Do Not Worry // Matthew 6:25-34

Join us as we continue our series on the sermon on the mount in Matthew 6:25-34!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, as a kid I was terrified of storms and I've
told you all this, a whole bunch.
I lived in a mobile home inDallas, so it was kind of a
rational fear, to be completelyhonest.
But there were lots of partswhere it wasn't rational, in
fact.
Like even if it was a perfectlyclear sky, like no cloud in
sight, I would constantly feelthe need and the compulsion to

(00:21):
go outside and check the sky,check the weather radar, turn on
the news and there was thisjust massive fear in my life and
I told myself that if I couldjust live in a place where
storms didn't happen, I wouldn'tbe so scared.
And so, for some reason, inlike 10-year-old Garrett's mind,
north Dakota.
Apparently.
I thought there were notornadoes in North Dakota, so I
was convinced, like, one day I'mgoing to move to North Dakota

(00:42):
and I was really disappointed tofigure out they have even
bigger tornadoes than we havehere.
And so by time, you know, timegoes on and that fear kind of
goes away I'm not as scared ofthat anymore.
But the thing is it would justmove.
I would be scared of heights orI would be scared of judgment,
right Like I got way into theleft behind books at way too

(01:02):
young of an age.
Right Binge through thosethings really jacked me up Not
great and so it would justbounce around from fear to fear,
to fear, and even in college Iwould have these fears, and it
wasn't tornadoes or heights, itwas the grown up fears like
student loan debt and interestrates and getting a big boy job,
like those types of things.
And so the reality is that whatI thought was a specific fear

(01:26):
was not so much a specific fearbut rather a pattern of anxiety
all throughout my life.
Why do I tell you that?
Well, because if I were toguess, I would say that the
majority of you in this roomcould probably relate to that
story in one way, shape or form,and maybe not the specifics.
It might be different fears,different anxieties, but

(01:48):
probably this theme of like anundercurrent of anxiety and
everything you do.
You don't know when it startedand it's just always kind of
been there with you.
And that's an educated guess,because our generation, gen Z,
and now Gen Alpha, has beencoined the anxious generation.
Over 70% of Gen Z say theystruggle with anxiety and mental
health, and over 82% of Gen Zworries about the future economy

(02:09):
, climate change, violence, allthose types of things.
But enough about the stats.
Let's just be honest andtransparent for a second.
Just a quick show of hands.
Who in here has dealt withanxiety, fear, worry at some
point in their life?
Good, all right.
So most of us have been there,right?
That's exactly what I'm tryingto say here is that it's one of
the most common struggles thatwe deal with in our day and age,

(02:31):
and so the question is if weall struggle with it, how do we
handle it?
What's the solution?
What's the answer?
And I'll be honest, I'm notgoing to pretend to have the
perfect answer for you tonight.
I am not a counselor.
I'm a chump from Red Oak, texas, with a couple of Bible degrees
, and that's all I am, and soI'm not going to pretend to be
able to solve everybody'sstruggle with anxiety.

(02:51):
But what I do have tonight isthe Word of God, and we've been
walking through the Sermon onthe Mount these past few weeks,
and that's where we get to.
In the Sermon on the Mount,jesus is teaching his followers
about worry, and their worrieswere far different than the
worries that we deal with today,but it was still anxiety, and
what we're going to see here inthe text is that really the root
cause is the same.

(03:12):
And so my prayer tonight isthat's where you add If you
walked in here tonight and youwould say, hey, I struggle with
anxiety, I struggle with worry,just lock in, not because I'm
going to solve all your problems, but my prayer is to give you a
space tonight to actually startto deal with it, to stop just
trying to bury it or run from itlike it's ever going to go away
.
And my prayer is that, throughthe Word of God, you would see

(03:32):
some sort of healing or freedomor change.
That starts even tonight.
And so, if you have yourscripture, let's go ahead and
flip open to Matthew, chapter 6.
We're going to start in verse25.
And as we study the words ofJesus tonight, we're going to
see him identify the problem.
He's going to give us a promiseand then he's going to give us
a way to practice peace.
So again, matthew 6, startingin verse 25.

