“Do Not Be Afraid, Little Flock” | Luke 12:22–34

You're listening to the Bible Guys, a podcast where a

couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun in

practical ways.

Hey, everybody, welcome, Welcome, Welcome, welcome for welcome for Welcome

to the Bible guys.

Well, Chris, yes, this better be fun and practical. We

just we just made that declaration.

I'm already having fun and it's always proud.

Okay. Well, so one of the most important segments in

all of the no humanity in the Bible, guys, universe, no,

in all universes in the what is it? The cannon

in the Bible guys? Cannon?

All right?

Is what made Chris mad this week?

Yes, and today is Friday.

You've allready just made our wildest dreams come true by

singing whatever good morning twice this week, Wow, Tuesday and Thursday.

Assuming people listened all.

Tuesday and Thursday. People, you gotta go back and listen.

Because there may be people just tuning in for the

first time.

That's right. So we are today recording our seven hundred

and fifty fifth episode zoinks. Isn't that crazy?

It's crazy?

And so we do these five days a week, and.

And I'm not sure I've ever wanted to do seven

hundred and fifty five things with you.

At all, evereven and fifty five anythings with you? What

was I thinking? So anyways, you've already delighted people beyond

our wildest dreams by singing two times this week to us.

Wow.

But the by far favorite segment that we do is

what made Chris mad this week.

And that's a heck of an introduction.

Joe, listener, you're going to discover Chris it's not mad

for himself. No, he's this is true, on behalf of

all of you. I don't know if it's true. It's

what he wants you to believe. No, no, no, no, actually

is actually on behalf of all of humanity. He's angry

for you.

Hate. By the way, this is true.

He bears this burden.

I'm she bears this Verden, Hey, this is true. I

actually didn't discover this about myself until this segment. I

promise you this is true because because what I what

I realized is.

You give purpose to your rage, your outrage outrage sort

of but like like when I'm with my family, so noble,

when I'm with my listen, when I'm with.

My family, and let's just say, like, I'll take a

classic one, right, like poor customer service or something or whatever,

and and and uh and so, yeah, that happens to me,

But my family will attest by far that I don't

ever think about me in.

That moment ever.

Listen, I'm not I'm not kidding. I'm not kidding. I'll

get mad, and then I'll always immediately go to like

that manager needs to know that that waitress is being

this way and I can't believe that that she's going

to mess up this entire business, and like and I'm like,

I'm like, so it happened to me, and yet I

immediately go toward like the injustice of like, you know whatever,

and and my family will attest to humanity. Look, you've met.

So I'm going to go really obscure in this one.

Okay, thank you.

And before I give my reasoning, I'm just going on

a limb and telling you that this is not going

to be a common thing that people think of, okay,

because people always think of not returning your life.

I'm shining a light in the darkness. At this point.

You're letting us, yes, which should be outraged, Okay, but

you are on our behalf here's.

What people can relate to. Everybody can relate to going

into a public place and you go into like a

public restroom or something, especially when there's multiple sinks lined

up right, like an airport or something like this, right,

And have you ever seen there's water everywhere? Yes, everywhere.

I'm with you on this one. So far, okay, go go,

So do you want to know get.

The majority of the reason why there's water everywhere?

Because people don't wipe up after themselves.

You would think that, But now I'm going to enlighten you.

Okay, okay.

I want you to pay attention to this, and I

promise you this is true. If you start paying attention

to this every time you see a bunch of water everywhere,

you will start to realize it's actually not the people's fault.

It's the people who choose. Well two reasons. The sinks

aren't built correctly. So you have this big bowl and

then a faucet that leans like it's three inches off

of one side. Why doesn't the faucet left the water

down in the middle of the bowl. If you had

a good sink, then the faucet would actually be in

the middle of the bowl. And no matter how much

you splash, the water stays in the bowl of the sink.

Mind blowing. Okay, And so here's what happens. You have

a big, huge sink and then you have a tiny

little faucet and it's actually like right near the edge,

and so when you're sitting there, washing water gets everywhere, right,

And it's because two reasons. Number one, people don't know

how to actually design sinks correctly. And by the way,

come on sing, what the heck is that? All right,

let's start protesting these sink designers. It's all about money. Yeah, right,

it's not about it's not about it's about I'm gonna

build a smaller faucet because do people want to get

it with the bare minimum? And this is what people

are going to buy. And if I build a smaller faucet,

they're gonna buy mine.

