James Nisbet's Church Pulpit Commentary
Matthew 6:32
THE ANTIDOTE TO ANXIETY
‘Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.’
Anxiety must be a sin. And it must be a sin very deep in the heart. So large a portion of the Sermon on the Mount would never have been directed against anxiety, if the sin were not very large, and its grasp very wide.
I. Why no man should be anxious.—For observe, there are at least seven reasons brought forward, in quick succession, why no man should be anxious.
(a) Anxiety is part of indecision of character, and partakes of its banefulness—it shows a divided allegiance—‘No man can serve two masters—therefore I say unto you, Take no thought.’
(b) The next is the argument from the greater to the less. It shows a greater providence to take care of ‘fowls,’ than it does to take care of men,—but God does take care of ‘fowls.’
(c) The third rests on the impossibilities in the case.—‘Which of you,’ by any amount of anxiety, ‘can add one cubit to his stature?’—or rather, can add the smallest period to his life.
(d) The fourth lies in the analogies of nature.—‘Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow.’
(e) The fifth puts the Christian to shame by showing that if he is anxious, he is like the heathen.—‘For after all these things do the Gentiles seek.’
(f) The sixth in order is the text,—the sweetest of all,—the most likely of all,—the character of God,—‘For your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.’
(g) And the seventh is based upon the folly of the thing.—‘Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.’
II. Anxiety does two things.—(a) It makes you unhappy, first; and unhappiness is not a matter for pity, it is a matter for blame. (b) And secondly, every shade of anxiety which passes over a man’s mind, is a positive wrong done to God; it distrusts Him,—it sets aside one of His attributes,—it gives the lie to one of His promises. Do not think and speak of your anxieties as something for which you are to be commiserated. Rather ask yourself, Can I be right with God, while my mind is so harassed?
III. There are two kinds of anxiety,—or rather, the same temperament of mind may feed on one or other of two states,—temporal or spiritual. The difference, perhaps, is not so great as might at first sight appear. The same character pre-disposes to both. The same charge of unbelief attaches to both. The same argument fits both. The same remedies cure both. Oftentimes the very same person rings the changes;—to-day, he is careful about his bodily necessities, and to-morrow, he is just as anxious about his spiritual. In the Sermon on the Mount our Lord addressed Himself chiefly to the earthly necessities.
IV. The antidote to anxiety.—But I have to do now with the Fatherly character of God as the antidote to anxiety. You must take into your minds a very little child,—for it is of very little children that Christ speaks, and to whom we are to be like. How happy we should all be,—what would become of all our anxieties and all our fears,—if only we could just simply treat our heavenly, as every child who has been kindly brought up, treats his earthly father, and if we could believe that with a love so unselfish, so minute, so munificent, so responsible, ‘our heavenly Father knoweth that we have need of all these things.’
V. Avoid occasions for anxiety.—Never place yourself willingly in a position of worldly anxiety. It is a fearful bar to the spiritual life; and it has led many a man not only into deadness of soul, but into actual sins, at which that man would, at another time, have stood appalled. Therefore, never run into anxieties,—never plant yourself on too broad a basis,—keep your scale of expenditure well within your income,—do not speculate,—do not take up engagements, nor enter upon any course which you know will entail pecuniary difficulty, or bring after it worldly carefulness. Remember, that you may expect God to supply your wants as bountifully as He supplies the birds,—but on the same condition. The birds work from morning to night;—they have not a grain but they have sought it, and sought it with patient labour. But if you do this, and still the untrodden path of your future life looks dark, and every to-morrow wraps itself in a thick cloud, do not be afraid, only believe.
—The Rev. James Vaughan.
(SECOND OUTLINE)
DIVINE CARE
A wealth of consolation for the believer lies in those four simple words, ‘Your heavenly Father knoweth.’
I. He knows His children’s needs.—There are many times when we do not even know our needs ourselves. We may think we know them. We may know our wishes, our desires, our whims. But wishes are not always needs, and desires are not at all times the same as necessities. God has many sons who fret peevishly for what His love denies. They know their desires well enough, but only their heavenly Father knows their necessities. Can we not bring ourselves to rest in His omniscience? Can we not trust His knowledge, blended as it is with a Father’s love? It is His very omniscience that lies at the back of the gracious promise, ‘They that seek the Lord shall not want anything that is good.’
II. He knows our pathway also.—Even Job in his partial and imperfect acquaintance with God could rest in this assurance, ‘He knoweth the way that I take’ (Job 23:10). God’s way is often hidden from us, but our way is never hidden from God. The clouds which hide Him from our eyes are not so dense as to hide our way from Him. Israel thought of old that it was forgotten of God, and complained in tones of despair (Isaiah 40:27). Our path, our whole path, past, present, and future, is clear as daylight in His eyes. Oh, the unspeakable comfort of that thought!
III. He knows our hearts too.—‘God knoweth your hearts’ (Luke 14:15). To each of the seven Churches of Asia was the same message sent, ‘I know thy works;’ but vast as that knowledge was it did not express the measure of omniscience. Works lie on the surface of life; they are open and visible to the eyes of our fellow-men. There are secret forces lying behind our works which man cannot see—our motives, our thoughts, our ambitions, our purposes and affections; in a word, our hearts.
‘What comfort can we find in such a truth as this? Is it not rather a terrifying thought?’ No, for it is this same omniscient God, to whom our hearts are naked and open and from whom no sins are hidden, Who says to us, ‘I have loved thee with an everlasting love.’ In spite of all that He knows of us, He has set His love upon us. His love survives His knowledge of our sinfulness. None of us would like to lay bare our inmost natures to our fellow-men, not even to our bosom friend. Yet God knows all—and yet He loves us. Is there no consolation here? If His love has not been slain by such knowledge as that, it must be love indeed.
The Rev. G. Arthur Sowter.