Rick Warren - Letting God Meet My Needs—Part One

Hello, everybody. This is Pastor Rick's Daily Hope with Rick Warren.

I'm really glad you're here today. We're continuing our series

from Psalm twenty three called Living in the Goodness of God.

It's all about how God's goodness meets you right where

you are and brings hope even in difficult seasons. First up,

we'll start with part one of a message called letting

God Meet My Needs.

If you take out your message notes, we're in a

series I started last weekend called Living in the Goodness

of God. If you missed that first message, please go

listen to it online because it's the foundation of everywhere

we're going for the next ten weeks. That when you

don't understand how good God really is, it creates all

kinds of problems in your life. We specifically talked about

four sources of stress in your life that you don't

need when you understand the goodness of God. Now, what

I want to do today is we're going to start

verse by verse through the most famous chapter in the

entire Bible, Psalm twenty three. The Lord is my shepherd,

and this is a perfect picture of the goodness of God,

and it shows you the antidote to the nine greatest

sources of stress in your life. Today, we're going to

look at worry and specifically, I want you to see

why God says you should never have to worry for

about anything. And then second, how do you connect with

God meeting the needs that are in your life. Now,

Before we look at that, I'm going to just give

you three facts about the goodness of God. So why

don't you write these down? These are just three fundamental

truths you can base your life on. Number One, God

is the source of everything I need to live. You

don't have to look anywhere else. You don't have to

look to Wall Street, you don't have to look to

the government. You don't have to look to your spouse,

or your individual retirement account, or your social security or

your job. God is the source of everything I need

to live. Now. The point I want to make here

is that if you're going to put your security in something,

you need to put it in something that can never

be taken from you. Because if you have put your

security in something that'll be taken from you, you're not secure.

You can lose your health, you can lose your job,

you can lose your good looks, some of you already have.

You can lose. You can lose your family, you can

lose your life, you can lose your mind, you can

lose all of those things. Don't put your security in

anyone or anything. You put your security in something you

cannot be taken from you, and that is your relationship

to God. Nobody can take that away from you now.

Psalm twenty three, verse one. The first verse of this

chapter says, the Lord is my shepherd, and then read

it with me. I will lack nothing nothing. That's a

place where he says, I will be your security in

every area. Now, obviously, the first question is what's a shepherd?

And most of you did not grow up on a

sheep farm. But shepherds are the people who care for sheep. Now,

you probably don't know a lot about sheep, but sheep

are incredibly defenseless animals. They have a lot of natural predators.

They're not fast, they can't run, they don't have claws,

they don't have teeth with sharp incisors that can bite.

And on top of that, they're not very smart animals.

They're not very intelligent. They fall off cliffs and they

get lost, and all kinds of things but they really

need a defender. They need a shepherd. Left on its own,

a sheep's probably gonna get eaten. And so what does

a shepherd do? Well, you might write this down because

this is what God wants to do for you. A

shepherd feeds, leads and meets needs. That's what a shepherd does.

A shepherd feeds, leads and meets needs. And God says,

I will be your shepherd throughout, will feed you, I

will lead you, and I will meet your needs. Now,

your needs are various. Sometimes you need protection, sometimes you

need comfort. Sometimes you need encouragement. Sometimes you need a

little discipline, Sometimes you need direction. We're going to look

at all the different needs that God has promised to

meet in your life. By the way, if you're a parent, listen.

If you're a parent, you're a shepherd. Dad's it is

your job to feed, lead, and meet needs. Mom, it

is your job to feed, lead, and meet needs of

those children. So you have a shepherd's role. If you

are ever in any management position in a business in

your career, and you have people under you that you

are supervising, that you are caring for, that has shepherding

capabilities or responsibilities to it, and as a manager, it's

your job to feed information, motivation, things like that. It's

your job to lead, and it is your job to

meet needs of the people. As a leader, you serve them,

not they serve you. By the way, do you know

what the Greek word for shepherd is pastor? I am

a shepherd. That is my job. It is my job

to feed you through this book. It is my job

to lead you. It is my job to meet your needs.

That's what shepherds do. So if you have any kind

of caring capacity where you are over a small group

as a leader, you're a shepherd. Or you are you

work in some ministry, you're a shepherd. And so the

very things that God does with us feed lead and

meet needs God wants you to do with other people. Now,

the second truth I want you to write down. First,

God is the source of everything I need to live.

Number two, there is nothing I need that God can't supply.

There is nothing that I need that you need that

God cannot supply. We're gonna look at this in depth.

But in Philippians chapter four it says this verse nineteen,

God will supply all you ever need from His glorious resources.

In Christ Jesus. If you're taking notes, you might circle

in Christ Jesus will come back to that. God's goodness

is not based on your goodness. It's based on his goodness.

You don't have to be good for God to be

good to you. God is good to you because of

what Jesus did on the cross. And number three third

thing I want you to write down is this, God

doesn't want me worrying about anything. Nothing, not a zip zero.

