Anxiety Is A Signal

To a high spot as a crowd swelled with students, curious onlookers and possible enemies wanting to hear this religious leader who seemed different.

Could it be the Messiah they have been waiting for to save them from their enemies?

Could the old kingdoms of this world be passing away?

Was this Jesus finally ushering in the kingdom of God?

And then he spoke a verbal attack on unrighteousness and self-righteousness.

And the soul on I'm gonna get me and mine was a message for the broken.

Blessed are the points, the spiritually bankrupt, those who recognize desperate need for God.

And starting with this deep tricky, dispensed, world-changing, life-rearranging, understanding.

Love your enemies, be generous to everyone.

Come on, free.

You will never be good enough by working harder.

Pray this way.

You are the light of the world.

Do not worry about your life.

Be realistic, Jesus.

Ask C.

Stop performing.

Today, many likers of Jesus listened to these words and they say, He probably didn't mean that, but if we truly assume Jesus meant what he said, a better kingdom would shine brighter in the darker world.

Together we can look to the Savior on the mountaintop and soak in the teachings of life.

Join us for uncommon sense, joyfully living out the challenges of Jesus' sermon on the mount.

Just in case there's any who don't know, um, we have kids zero to six out those doors.

And then today we also have bigs out here for seven and up.

Amen.

Praise God.

Good morning.

Uh, pleasure to be with you all this morning.

Thank you, thank you.

Praise God to be with you guys.

I'm gonna try to preach, despite the fact that Sister Cynthia's prayer was already so much, so so good.

So I think we're good.

See you guys next week.

No, but truly, um when you have endured and been around the block and experienced life enough as much as the Santos family has to have a resilient faith, to pray like that, not necessarily poetry, but posture.

It shows the resilience of your faith.

So thank you for that prayer this morning.

Praise God.

Praise God.

All right.

So we're gonna get into this word.

As you guys know, we're in the book of Matthew.

If you have your study Bibles, let's see them.

Anybody got a study Bible this morning?

We're gonna be in page 1215.

Praise God.

You got a cell phone?

Hold up the cell phone.

We don't discriminate.

Let's see it.

Woo! That's right.

I'm in the tech age, so I'm okay with the phone.

Just turn off your Tinder.

Alright.

This is God's time.

Swipe right on the sermon, not on your next match, all right?

All right.

Good morning.

Bienvenidos.

If you guys have a Bible, open those up.

Uh Matthew 12 15.

We're gonna be in Matthew 6, uh, 25 through 34.

And then I'm gonna say this in Spanish.

Bienvenidos, familia.

Si tienen Biblias, or si no tienen Biblias disponibles, tenemos Biblias in este lado del salon para ustedes.

And then I'm gonna say it in Haitian Crayol because we like that.

Nugen Bib Ancreol a Isien disponible topusami nu yoquipale juol.

Okay, how was that?

Is that okay?

That's all right.

I got the seal of approval.

Praise God.

I'm done.

All right.

So we're on the Sermon on the Mount.

In my opinion, the greatest sermon ever delivered.

Okay?

And we're jumping into the Sermon on the Mount, and I want to remind you guys of the journey we've been on.

We've watched Jesus lay out the beatitudes, redefine what it means to fulfill the law, to not be performers in our faith.

And just last week, thank you, Brother Isaiah, deliver a stark warning.

You cannot serve two masters.

You cannot serve both God and money.

Today, Jesus brings that tension to a head on a hillside in Judea.

Say Judea.

Thank you.

Now northern Israel in today's time, overlooking Galilee.

The Bible calls the audience a multitude.

Say multitude.

Say a lot.

Multitude means a lot.

All right?

We're gonna grow in our word.

Here we go.

That's how we do it.

All right.

This multitude was a collection of farmers, day laborers, fishermen, mostly poor, and people living with chronic illness and disability.

There was no Kaiser Permanente, there was no Trader Joe's Aldi, all right?

There was no meals on wheels.

All right.

We relied on the generosity of our neighbors, if there was ever generosity.

So this was a marginalized crowd, intimately familiar with basic survival anxiety.

Say anxiety.

Okay, and what's vital to remember is that Jesus wasn't preaching down to them from a from a place of privilege.

He himself says he didn't have a permanent place to lay his what?