And so it's a conspiracy. It's a faucet conspiracy people,

And you know who you are.

You already know this to be true. A faucet shouldn't

come out three or four inches on this massive bowl.

Then why have the bowl? Why not make why not

make you know, the bowl just this big, because that's

where you're doing so everything. Water gets everywhere. So my

point is the manufacturers, it's their fault and it's and

it's also the people who don't want, all right to

spend the money on proper sinks.

All right. And uh so it has nothing to do

with the fact that people have wet hands and when

they take their hands out from underneath there, it drops still,

believe it or not. It don't wipe up afterwards, believe

it or not.

I think it has way less to do with that

than it has to do with the fact.

Because it must be washing your hands vigorously. Uh vigorous washing.

No, no, no, no, I'm telling you right now. It's

it's the reason why you see water everywhere. Alls I

know is majority of the time you'll discover it's actually

the fop at our Scaling Heights campus. Yes, we have

like this. It used to be a movie theater. Yes.

One of the benefits of buying a movie theater is

the restrooms are huge. Yes, it's like a fourteenth theater yep, yep.

And so we have what eight nine.

Yeah, a sink sinks yep.

And what I know is that the sink countertop gets

wet yep, But so does the wall where the paper is.

The paper towels, yeah are whatever.

It's wet, everything's going to get wet. But what I'm

saying is.

And the space between the sink and the paper towel.

When I travel on the Interstate and I travel from

here to Youngston, Ohio, which is where I grew up,

I'm on eighty ninety at the turnpike and I get off,

and they have the worst example of this. They actually

have the smallest faucets with the biggest sinks, and all

the water runs where the fossils are across. It's right

across the right and everybody you know doing this, and

of course you know you have the soap and all that.

As you're doing it, water is getting everywhere, and it's

because people don't buy people.

So so then you know, we can lament the fact

that the big faucet yep isn't engineering for our benefit.

That we could lament that, or we could also just

look out for each other and wipe off the counter

when we're done, and then the next words come and

do the next thing there too. That listen, we are

bringing the finest outrage to our customers. Yes, and the

fact that you are thinking about things most everybody else

is not. Well. I will bet you helps us. I

bet you you make us better complete. I'm gonna make this.

Claif you complete that, I will, I will. I will

go ahead and go on a limb and say, I

bet you that you personally, you will pay attention to

this more because now I don't think that every he

thinks that way. And when you walk into a public

setting and you're going to see water everywhere, just pay

attention to the faucet, and I think you're going to

walk away. Go dude. For the last five years, I've

looked at this and I'm telling you, ninety percent of

the time the water exists because of the poor faces.

Yeah yeah, yeah. And and so the fact that you

worry about this for us.

Well I'm outraged. I'm not worried about it.

Yeah, but I'm just you're worried for us that our

life is going to be more difficult and uninformed if

you don't show it to usted. And Jesus warns us

about worry.

I see, I see.

He lets us know.

Okay, you worry on me for no reason. I'm like,

I'm not worried, but but you're anxiety over this this issue.

All right, I'll buy it. I'll buy it.

Wow, Chris, Well, thank you, thank you on behalf of

all the rest of humanity. Yeah, you can't. We can't

thank you enough. Ye, you're just There're like you're like

the other superhero that didn't make it into them, into the.

I'm like one of the thunderbolts.

Yeah, here we go. Well, anyways, it's us here. In Luke,

chapter twelve, verse twenty two, Jesus is talking about worry,

and he says, then turning to his disciples, Jesus said,

this is why I tell you not to worry about

everything her everyday life, whether you have enough food to

eat or enough clothes to wear, for life is more

than food in your body, more than clothing. Look at

the ravens. They don't plant or harvest or store food

and barns, for God feeds them, and you are far

more valuable to Him than any birds can all your

worries at a single moment to your life. And if

worry can' accomplish a little thing like that, what's the

use of worrying about bigger things? Look at the lilies

and how they grow. They don't work or make their

clothing Yet Solomon and all his glory was not dressed

as beautifully as they are. And if God cares so

wonderfully for flowers that are here today and thrown into

the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you. Why

do you have so little faith? Is that it? Nope,

we go and don't be concerned about what to eat

and what to drink. Don't worry about such things. These

things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers all over the world.