In fact, worry may be the most common sin on

the planet. God says you don't need to worry. I

don't want you worry Philippians four six. Don't worry about anything.

That's pretty clear. I looked up that word don't worry

about anything, and it actually means anything. Don't worry about anything. Instead,

pray about everything. We've talked about this many times. You

can pray or you can panic. If you're not praying,

you're panicking. You can worry, or you can worship. If

you're not worshiping, you're worrying. You invite worship in the

front door. Worry goes out the back door. You invite

worry in the front door. Worship goes out the back door.

And so God says, I don't want you worrying about anything. Now,

why why does God not want me worrying about anything? Well,

in the famous Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gives us

five reasons why worry is worthless. I'm going to go

through these pretty quickly, and then we're going to look

at what difference it makes in your life. So write

these down. Five reasons God says you should never, never, ever,

ever worry about anything. Number one, he says, worry is unreasonable.

It's unreasonable. In other words, it doesn't make sense, it's illogical,

it is irrational, it is unreasonable. And the Bible says

this in Matthew chapter six, verse twenty five. Don't worry

about your life what you'll eat or drink, and don't

worry about your body or what you'll wear. Your life

is far more important than clothes. For some of you.

That's a big revelation. But that's true, okay. Clothes don't

make the man or the woman. And so he says,

don't worry. Don't worry about these minor issues here, and

he's saying that worry is unreasonable. Now, why is worry unreasonable?

Let me give you three reasons it's unreasonable. In the

first place, we typically worry about the wrong thing. We

worry about the little stuff, how I look, how I appear,

what I say, who I'm talking to, stuff, Am I

gonna be late for this meeting? Stuff that ain't gonna

matter in five years. It's all temporary. If you're really

gonna worry, and God says you shouldn't. But if you

were going to worry, worry about things that are eternal,

not external. Worry about stuff that's going to matter in

ten years or one hundred years, or a thousand years,

or for eternity. Don't worry about stuff that's not going

to matter tomorrow. And yet most of the things we

worry about are temporary things like in the next five minutes,

I'm worried about this, And so he says it's unreasonable

because you pick the wrong things to be concerned about.

The second reason is to worry about something you can change.

There are something you can't change is useless. If you

can't change it, why are you worrying about it. To

worry about something you can change is stupid. So either way,

if you can change it, change it. If you can't

change it, so what you can't do anything about it.

Worry will not change it at all. So he says

it's irrational because we think that worry is actually a

form of control. We think by control, by worrying about something,

we're actually controlling them. By worrying about your kids who

are out late at night, you think you're controlling them.

You're not. You're not. It doesn't change anything. And the

third reason why it's irrational, and you've noticed this, is

that anytime you worry about something, it keeps getting bigger

in your mind. It's not logical, it's irrational. And so

if you start worrying about somebody criticizes you, says an

unkind wordy to you, says an off the wall comment,

it hurts your feelings, and you worry about that, And

what did they mean. They've already forgotten it, and they

probably didn't even mean it. It's just some stupid thing

they said. But if you keep going over a worry

in your mind, it doesn't get smaller. When you worry,

it gets bigger. And if you keep thinking about pretty

soon you think the whole world hates me. Oh, they

don't hate you. No, they don't hate you. That's the

irrationality of worry. Worry is unreasonable. Number two, Jesus says

you should never worry, not only because it's unreasonable, it's unnatural.

Nature does not worry. It's unnatural. Human beings are the

only thing in nature. Human beings are the only thing

God has created in all the universe that worry. You know,

ants don't worry. Cows don't worry, plants don't worry, rocks

don't worry. Horses don't worry. The only thing that worries

are human beings in rebellion against God. It's unnatural. You

weren't made to worry. Now. In the Servant on the Mount,

Jesus gives us a couple of lessons. He uses a

biology lesson and a botany lesson or plants and animals.

Look at this verse twenty six. In Matthew six, Jesus says,

you know, look at the birds. Look at the birds

of the air. They don't sow or reef or store

away in barns. And then they're not worried about you know,

do I have enough to live on? And he said,

and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not

more valuable than birds? If God takes care of birds,

isn't going to take care of you. And then he says,

in verse twenty eight and twenty nine, Matthew six, and

why do you worry about your clothes? Go ahead and

look at the flowers. Look at the field lilies. They

don't worry about about how they look. Yet King Solomon,

all of his glory, was not clothed as beautifully as

they are. I don't know if you've ever looked at

a flower real close, an orchid or a rose, or

any kind of flower, the intricacy and the design and

the detail and the beauty of just an ordinary wildflower.

God says, Look, they're beautiful the way they are. They

don't have to put on makeup, they don't have to

get fancy, they don't have to worry about how they

appear to everybody else. They're not worried about their parents.

They're just who they are, and it's beautiful. Now, what

he's doing here is he's given us a couple of

lessons from nature. He says, Okay, let's look at bird watching.

