“Therefore, I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?
“Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?
“Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?
“So why worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
“Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
“Therefore, do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.
“But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.
“Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.”
The Daily Study Bible – William Barclay (Commentary on Matthew 6:25-34)
“In these ten verses Jesus sets out seven different arguments and defences against worry.
- …God gave us life…If God gave us life, surely we can trust Him to give us food to sustain our lives. If God gave us bodies, surely we can trust Him for raiment to clothe these bodies…
- Jesus goes on to speak about the birds. There is no worry in their lives, no attempt to pile up goods for an unforeseen and unforeseeable future; and yet their lives go on.
- Jesus goes on to prove that worry is in any event useless…It can mean that no man by worrying can add a cubit (18 inches) to his height…or…no man can add the shortest space to his life.
- Jesus goes on to speak about the flowers…The lilies of the field were scarlet poppies and anemones…they were clothed with a beauty that surpassed the robes of kings. If God gives such beauty to a short-lived flower, how much more will He care for man?
- Jesus goes on to advance a very fundamental argument against worry…[it] is characteristic of a heathen and not of one who knows what God is like…Worry is essentially a distrust of God…
- Jesus goes on to advance two ways in which to defeat worry. The first is to seek first, to concentrate upon, the Kingdom of God…[the second is] To concentrate on the doing of, and the acceptance of, God’s will is the way to defeat worry.”
- Lastly, Jesus says that worry can be defeated when we acquire the art of living one day at a time…It is Jesus’ advice that we should handle the demands of each day as it comes, without worrying about the unknown future and the things which may never happen.”