(03:52):
It's going to be on the screen.
If you don't have your Bible,therefore, I tell you, do not
worry about your life, what youwill eat or drink, or about your
body, what you will wear.
Isn't life more than food andthe body more than clothes.
Can any one of you, by worrying, add a single hour to your life
?
And so when you first read this, you might think, hey, jesus,
that's not all that helpful,like you're just telling me hey,

(04:13):
man, you ever tried notworrying, like you ever just
tried not doing it.
It's great, and especially foodand clothing, because those are
two things that we need, andthat's how I viewed this passage
for a while, like I always usedto think, like I don't know how
this is helpful, jesus, butlike I trust you, I guess and
it's not until you start to diga little bit deeper into what
Jesus is actually saying thatyou realize, oh, this is

(04:33):
actually incredibly helpfulBecause later, in verse 32, he's
kind of summarizing hisargument he says don't worry
about food and clothing, whatyou'll wear, because the pagans
chase after all these things.
And so he's not talking aboutjust needing food and clothing,
but he's talking about thisintentional pursuit, this
chasing.
And really, at the core, Ithink what he's trying to get at

(04:54):
is this idea of trying to findpeace in these things of life
and food and clothing, becausethe reality is, anxiety in our
life comes when our peace isbuilt on things that can be
taken away.
Anxiety comes when our peace isbuilt on things that can be
taken away.
Two weeks ago I told you astory about how I would approach

(05:14):
relationships in high school.
Primarily that I had a hole inmy life from my parents' divorce
and a lot of just terriblethings that we had gone through
as kids and I tried to findpeace from that in the arms of a
person.
But because I felt like Ineeded that relationship to have
peace, it actually did nothingbut cause me anxiety because I
would be in it and I wouldsearch for it and like if that
person started to give me lessattention or if they didn't live

(05:35):
up to these unrealisticexpectations that I had set, I
would start to feel reallyanxious and jealous and it would
just torpedo the whole thing.
But it wasn't just relationships.
That would happen with sports.
I would run to football to tryand find peace and it would work
for a little bit.
But then what happens whensomebody's better than you?
What happens when you get hurt?
What happens when coach doesn'tlike you as much as he used to

(05:56):
and you start to get anxious?
You start to try and hold on toit because you start to feel
your grip slipping on that thingthat you've tried to find peace
in your entire life.
It could be academicperformance, right.
I really saw it pop up duringCOVID in a totally different way
.
How many of y'all remembergoing through COVID?
I don't know how many peoplewere here born not terribly long
after COVID it was only fiveyears ago so most of you were at

(06:17):
least middle school, right.
So I remember in COVID we werein college and there was a
period where food wasn't on theshelves and obviously, looking
back, we chuckle and it's like,oh, you know, it was no big deal
Like COVID, you know, it wasall.
We're back to normal.
But there was a period therewhere me walking into Walmart
and not being able to buy foodwhenever I want really kind of
caused this shake-up in my mindof, hey, like my peace is in

(06:39):
some way built on the fact thatI can walk into a grocery store
and buy food whenever I want andthat's not promised, it can be
taken away.
And so this anxiety was alwaysat my door because my peace was
built on all these things, somestuff that we all take for
granted, like food, but otherthings like popularity or sports
or relationship, and because myanxiety or because my peace was

(07:00):
built on things that werefragile, I felt anxiety and so
you have to ask yourself what isyour peace built on?
Let's do a little practice.
Work backwards from your fears.
Think of that thing that keepsyou up at night, that thing that
you really struggle with if youare in that place, right, are
you afraid of being left out,not being in the in crowd,

(07:21):
having enough friends?
Do you think, as long as I'mliked and as I have a group like
, I'll be okay?
You might be looking topopularity or status to try and
find peace.
And the problem is, people arefickle.
Friendships shift and change.
Approval is unpredictable andwhat it's ultimately going to do
if you try to find your peacethere, it's going to leave you

