17) be sure that you know God is providing for you more than you can fathom.
Work within your identity — why you are here and what you are made to do.
3. You need to keep going — Worry and anxiety accomplish nothing. They can’t add even an hour to your life (v27). Worry is a vague stress that takes away from your life and accomplishes nothing.
Ben Sasse knows these are his last days. He can’t control the future. He can help inspire others to live a much brighter future, so he is talking to major news outlets and institutions and sharing incredible insights and recommendations for government, businesses and families should go about their work.
If you want to accomplish things, let go of the worry and get to work doing what you can do and then your coworkers and God will help you see the next steps.
4. Put your full trust in God — Your appearance was made to glorify God. Quit worrying about how you look or what to wear (v28-30). Consider creation — lilies, grass, animals, mountains — the most glorious things are given their beauty by God. This is especially true for humans. God will make you shine like stars in the sky (Philippians 2:15).
Consider Ben Sasse, you can see his treatment makes him look terrible, but God is saying, Ben never looked better. He is using his looks as part of his testimony that gives glory — shining like a star back to his creator.
Trust God to work in and through you to shine without unnecessary clothes and body treatments.
5. Become more humble — God knows your needs better than you do. Don’t seek the things of the world (v31). The constant desire for the next thing — best food, best drink, coolest gadget, better home furnishing — is the activity of people who don’t know God.
God knows what you need. John Piper says it this way. “The argument is: Don’t be anxious because you have the Father; he is “heavenly” not earthly; and he knows exactly what you need. “Father” means he loves you and you are in his heart as a child. “Heavenly” means he is sovereign over all the earth and nothing can stop him from doing good to you. “He knows that you need them” means that he is never at a loss to know what is good for you and he has all the wisdom it takes to meet your need.”
Honor God as Supreme and Sovereign and trust Him to take care of all of your needs.
6. Confidently work toward your destiny — Your job description is clear “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” (v33)
As you confidently embrace your identity and trust that God will provide, you will become increasingly more centered in Christ — seeking the very same things, and doing the very same work Jesus did.
Of course there are no guarantees for physical comfort in this world, but when you do the math of eternity — 50, 80, or even 100 years divided by infinity — leads to decimal places that go around the planet.
Your work is to seek first the kingdom of God on this earth and for life to come.
7. Work with Hope —To work with hope is to be full of peace, joy, and love. Anxiousness is the opposite of hope, peace, joy and love. Jesus is saying to quit your worrying about tomorrow (v34).
Hope does not worry about tomorrow because hope is concerned with doing the right things today.
Hope keeps your eyes on the destination. Anxiety pulls your eyes to every possible obstacle between here and there.
Hope says here is a realistic path. Worry systematically dismantles every path you identify. Worry is a pathway destroyer.
Agency is your sense of personal capacity — “I can do this.” Anxiety and chronic worry quietly whisper the opposite.
Ben Sasse is hopeful about where he is headed as he leaves this earth. He is concerned about the future of our country, our neighborhoods, and our families. He saw a realistic path so he made himself available with his agency to be interviewed by major news outlets so that we could share in his hope for the future
Jesus is charging each of us to do the very same work as we follow Him.
Resources:
Article: The Impossible is Possible | Howard Graham
Video: Extended Interview Ben Sasse on Lessons for America | 60 Minutes
Podcast: Don’t Be Anxious, Your Heavenly Father Cares | John Piper
[.text-color-blue]7 Causes of Worry and The Solution for Each[.text-color-blue]
AI does not worry. It just takes the task it is given and completes it to the best of its ability.
Ben Sasse is not worried even though he is dying. In his suffering, Ben has offered the world some of the best ideas — economic, historic, and deeply theological — for the future of our country, for our communities, and for our families. His clarity in suffering is miraculous!
Jesus says, "Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” - [.no-reftag]Matthew 6:34[.no-reftag]
The Worry Problem
Worry lacks purpose.
Worry lacks proper self-identity.
Worry lacks action.
Worry lacks trust in God.
Worry lacks humility.
Worry lacks confidence.
Worry lacks joy, peace, hope, and love.
Worry is being anxious about who you are and what you were made to do. The anxious person is almost always aware of the right move. The problem isn’t information — worry makes the discomfort of acting feel more immediate than the cost of waiting.
“Worry feels like responsibility, but it’s really just pride in disguise. It takes humility to admit we don’t have all the answers, to trust that when life isn’t going our way, there’s a bigger plan at work.” - Tim Keller
Worry is a weakness. Worry is futile. Worry can be overcome.
Do Not Worry
The opposite of worry is hope. Hope is filled with love, joy, peace, and faith. True hope is confident in the promises of God over all of our abilities.
Jesus knows that we worry. In fact, He knows our worries before we can even consider them. Jesus completely understands the cause and the solution of our anxiousness.