His head.

Come on, y'all are red.

Praise God.

That's good.

He was a tradesman, right?

He worked with his hands, he knew what it meant to work for his next meal.

He didn't just understand their struggle from a distance, he was full sovereignty, intentionally living right beside them.

So when he speaks to them and to us, he does so from experience, not theory.

He's speaking from radical faithfulness.

And this is our sermon text we're gonna read.

Verse 25 through 34.

Therefore, I tell you, don't worry about your life, what you will eat, or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear.

Isn't life more than food and the body more than clothing?

Consider the birds of the sky.

They don't sow or reap or gather into barns, yet your heavenly father feeds them.

Aren't you worth more than they?

Can any of you add one moment to his lifespan by worrying?

And why do you worry about clothes?

Observe how the wildflowers of the field grow.

They don't labor or spin thread.

Yet I tell you that even Solomon in all his splendor was adorned like one of these.

If that's how God closed the grass of the field, which is here today, and thrown into the furnace tomorrow, won't He do much more for you, you of little faith?

So don't worry, saying, What will we eat, or what will we drink, or what will we wear?

For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things, and your heavenly father knows that you need them, but seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be provided for you.

Therefore, don't worry about tomorrow, because tomorrow will worry about itself.

Each day has enough trouble of its own.

This is God's word.

Let's pray.

Father, statistics tell us that at least one out of every four people in this room will face the heavy weight of anxiety at some point in their lives.

And the reality is many of us carried that weight right through the church doors this morning.

Lord, we want to pray for a healthier, holier relationship with our anxiety.

When we are overcome with worry about material things, or when we start to doubt your hand in the small details of our lives, help us to see that anxiety is not a failure, but a diagnostic tool, a prompt to check our hearts and see where we are placing our trust.

God, we want to also explicitly acknowledge that for many, anxiety isn't just a fleeting thought, it can be a severe, chronic battle that requires the grace of therapy and medication.

Thank you for providing those tools.

We pray for total healing for those suffering under extreme anxiety today.

But even as we ask for that healing, give us the strength to live honestly.

Let anyone in this room know with absolute certainty there is zero shame in their struggle.

There is so much in this world to be anxious over.

But as we listen to your word today, give us the grace to redirect that energy into productive, kingdom-shaped ways.

Meet us in our worry.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

Alright.

So as you may have noticed, we're going to be talking about anxiety, something I am quite familiar with, something that has spent the night at my house a few times.

A guest that overstays their visit, that doesn't pay your bills, but eats your food.

Alright.

Anxiety is a normal, that was not in my notes.

Anxiety is a normal and natural emotion connected to the alarm system God placed within us.

Theoretically, that system is good.

But when it misfires or won't turn off, it can leave us in a constant state of worry, fight or flight, and wear down our nervous system, reshaping the way our body deals with stress.

Before we go further, I want to talk about the many faces anxiety wears.

Because I also want to admit I personally have experienced, done, or am currently doing these things.

Amen.

So there's no shame, no guilt, and like a finished bottle of Sprite in my house, there's no cap.

Alright?

Thank you for that.

You're welcome.

There's so much more of those.

I'm so sorry.

Alright.

Sometimes anxiety is not always a panic attack.

Sometimes it looks like checking your bank account multiple times a day.

It looks like procrastination.

Or it looks like perfectionism.

It looks like people pleasing.

It looks like checking your pulse when your body feels off, even slightly.

Shouldn't have had that coffee.

Now I feel weird.

Let me go to the doctor.

Let me get a blood test.

Based on a very true story, alright?

And here's what I say.

If you don't want to give me that test, document that you didn't want to give me that test.

That's what I tell the doctor in my anxiety.

Alright.

God is working.

God is working on me.

Thank you.

It looks like assuming the worst, even with limited information.

It is a Jedi mind trick that can perfectly lead a healthy individual to literally shut down their entire body because the brain is convinced it's the best way to keep you safe.

Jesus understands that.

Matthew 6 is not Jesus speaking from a gated community to people whose greatest problem is choosing a vacation destination or going over budget on that kitchen renovation.

Jesus is speaking to ordinary people living under Roman occupation.

And many of them survived day to day.

