NEW TESTAMENT CONTEXTUAL COMMENTARY

by Dr. Robert R. Seyda

GOSPEL OF MATTHEW

CHAPTER SIX

Part VI 12/07/15

Verses 31-33: “Don’t worry and say, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ That’s what those people who don’t know God are always thinking about. Don’t worry, because your Father in heaven knows that you need all these things. What you should want most is God’s kingdom and doing what He wants you to do. Then He will give you all these other things you need.

In a book on Yiddish Proverbs (Hebrew dialect spoken by Germans), I found this gem: “Do not worry about tomorrow, because you do not even know what may happen to you today.” Such maxims have been around for a long, long time. But it shows that Jesus was not picking a fight with His opponents, He was simply picking their brain to see if they still remembered what the ancients had taught them through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Now our Lord summarizes His thoughts for this lesson.

When God was instructing Moses on the year of Jubilee and the seven years that would follow, the question that came up was: “If we don’t plant for seven years, what are we going to eat. The Lord told him that even though they did not plant, the land would produce crops naturally so they could have plenty to eat until the Jubilee period was over.”¹ Jesus is saying the same thing here. In addition to what we do to maintain our livelihood for the present, God is already preparing things for tomorrow.

I read in the newspaper one day that a police officer from the New England area of the United States retired after some 50 years on the police force and moved to a retirement village in Florida. A few days after moving in, he walked out one morning to catch a bus, and a drunk driver lost control of his vehicle, ran into the bus stop, and killed the retired officer. The pitiful thing was that this officer had delayed and put off so many things he wanted to see and do during his life, and now he would never have a chance to enjoy a single one of them. That’s how quickly life gives us a bitter pill to swallow. That’s why Jesus was telling His followers to enjoy life each day along the way to their destination, and do not be so focused on tomorrow you miss what He has for you today.

As a young minister, I failed to learn this lesson in my early years. I thought that if I took a vacation I was letting God down because I wasn’t preaching or teaching everyday. I could not have been more wrong. This doesn’t mean we should become lethargic or irresponsible in fulfilling God’s will and purpose for our lives, but to enjoy the commission He gave us on those good days, because there will be enough bad days. Our Lord was addressing the need for setting priorities. One Jewish commentator pointed this out: “It was taught in the name of Rabbi Shimon the son of Yochai: The children of Israel rejected three things during the reign of Rehoboam; the Kingdom of Heaven, the kingdom of the House of David, and the Holy Temple.”² And as we know, this son of Solomon lost half his kingdom in a very short time. So it doesn’t pay to borrow from tomorrow at the expense of losing what we can spend for today.

Bishop Augustine the theologian gives us this exposition on what Jesus is saying here. He writes: “Here Jesus shows most clearly that these things are not to be sought as if they were some sort of blessing, that on account of them we ought to do well in all our accomplishments, but yet that they are necessary. For what is the difference between a blessing which is to be sought tomorrow, and a necessity which is to be taken today for our use? He made that plain when He said: ‘Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.’ The kingdom and the righteousness of God are there for our good; and this is to be sought, and there everything will eventually be set up, and for that reason we do everything we do. But because we serve as soldiers in this life, in order that we may be able to reach that kingdom, and because our life cannot be spent without these necessaries, by using that word ‘first,’ He has indicated that these other things are to be sought later, not in point of time, but in point of importance.”³

Verse 34: So don’t worry about tomorrow. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Tomorrow will have its own worries.

Jesus is saying, more or less, don’t be like your forefathers, put God first and He will take care of the other things He believes you will need to fully serve Him. Our Lord is echoing the words of Solomon: “Never brag about what you will do in the future; you have no idea what tomorrow will bring.”⁴ And the words that come closest to what our Savior is saying here come from the traditional Jewish Spoken Word: “Don’t worry over tomorrow’s troubles, because a person doesn’t know what a day will bring, and if by chance tomorrow they pass away: they will have left grieving over a world that was not theirs,”⁵ which were also based on Solomon’s wisdom.

