Luke 12:22-31

Luke 12:22-31

And He said to His disciples, “For this sake I say to you: do not be anxious in your soul about what you should eat or in your body about what you should wear.  The soul is greater than meat and the body is greater than clothing.  Consider the ravens, because they neither sow nor reap, to whom is there neither closet nor barn.  Yet God feeds them.  You all are of far greater worth than birds.  And who out of you all, while being anxious, is powerful enough to add even a cubit to his stature?  Therefore, while not being powerful enough in such a small thing, why are you anxious regarding the things that remain?  Consider the lilies: how it never spins nor weaves.  But I say to you all, not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed as these.  And if God clothes them in this manner, being grass in the field this day and tomorrow being cast into an oven, how much more will He clothe you all, ones of little faith?  And do not seek for yourselves what you should eat or drink, and do not be in a doubtful mind.  For the Gentiles of the world seek after all these things.  And your Father has known that you need them.  Nevertheless, seek His kingdom and these things will be added for you. 

Thoughts for Today

First Thought:

Do not be anxious about what we are going to eat and what we are going to wear.  Have you ever watched television lately?  I am willing to bet that over half of our commercials are related to food and clothing.  I might be slightly over stating that, but if so I don’t think I am doing it by much.  Human beings worry about what we are going to eat and we worry about what we wear.  Naturally, eating is important.  It’s not fun being hungry.  But worrying about our clothing is silly.  What compounds this issue is not that we worry if we will have anything to eat or if we will have anything to wear.  What makes our predicament sad is that we worry if our food will be good enough and if our clothing will be in style enough.  That’s what really makes our condition sad.  Jesus tells us point blank: stop it.  Why worry about such trivial things as the kind of food we eat and the chicness of our clothing?

Do you worry about things that you shouldn’t?  How does this speak to our perspective in life and even our priorities?

Second Thought:

I love the analogy that Jesus gives here.  He goes to the natural world.  Takes bird.  They don’t harvest or plant.  Yet they seem to manage just fine.  Or take flowers and grass.  They don’t dig their own holes and water themselves, but they do just fine, too.  In fact, in all of creation there is only one species that doesn’t naturally live on God’s provision: mankind.  Yet how much of the rest of the world is truly in trouble?  The rest of creation, which depends fully on God, is doing just fine.  We can learn that lesson.

Why do human beings have such a hard time fully relying upon God?  Where in your life can you rely more upon God and less upon yourself?

Third Thought:

I really love the way that this passage ends.  Seek His kingdom, and He will add these things to you.  In other words, pursue that which is higher and let God take care of the lower things.  So often we think that we have to worry about the basics before we can ever worry about the higher level stuff.  Jesus is telling us that it is the opposite.  If we put our mind in a position to always be thinking about God and His ways, the small stuff will naturally work itself out!  Jesus doesn’t say it here, but I think a lot of that has to do with the lack of sin getting in our way when we focus on Him and His ways.  But in the end, what Jesus is really talking about here is trust.  He is telling us to trust God and pursue Him.

Are you willing to trust God?  How do you pursue God’s ways instead of the basics in life?  How has God come through with you and given you the basics for your needs when you follow Him?

Passage for Tomorrow: Luke 12:32-34