Their concern about food, clothing, and tomorrow was not imaginary.

And Jesus himself knew displacement.

West Philadelphia, born and raised.

Dodging Herod is where he spent most of his days.

Alright, that's ball knowledge.

If you guys don't know, if you're new here, Herod was the king who wanted to kill Jesus.

So as an infant, they fled away from Herod's reach.

So that's why dodging Herod, where he spent most of his days.

Let's move on.

As a child, his family fled political violence.

And as an adult with no job, no 401k, no foreign whip, no house, he regularly depended on the hospitality of others.

So when Jesus says, do not worry, he is not speaking as somebody who has never struggled.

Jesus is not dismissing their needs or yours.

He is teaching us that our needs must not become our God's.

And that brings us to our fourth point.

Anxiety blinds us.

Verse 25.

Isn't life more than food and the body more than clothes?

Now pay close attention, friends.

Jesus saying food or life does not matter?

No.

Jesus is saying that the butt if if sorry, whoo, I said that wrong.

Is Jesus saying that the body does not matter?

No.

He is saying what?

That they are more.

Anxiety has a way of reducing us to our needs.

We become the unpaid bill, the empty fridge, the resume nobody answered, the doctor's diagnosis.

Jesus is saying your life cannot and should not be measured by only what is missing from it, because anxiety is your signal, not your shepherd.

And how do we know this?

Let's look at the word.

Genesis 2 7.

God formed humanity from the dust of the ground and what?

Breathed life into us.

Quickly we forget that if God can create us, surely he can sustain us.

Deuteronomy 8.3.

Man does not live on bread alone, but on what?

Every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

Jesus says this himself when tempted by Satan.

He's 40 days without food.

Satan said, Let me get you a Wendy's fo-fo-fo.

You know, and Jesus said, Now I'm good.

I'm good.

I got the word of God.

All right, bacon cheeseburger.

All right.

Psalm 139, 13 through 14.

For it was you, who is you?

God, who created my inward parts.

You knit me together in my mother's womb, and I will what?

Praise you, because I have been remarkably and wonderfully made.

First Corinthians 6, 19 through 20 teaches us that our bodies are what?

Temples of the Holy Spirit, and we belong to who?

God.

That's right.

Y'all gotta holler back more, all right?

Getting Pentecostal.

I'm feeling it.

My wife gave me coffee.

It was a bad idea.

Told her not to do it.

Alright?

Let me check my pulse real quick.

Let me get on my mic hair app real quick.

Let me schedule a doctor's appointment.

Jesus is not shaming us for being anxious.

He wants to shepherd us away from it because anxiety is our signal, not our shepherd.

We know God sees us in our needs.

We're going to go through Genesis 21, 14 through 19, because this is a great example.

Okay.

Sarah demands Hagar, and if you don't know who Hagar is, she was one of the first side pieces in the Bible.

All right.

And Hagar and her son Ishmael went into the wilderness because they were forced to.

All they took was some bread and a container of water.

There's no liquid IV, no Gatorade, no protein packs.

This is desert climate with nothing but bread and water.

The water runs out.

So worst case scenario, you know, is like your food pantry ain't running out of your kid's favorite snack, and they're going to have a tantrum.

This is life and death at this point.

Hagar places her son, Ishmael, under a bush because she cannot bear to watch her own son die, because that's what was coming.

That's what she was convinced was coming.

Mercifully, an angel of God calls to her and says, What's wrong?

Be not afraid.

For God heard the boy crying from the place where he is.

God opened her eyes and she saw a well.

What does a well have?

Water.

Right?

Anxiety had Hagar thinking, this is where her story ends.

God was saying, There is still water in this wilderness.

Why are you tripping?

Anxiety is blinding even when the water is right in front of us.

Your needs are real, but your father sees you.

Dale, your father sees you.

Cheryl, your father sees you.

Where's my boy Alvin at?

Your father sees you, Alvin, whether you're watching online or in the building.

I already had the names written down, sorry.

I can't go off the dome because then I get distracted.

Anxiety is the body's alarm system.

But Jesus is telling us the alarm cannot tell us where safety itself is.

So how do we know where our safety is?

We pray, we read, we seek godly counsel.