If Anybody's on God's welfare plan, it's birds. Because birds

really don't do anything. What do they contribute to the world.

All they do is tweet and poop, But you do

a lot more than that. Birds, Well, I mean what

I mean? You don't eat birds. They don't provide sustenance

for you know, human beings. And he says, they're on't

God's welfare system. God just made them because they're beautiful

as sweet to the listen to. And he says, look,

they're not worried, and aren't you more valuable than the birds?

I take care of them, I'll take care of you.

And then he gives a botany lesson. He says, look

at these flowers and how God makes them beautiful just

the way they are. You're beautiful just the way you are.

So he's said, animals don't worry. Plants don't worry nothing

at all. Creation worries. The only thing I've created that worries,

that doesn't trust me are human beings. And he said,

all a creation trusts my care except humans. He's saying,

worry isn't natural. Did you know you weren't born to worry?

You weren't made to worry. Now some of you say,

well I was a born worrier. No, you weren't. Worry

is learned. You learned it by watching other people worry.

No baby worries. They learn to worry watching other people worry. Now,

anything that is learned can be unlearned. So you don't

have to go the rest of your life in a

worry wart being so uptight, having your stomach in a

not getting a tight and tense back, having to go

get a massage, getting a migraine, headache, all these other

symptoms of worry. God says, you don't need to worry

about that. Worry is unreasonable and worry is unnatural. You

have to, by the way, not only do you have

to learn it, you have to practice it to get

good at it. But some of you are pros at worrying.

I mean you're really good. You're good at worrying. But

you can unlearn it. And notice in verse twenty six

there he says, your father sees what the bird says,

as your father takes it and doesn't say the bird's

father says your father. So you're in a different category.

God created everything else, but he made you his child.

God is not the father of cows. God is not

the father of ants. God is not the father of

you know, horses, because they weren't made in God's image.

You and I are distinctly different from all the other

plants and animals because we were made in God's image,

which gives us a capacity to trust him to love him.

You never see a cow praying, you know. You never

see a doggie going to worship unless you brought him.

And he's saying it's not natural. He said, God cares

for you as a father. Children get special privileges even

more than the other things in creation. Worry is unreasonable,

Worry is unnatural. Number three, Jesus says worry is unhelpful.

What does he mean by that? It's useless, It doesn't work.

Worry is worthless. It doesn't change anything when you worry

Matthew six Verse twenty seven, Jesus says, who of you,

by worrying, can add a single hour to his life?

Worry can't make you an inch taller. Worry can't make

you an inch shorter. Can't make you bigger or smaller,

thinner or fatter. Worry doesn't work. Who if you can

change anything? He says, you can't add even a single

hour to your life. In fact, worry can shorten your life.

If you're worried, well, I may not live long if

you start worrying about it, the tension and stress could

actually shorten your life. But worry about any problem in

your life will never move you one step toward that situation.

Worry is worthless. It's doing without doing. It's investing a

lot of emotional energy for something that doesn't going to

do anything. It's like sitting in a rocker and you

can rock back and forth, back and forth, back and forth,

back and forth, and you expend a lot of energy,

but you're not one inch further. You have made no

progress at all. Worry cannot change anything. In fact, the

only thing worry can change is you. It will make

you miserable, and that's what it does. It won't change

that person you're worried about. It'll only change you, make

you more miserable. Now follow me on the logic of this.

Worry cannot change anything in your past. It's already done.

Your past is passed, So why are you worried about it.

Worry cannot control your future, no matter how much you

think you can. You're not controlling it by worrying about it.

So if it can't change the past and it can't

control the future, what does it do messes up today.

It just keeps you messed up today. It keeps you

stewing without doing as I As I said, it just

ruins the present. It SAPs the strength out of your body.

It is not only unreasonable and unnatural, it's uncolpeful.

Man. I love hearing Pastor Rick. What a great message.

We also love hearing from our listeners. Here's Rick with

a very encouraging letter.

Let me close this broadcast by sharing a letter from

a listener in Rome, Italy. Her name is Heitian and

she says, Pastor Rick, I've relocated to Rome, Italy, where

I'm currently working at the World Food Program. I really

love listening to your sermons and I also love reading

your daily devotionals, which I share with many of my

colleagues serving in the field offices in Africa and another

hardship duty stations. They appreciate receiving the message very much.

God bless you Heitian in Rome. Now did you get this?

A message that is starting in southern California in the

United States of America is being sent to Europe in Rome, Italy,

and then it is being reset out to other continents

like Africa. That is the amazing age of technology that

we live in today, and that's why your gifts go

much further than they used to go even twenty or

thirty years ago. Our ability to reach listeners like Heshan

and her friends, not just in Europe, but in Africa,

is a direct result of your prayers and your support

for Daily Hope. So thanks so much, and by the way,

join me next time when we continue looking into God's

word for our daily hope.

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