But your father already knows your needs. Seek the Kingdom

of God above all else, and he will give you

everything you need. So don't be afraid. Little flock gives

your father great happiness to give you the kingdom. Sell

your possessions, and give those in need. This will store

up treasures for you in heaven, and the purses of

heaven never get old or develop holes. Your treasure will

be safe. No thief can steal it, no money can

no moth can destroy it. Wherever your treasure is, they're

the desires of your heart will be also.

Boom, bang, there you go, boom. You know it's so

great about the Bible, a lot of things, But let

me tell you. Let me tell you what I well,

best things the resurrection, Yeah, are salvation. One of the

great things about the Bible from a skeptics point of view,

how about that is that even though these stories are

written down and some of them are so ancient, you know,

thousands and thousands of years old, that and they're so outrageous, right,

I mean, you know, Elijah on top of the mountain

with fire coming down. I mean, just just crazy stories.

What's so interesting is that every single time that in

this case Jesus talking about human nature, but even the

Bible talking about human nature, our human nature has not changed. No, Yeah,

isn't that crazy? So everyone it talks about thoughts and

intents of the heart or human tendencies to lean a

certain way or do a certain thing, or or you know,

or struggling you know, commandment to not uh uh you know,

do this, but do this. And I mean every time

it talks about the desires, the intentions, the human hearts,

the sinful nature, everything it is. It is dead on.

Yes.

And so here's Jesus talking about where your treasure is,

the desires of your heart will also be And holy cow,

is that true? That is one of the most prominent

truths that supersedes every race, every culture, every generation. It's

just like, think about it, everybody wherever they You know,

if a person loves money, right, and if a person

loves stuff, then that's where their heart's going to be.

Their heart's going to be there. It's not going to

be anywhere else. Which is we see that in you know,

people who come to their senses and they say, man,

I've sacrificed my family for the pursuit of more money. Yeah,

you know, I got divorced because I'm always at work

and I'm searching for that next promotion. And it's just

like money is the first priority, and then you lose

everything else, or if you don't lose it, it suffers. Right.

I was in Naples, Florida and working with or meeting

with a couple of guys who give pretty significant resources

to the Timothy Initiative to help start discycle making movements

in church planting movements in the least reached countries in

the world. And the one gentleman was wealthy. The other

gentleman was insanely wealthy, insanely with He's an old guy,

quite old gentleman, and he made his money a number

of years ago. Hundreds of millions of dollars, and he

has a huge car collection. He owns a bunch of

houses all around the country, all these things. But about

a decade or two ago he set up a family

foundation and began realizing, I want to give it all away.

And so when we were sitting there in the restaurant,

it was just a diner, literally, like a diner with

some lady named Flow who came up to a bubblegum,

want to know what you want today?

All right?

I think it's his favorite place to eat, which is hysterical,

and it looks like that old diner, you know, the

old kind of diners with the like the stainless steel

building and the neon signs and stuff.

Trivia. Do you remember the name of that series.

Of what series?

The Flow or wait?

I was talking about some lady named Flow, I.

Know, But did you get that quote from Dumb and Dumber?

No Flow?

No oh, because that she was made popular as a

diner worker. She her name was Flow. Her cats phrase

was kiss my grits okay, and it was from Alice okay,

and it was Mel's Dinner. Oh well yeah, from the seventies.

So anyways, it's kind of that idea, you know, that place.

So it was just kind of a low key restaurant.

Really cool to hang out with him there, and I

asked him about it. I said, you know, he's a

really grumpy old guy all this stuff, so you just

never know if you're gonna offend him. But I asked him,

I said, hey, can I ask you? You know you

mentioned because he was measuring what kind of investment was

he making and what kind of results is he getting?

So he wanted all these details. Typical rich guy making

investments and now he's trying to give his money away.

And I asked him, I said, you know, you take

these things really seriously, and you're reacting like this is

your job. He said, it is my job. That's what

I mean. He said, when I was trying to build

my career, he said, I was building buildings, building apartments,

building all these things. And he said I was in

detailed down to like the penny and he said, every

minute mattter to me, and everything made money. He said,

Now I'm trying to figure out how to give it away.

And he said, it matters, it matters where it goes,

it matters what kind of results is going to get

Am I going to get a good return on my investment.

I'm still investing. And I said, what made you decide

you want to give your money away? And he said,

I've lived a really great life, and I've got a

lot of good things here. And he said, I've got

cars that you can't imagine. I've got homes and estates

that you can't fathom. I just chase the sun. I

just live wherever the sun is. You know, sunny, good weather.