Whether you are a salt and pepper Christian, that means seasoned, or not, we remind you weekly that we have to read, that we have to pray, we have to gather to know where our safety is.

Who our true shepherd is.

And I want to remind again this is not an attack on those who experience severe anxiety, speaking to a doctor, seeking counsel, uh counseling.

This is all good things.

But importantly, bring what you are feeling to Christ.

Hagar cried, David cried, Jeremiah cried, and yes, even Jesus cried.

God does not want your poetry, He wants your posture, whether it's upright or caving down to your knees.

Faith tells the truth in the presence of God.

The next thing to ask yourself is what is your anxiety preaching?

When anxiety begins to take the throne, that belongs to God and it replaces his word.

And then you have to ask yourself, what has taken the throne?

What is defining your worth, your job, your situationship, your appearance.

The problem with anxiety is that we let it alert us and lead us.

We diagnose the symptom, not the illness.

And this is how anxiety blinds us, which brings us to the second point.

Anxiety makes us suffer tomorrow twice.

Anxiety makes us suffer tomorrow twice.

Matthew 6, 34.

Therefore, don't worry about tomorrow, because tomorrow will worry about itself.

Each day has enough trouble of its own.

It wants today, it wants tomorrow, it wants the day after that.

And anxiety will take it if you let it.

Worry adds nothing to tomorrow and takes everything from you today.

Anxiety on the throne is greedy, it is lustful, gluttonous, and possessive.

But the worst of all, it is insecurity, breeding more insecurity into you.

Anxiety is your signal, not your shepherd.

The crazy thing is, the Bible is a history book and an amazing field study to show how patient God is.

Because from the very beginning, we were acting a fool.

We were anxious and we did some crazy stuff.

So here are some examples, okay?

Abraham in Genesis 12 through 13, he tells Sarah, his wife, to say that she is his sister when famine came and was afraid of Egyptians, because he's afraid they would kill him because of Sarah, saying, like, you're an attractive woman.

If I'm the husband, they'll kill me and take you.

But if we're siblings, they're gonna treat us both okay.

Because they're gonna honor you and me as your brother.

So he's lying.

When mind you, where's that meme?

You got it?

Do you get it by any chance?

There's a there's a meme, and it's like a very good pose.

Mind you, all right, and the reason I'm saying mind you is because God has shown miraculous things and promises to these people, and yet we forget.

So again, God promised, God himself, all right, the colossus of clout, the big cheese, made himself present to Abraham multiple times before and promised him a future.

But here he is, anxious, telling his wife, you need a lie.

You need a lie right now, because our lives depend on it.

Okay?

Second example Israel hoards manna in Exodus 16, 16 through 20.

God gave Israel manna, and manna, if you don't know what that is, it's a miraculous food that God gave Israelites and instructed them to gather what they needed, very, very important, for the day.

For the day.

What do you think people did?

They kept extra.

You would have thought it was toilet paper during COVID.

All right, and that wasn't God's instruction, right?

They were food insecure and anxious when, mind you, mind you.

God split the sea in front of them.

Right?

He made food in front of them.

David in 1 Samuel 27 through 1.

David fled to the Philistines, enemies of Israel at the time.

When, mind you, God, that's capital G-O-D, the big guy, promised David a throne.

But anxiety took over the throne for David.

This is the last one.

Mark 4.35 through 41.

Jesus and his disciples, who by this point have seen Jesus cast out unclean spirits, cleanse the leper, healed the paralyzed man, healed Peter's mother-in-law.

Okay?

And in Mark 4.35, where Jesus and the disciples are crossing the Sea of Galilee, a storm hits their boat.

Some of the disciples experienced, you know, they're experienced fishermen, sorry.

So this wasn't the first storm they've sailed through.

But meanwhile, Jesus Germarchus Christ is taking a much-needed nap.

All right?

Light work.

But their anxiety blinded them from the fact that God is quite literally next to them.

So because anxiety took the throne and they're in a storm and the boat's moving, they wake Jesus up.

They say, Jay dog, Jay Bug, Jay Baby, don't you care that we're about to die?

Imagine telling the sovereign Lord of all the earth, don't you care?

God, don't you care?

When anxiety speaks, it's demeaning.

It's accusatory.

And if anything, anxiety assumes the worst.

Anxiety will abuse not just you, but the people around you.