Jesus is calling us into a life of peace, purpose, and power as we work with Him in building the kingdom of God, on earth as it is in heaven (Matthew 6:10).
To equip us as partners, Jesus tells us exactly how to get rid of worry and anxiety.
[.indent]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 than food, and the body more than clothes? 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? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?[.indent]
[.indent]28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers 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—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’[.indent]
[.indent]32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own."[.indent] [.indent]Matthew 6:25-34[.indent]
7 Solutions to Let it Go
Jesus wants us to be free of paralyzing worry, so much so that he gives us 7++ reasons to let worry go. The advice of Jesus is incredibly practical for our everyday work.
1. Know your life purpose — Jesus starts the solution to worry in verse 25 with “Therefore” because He has just explained why “you can not serve God and money” and “where you treasure is there will your heart be also.” It’s not that He is saying you don’t have to eat or get dressed. He is saying life and work are vastly longer and more significant than your temporary life on this earth. Your work is to believe and to store up treasure in heaven where you will live forever.
Ben Sasse is faced with his death and he knows that to live is Christ and to die is gain (Philippians 1:21). Ben is spending his life so that more people will know this saving truth and the most important reason to do all of your work well.
Aim your life toward heaven. Do everything for one thing!
2. Know your identity — you are incredibly valuable to God. Look how He takes care of the birds (v26). How much more is God taking care of you? He always provides what is needed. As God’s dearly loved child (Ephesians 5:1) and as a co-heir of Christ (Romans 8:17) be sure that you know God is providing for you more than you can fathom.
Work within your identity — why you are here and what you are made to do.
3. You need to keep going — Worry and anxiety accomplish nothing. They can’t add even an hour to your life (v27). Worry is a vague stress that takes away from your life and accomplishes nothing.
Ben Sasse knows these are his last days. He can’t control the future. He can help inspire others to live a much brighter future, so he is talking to major news outlets and institutions and sharing incredible insights and recommendations for government, businesses and families should go about their work.
If you want to accomplish things, let go of the worry and get to work doing what you can do and then your coworkers and God will help you see the next steps.
4. Put your full trust in God — Your appearance was made to glorify God. Quit worrying about how you look or what to wear (v28-30). Consider creation — lilies, grass, animals, mountains — the most glorious things are given their beauty by God. This is especially true for humans. God will make you shine like stars in the sky (Philippians 2:15).
Consider Ben Sasse, you can see his treatment makes him look terrible, but God is saying, Ben never looked better. He is using his looks as part of his testimony that gives glory — shining like a star back to his creator.
Trust God to work in and through you to shine without unnecessary clothes and body treatments.
5. Become more humble — God knows your needs better than you do. Don’t seek the things of the world (v31). The constant desire for the next thing — best food, best drink, coolest gadget, better home furnishing — is the activity of people who don’t know God.
God knows what you need. John Piper says it this way. “The argument is: Don’t be anxious because you have the Father; he is “heavenly” not earthly; and he knows exactly what you need. “Father” means he loves you and you are in his heart as a child. “Heavenly” means he is sovereign over all the earth and nothing can stop him from doing good to you. “He knows that you need them” means that he is never at a loss to know what is good for you and he has all the wisdom it takes to meet your need.”
Honor God as Supreme and Sovereign and trust Him to take care of all of your needs.
6. Confidently work toward your destiny — Your job description is clear “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” (v33)
As you confidently embrace your identity and trust that God will provide, you will become increasingly more centered in Christ — seeking the very same things, and doing the very same work Jesus did.
Of course there are no guarantees for physical comfort in this world, but when you do the math of eternity — 50, 80, or even 100 years divided by infinity — leads to decimal places that go around the planet.
Your work is to seek first the kingdom of God on this earth and for life to come.
7. Work with Hope —To work with hope is to be full of peace, joy, and love. Anxiousness is the opposite of hope, peace, joy and love. Jesus is saying to quit your worrying about tomorrow (v34).
Hope does not worry about tomorrow because hope is concerned with doing the right things today.
Hope keeps your eyes on the destination. Anxiety pulls your eyes to every possible obstacle between here and there.
Hope says here is a realistic path. Worry systematically dismantles every path you identify. Worry is a pathway destroyer.
Agency is your sense of personal capacity — “I can do this.” Anxiety and chronic worry quietly whisper the opposite.
Ben Sasse is hopeful about where he is headed as he leaves this earth. He is concerned about the future of our country, our neighborhoods, and our families. He saw a realistic path so he made himself available with his agency to be interviewed by major news outlets so that we could share in his hope for the future
Jesus is charging each of us to do the very same work as we follow Him.
Resources:
Article: The Impossible is Possible | Howard Graham
Video: Extended Interview Ben Sasse on Lessons for America | 60 Minutes
Podcast: Don’t Be Anxious, Your Heavenly Father Cares | John Piper