So we're in Naples in the middle of winter, he said,

But when my wife died, I realized I loved this

place more than that place. And he said, Jesus is

right where my treasure is. That's where I want to be.

And he said, at first, I started giving all my

money away so I would fall in love with the

idea that heaven is great and I want to lay

up treasures in heaven because I want to see my wife.

And he said, the longer I've been doing this, the

more I'm in love with the idea that I get

to spend eternity with Jesus. He said, So it started

off with my wife, Now it's Jesus. And he said,

I love this idea heaven. He said, before I was

afraid of dying. Now I can't wait to go to heaven.

He said all these things, and he said, come laying

up treasure in heaven. He said, it's true. Where your

treasure is, that's where your heart is. And he said,

my treasure was in cars and barns. And now I'm

trying to figure out how do I sell my barns

and my cars because I want more treasure in heaven.

And he said, I long for it. I look for it.

I'm so excited for it. And I've never had anybody one.

I never had a guy who with one hundreds of

millions of dollars tell me I'm trying figure how to

give it all away. The other one is I never

had anybody that was just that crystal clear on why

this was so important to him. Yeah, right, you have

it away.

That's amazing.

I love it. And that's what Jesus is saying. Where

your treasure is, that's where your heart's going to be.

Yeah.

And so for most of us, our heart is on

our house, it's in our vacations, it's in our bank account,

it's in our retirement, it's in our camper, it's in

our place up north. That's where it because that's where

our treasure is. We're working, we're spending our minutes, in

our hours in order to have money in order to

be able to fund those things. Yeah, so that's where

that's where our hearts are.

Yeah. And by the way, the Bible never says that

having money or having wealth is a bad thing.

No.

No, In fact, the scripture even says we're supposed to

leave inheritance for our children's children.

Right, plan for your future future and spends everything you get.

Somebodyle says, yeah.

And so and so the idea that we you know,

are blessed with means isn't designed to make us feel guilty.

Right, well, Paul told Timothy, God has given you all

these things to enjoy. That's right, right, just make sure

you don't put your trust in them, that's right, right.

That's right. So when you read like verse number thirty three,

where it says sell your possessions and give to those

in need. This will store our treasures in heaven, you

know that is true. Whenever we decide to invest in heaven.

You know, if we're if we're helping the poor, of

course we're reading your treasures in heaven. But that should

not be taken as a commandment of like, if you

have prized possessions, you must sell them. That's not what

that's saying, right, right, it's saying that if you have

an attitude of of.

You know, give saying start letting go. Yeah, that's right,

that's hanging on so tight, start letting that.

That's right. It's the principle of this. This is what

this means, and this is what this means. Right.

Well, so we always say that the Bible is its

own best commentary. That's right, so he says, so in

my mind, Jesus doesn't waste words. So in verse thirty one,

he says, seek the Kingdom above all else. So I

can tell you this, there's almost nothing else in this

passage that's more important than that statement.

Right.

He literally says above all else. If you ever wonder

what's important to Jesus, well, there's nothing more important than

you seeking the Kingdom of Heaven above all else, and

he will give you everything you need. So don't be afraid,

little flock. It gives your father great happiness to give

you the kingdom. So if you seek the kingdom, that

means seeking Jesus to be the king of your life.

And then your will be done, not my will, be done.

When your will and your values begin to align with his,

he says, then I'll give you everything you need. Right,

My father's gonna give everything you need. And it's in

that context that he says, sell your possessions and give

to the poor. He's saying, release your grip. If you're

seeking his kingdom above everything else, you're going to release

your grip on your kingdom. And when you release your

grip on your kingdom, what's going to happen is all

of your work and all of your efforts are going

to start laying up treasures in heaven rather than just

accumulating treasures here. There's nothing wrong with having things here,

it's just where's your grip? What's because what you're gripping

onto probably has a hard grip on you. Right.

And he also made us a very similar statement in

Matthew chapter six, where he says, seek you first the

Kingdom of God and his righteousness. That's right, and all

these things shall be added to you. God will take

care of you, you know, that's all. Yes, seek first

the Kingdom of God. Okay, And it is righteous. Okay,

So anyway, the point is is that when God tells

us to seek him first, he promises then provision, right right.