One Rabbi commented on how sometimes people try to get what they want against the will of others, and likens it to attempting to capture a bird without baiting it with corn.⁶ And another Rabbi said it was like making a pond without putting any fish in it.⁷ Then the compiler of the Talmud says: “I AM that I AM.⁸ The Holy One, blessed be He, said to Moses: Go and say to Israel: I was with you in this bondage, and I shall be with you in the bondage of the other kingdoms.⁹ He said to Him: Lord of the Universe, sufficient is the evil in the time thereof! Thereupon the Holy One, blessed be He, said to him: Go and tell them: I AM has sent me unto you¹⁰.”¹¹

Augustine now adds this comment: “Therefore it is with a single heart and only for the sake of the kingdom of God that we ought to do good to all; and we ought not in doing so to think either of the temporal reward alone, or of that along with the kingdom of God: all which temporal things He has placed under the category of tomorrow, saying, ‘Take no thought for tomorrow.’ For tomorrow is not spoken of except in time, where the future succeeds the past. Therefore, when we do anything good, let us not think of what is temporal, but of what is eternal; then that will be a good and perfect work. ‘For tomorrow,’ He says, ‘will have anxieties of its own,’ i.e., so that, when you must, you will take food, or drink, or clothing, that is to say, when necessity itself begins to urge you. For these things will be within reach, because our Father knows that we have need of all these things. For ‘each day has enough of its own misfortunes’ i.e. it is sufficient that necessity itself will urge us to take such things. And for this reason, I suppose, it is called misfortune, because for us it is punishment: for it belongs to this frailty and mortality which we have earned by sinning. Do not add, therefore, to this punishment of temporal necessity anything more burdensome, so that you should not only suffer the want of such things, but should also for the purpose of satisfying this want enlist as a soldier for God.”¹²

In other words, Augustine is saying that his understanding of what Jesus is saying here comes down to a simple conclusion, and that is: since we have enough to worry about in doing what we’ve been called to do today and finding the resources in order to complete the job, don’t add to it the burden of worrying about what we may need tomorrow until we have finished the task for today. I guess we could liken all of this to a farmer who is getting ready to sow a field of corn who gets so worried about getting the corn to plant that he forgets to plow the field; or a carpenter building a house is so concerned over the lumber he needs that he doesn’t lay the foundation, or a student wanting to write an essay for graduation becomes so anxious over the paper they’ll need that they don’t get the books from the library required to finish the endeavor. In other words, Jesus is talking about prioritizing based on need, not on want.

Unfortunately, today some of Jesus’ followers have allowed worry and frustration to become so strong that they have begun to worry over their worry. Also, many feel that this teaching of Jesus cannot be taken literally; that it is more of a philosophical view than theological instruction, so they have not heeded it at all. Christ’s paramount thought here is “worry.” Don’t worry about clothes, food, shelter or tomorrow. He did not say “don’t worry” to the point of inaction or laissez-faire, but don’t let the worry of these things come between you and your Christian duty to fulfill God’s will and plan for your life. God knows our need, and He will provide. When the old suit is about worn out, He will lead you to a bargain, provide the extra money to buy a new one or even give opportunity to receive one as a gift. But if you fail to preach, teach, testify or witness because you’re fretting over your old suit, then you are missing the point.

In addition, Christ’s advice has medicinal value, because worry can lead to ulcers and heart problems. God’s promise for obedience in putting first things first is not contingent upon a certain accomplishment or tied to some calculated time-line. So often the awarding of “other things” impedes the original “seeking” of the kingdom. It all depends on how sincere we are in searching for the kingdom of God. But in any case, as we seek for this kingdom and God’s way of right living, it should be done with this thought in mind: I would rather enter heaven as a pauper than end up squirming in hell as a millionaire.