Anxiety made the disciples question the character of God in that moment.

Anyone know what's next in that story?

Jay Alpha wakes up.

Now the Bible doesn't say this, but I imagine he did like a I imagine he did like a not like a Spider-Man, but like a gesture and rebuke the sea, right?

Silence, be still.

And Jesus asked them, Why are you afraid?

Do you still have no faith?

After all they've seen, my God.

That's us too, though.

My gosh.

The boat feels like it's about to capsize for some of us right now.

Anxiety will make an idol of the one thing we should be faithful enough to hand over to God.

And that is control.

Which brings us to our third point.

I think I'm about to break a record.

Anxiety seeks control, but faith seeks the kingdom.

Matthew 6, 31.

So don't worry saying what will we eat, what we will drink, or what will we wear.

For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be provided for you.

If I can control every outcome, I'll be safe.

If I make enough money, then I'll never struggle.

If I can make this person stay, then I will never be lonely.

If I can predict everything that could go wrong, then nothing can hurt me.

Anxiety is your signal, not your shepherd.

Friends, anxiety often makes us live like spiritual orphans.

No one sees me, no one is coming.

We believe in God, but still live as though everything depends entirely on us.

There's a quote from an Indian theologian named Sadhu Sundar Singh.

Gangster name.

Sadhu Sundar Singh.

Triple S.

Are you kidding me right now?

Anxiety is the exhaustion of begging every branch for fruit while forgetting that your father owns the garden.

He also says in a parable of his own a crying child is offered mangoes and flowers, but responds, No, I want my mother.

The child understands that the gifts are not greater than the one who owns the garden.

I seek from thee no other gift but thyself.

That is God.

And that brings us to the gospel.

That Jesus, who is our shepherd, is the one who supplies us with the security we desperately look for, would come down, fully man, fully God, eat the same food, bear the same sickness, be gossiped about, right?

Be strung up, be made fun of, in full majesty, sacrifice it on a cross, willing to die for a moment.

There is a moment, and I want to bring this up because it's very important.

Now, there's not really a debate on this.

This is my opinion.

So this isn't theology, this is around the theology.

Okay?

This is like when you look at a playbook and you say this is the best way to get to the end zone, this is kind of like that.

When Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane before his crucifixion, I believe he was almost suffering a panic attack.

Because when you read the scripture, it says he was sweating like drops of blood.

Anybody ever sweat like that?

And not be anxious?

You just do it because?

I mean, don't get me wrong, you might be smoking meat outside like on a hundred-degree day, but aside from that, he is praying frivolous, uh frivolous.

Wow.

Let's try that again.

That's my guy.

Praying, asking God to perhaps spare him.

And then finally, he says, if this cup won't pass, give me the strength.

Give me the strength to endure what comes next.

Friends and Christians, I remind you today that anxiety will take the throne of your father.

It will convince you that control is your father, that wealth is your father, that relationships are your father.

All these things are not God.

You are exhausted begging for fruit from the branch when the source itself, Jesus Christ, the way, the truth, and the life is accessible to you.

So I ask you to pray this prayer with me in the privacy of your heart.

God, we come to you with our mess.

God, some of us have made sex, drugs, work, our spouse, our children, our appearance, our health, the one who sits on the throne.

And yet we are still so anxious.

And yet we are still so empty.

God, I pray and confess my sin to you, and I accept your Son, Jesus Christ, as my Lord and Savior.

I pray that today I can remove the things that belong on your throne so that you may be my shepherd.

God, for those of us who call ourselves believers, our memories are short.

We've seen you cure cancer, we've seen you pay bills, we've seen you bring people out of critical surgeries the doctors warned they may not make it out of.

God, you have moved in our lives in smaller miracles every day.

Yet our anxiety blinds us.

It makes us forget it is you who is moving, Lord.

God, we pray today that as believers, we can spend more time in your word in intentional, intimate, intrusive prayer each and every day.

God, you want our posture, not our poetry.

May we pray in a jumbled mess because you know what our heart needs, is desperate for.

God, you are worthy and deserving of more than just one and a half hours on one day of the week.

We pray you allow us to remember anxiety is our signal, but you are our shepherd.

We pray this all in Jesus' name.

Amen.