And so when he's talking about money, he's talking about

the ravens. He's talking about the flowers. And and I

love the deep thinking here, right who looks at the

flowers and says, man, God has clothed them so well

with their with their garments, you know. But Jesus looks

at the flowers and says, they're dressed so beautifully, the purples,

the yellows, the greens or whatever. And he's talking about

just and he says, you know, not not even Solivan

and all this splendor was dressed more beautifully than these God.

And God does that. And God cares for the flowers

just by the way, so you know God cares for ravens.

God cares for flowers, And how much more does he

care for you? Because God provides? And so he's telling us,

you know, rely on God because you know it's all

around you. You know, the idea that you know, ravens

don't worry is a hilarious thought, right right. And he's saying,

look around you, the flowers aren't worried. The ravens aren't worried.

Not worrying is something that's all around you, right, And

they were completely dependent upon God.

He says in verse twenty five. Can all your worries

a single moment to your life?

That's hilarious, right, really, yeah.

What is your worrying accomplishing? It doesn't acomplish anything. And

he says, and if worry can't accomplish a little thing

like that, right, adding more minutes to your life, Jesus

views that as a little thing, right, Right, what's the

use of worrying over bigger things if you can't add

any more time to your life? And that's just a

little thing for God. Right, If you if you're not

in control of that, then why are you worrying about

the big stuff? Right? Instead? Seek God and his kingdom

and all these other things that we added to you.

That's great, Yeah, I love it.

You know when it talks about worry, you know that

whenever I start preaching on worry or you know, teach

on worry, you can get through the negative consequences of

worry so much, I mean so quickly. And and there's

I don't think there's a single upside to worry no,

it's one of it's one of those. It's one of

those topics where like I remember arguing with my mother

about smoking one time, and I said, name me a

single benefit of smoking, right, and now she has she has,

she has hard I'm breathing at eighty five. What is

that called? Nod? Yeah? And so. But but I used

to say to her, name me a single thing. And

you know it smells it, you know, second and smoke,

it's cost you money, all these different things and uh.

And so finally she goes, oh, I have it. I

said what and she goes, it makes me want to

eat less, and therefore I'm thinner when I smoke. And

I said, okay, fine, you came up with one thing, okay,

out of the out of a million negatives. But I

don't think there's a single good thing about worry. Now,

if you try to come up with one single thing,

I don't think you really can.

I think warriors would try to tell you they're just

trying to be diligent. Yeah, they're trying to focus on

the thing that you're not focusing on, right. Uh, and

so your your personal responsibility and your diligence, those things

are are no but there's almost always an equal and

opposite corresponding negative, and if it's unchecked to every every

noble thing that you can think to do. Telling the

truth is incredibly noble. But I can use the truth

as a club and beat you with it too. So

there's almost an opposite, equal and opposite corresponding negative to

all the positives. So if you're a worrier and you're

justifying it by saying, well, I'm just trying to be diligent,

I'm just trying to be you know, responsible, then just

understand every sin can be justified by some noble side

of it. Right your your outrage on our behalf. For instance,

I'm joking, bro.

I was gonna say, are you about sure?

You?

Are you about to classify that a sin?

I'm joking. I'm joking, but I mock it. I think

it's a funny idea. And so be careful about justifying

your worry as if it's some because Jesus doesn't give

any of those caveats. He goes listen, if your hat

and it's because of this, how tightly you're hanging on

to a thing. If you're hanging on to a thing,

the one of the ways you know that it's beginning

to hang on to you and grip you too tight.

Is the fact that it's dominating your thinking. Yeah, And

Jesus said, these kinds of things dominate the way pagans

think what they're going to eat next, and all these things.

He said, Listen, God delights in giving you the kingdom,

but you got to let it go. If to let

go of these things and trust that God's can do it,

it doesn't mean you stop being diligent. It doesn't mean

you stop being responsible. It means that you trust the

outcome to God. And when you trust the outcome to God,

then there's a lot more peace. Yeah.

And somebody might also say, well, being a worrier causes

me to think through things more and plan more because

I worry about you know, inevitable or probable you know, outcomes.

And I would just say, guess what, it's possible to

still plan and think that way without worrying. That's right, right,

So the worrying is the negative part of things, right.

It's of worrying is worrying about things you can't control,

that are out of your control, that may or may

not even happen. And therefore it's a negative feeling. It's

a negative thing all around. It actually takes moments from

your life. You know, worry can actually end your life early.

It does, it really does. So studies have been done.

We hey, that is a great place to end. Thank

you for joining us in the Bible guys, and hopefully

we'll see you next time.