(07:41):
lonely and stuck in a cycle ofpeople pleasing where you don't
even know who you are anymore.
Or are you afraid of messing up, of not being good enough, of
falling short of expectations?
Do you find yourself thinking,well, hey, as long as I succeed,
as long as I don't disappointanyone, I'll be okay?
You might be looking toachievement, school, sports,

(08:01):
perfection, to try and findpeace.
The problem you're going tomess up, you're going to let
people down.
Achievement is this movingtarget?
One mistake, one bad day andyou're back to square one and
it's going to keep you in thisplace where you're anxious and
just trying to perform all thetime and you're never really
known.
Or are you scared?
When things feel chaotic, whenyou don't know what's coming

(08:23):
next?
You tell yourself, if I canjust control my little circle, I
don't need a big circle.
But if I control the thingsright around me, then I'll feel
safe.
You might be trying to findyour peace and your own control
and predictability.
But here's the thing control isan illusion.
Life is full of unexpectedthings and storms and trials and
we're always one phone call orone text away from all of life.

(08:45):
Being flipped upside down onits head and trying to manage
every single detail is going toleave you exhausted.
Do you get anxious, thinkingabout the future, about what
could go wrong, what might fallapart?
Do you think, hey, if I canjust have a plan, if everything
will go according to how I wantthings to go, I'm going to go to
this college, get this type ofjob, have this type of family.
You might be putting your peacein your plans, but plans change

(09:10):
.
Life doesn't follow scripts.
Things fall apart, and whenthings fall apart, so does your
sense of security.
Or do you worry about your homenot being okay, about your
parents fighting, splitting upor something going wrong behind
closed doors?
Do you think, hey, as long aseverything at home stays stable,
I'll be okay?
You might be looking to yourfamily to be your peace, but
here's the thing even the bestfamilies can shake.
People change.
Life gets hard, and if yourpeace is built on this, then

(09:33):
when things break, you're notgoing to know what to do.
Or do you get scared?
Last one, when you feel sick, orwhen someone talks about
disease or death, or maybe aloved one, somebody that you
care deeply about, gets sick ortheir health starts to falter,
you start to notice they'regetting older.
Do you find yourself thinking,well, as long as I'm healthy and
nothing bad happens to me, ormy family, like I'll be fine,

(09:54):
I'll be fine.
Well, you might be looking tohealth for peace, but here's the
reality health fails, bodiesbreak, people age, even when you
eat the right food, exercise,you're not ultimately in control
.
And so I could keep going onand on and on, but I think you
get the point here.
And my point is these are allvalid fears.

(10:18):
I'm not trying to downplaythose fears, I'm not trying to
step on that anxiety, but I'msaying, hey, because they are
valid fears, because all ofthese things could happen, you
have to find your peacesomewhere else.
I'm not saying that you aren'tconcerned about these things,
but I'm saying that if you tryto not be concerned because you
can control everything, becauseyou can do everything, you can
make the plans, I'm telling youit's going to fail.
You have to find your peacesomewhere better, somewhere

(10:39):
unshakable.
And the question is where?
Well, jesus tells us that inverse 26.
Let's get back into the text.
Look at the birds of the air.
They do not sow or reap orstore away in barns, and yet
your heavenly Father feeds them.
Are you not much more valuablethan they?
Can any one of you, by worrying, add a single hour to your life
?
And why do you worry aboutclothes?
See how the flowers of thefield grow.

(11:00):
They don't labor or spin.
And yet I tell you that noteven Solomon, in all of his
splendor, was dressed like oneof these.
If that is how God clothes, thegrass of the field which is
here today and tomorrow isthrown into the fire, he will
not much more clothe you, you oflittle faith.
And so in these verses, jesususes this image of creation.
He talks about birds andflowers, which at first might

(11:21):
seem kind of cheesy, like, okay,but birds die, flowers, like
what's going on here, like thatdoesn't speak to my situation
now, but what Jesus is doing,he's actually using a strategy
of arguing that was very commonamong Jewish rabbis.
It was called and I'm going tobutcher this kol wahomer, and
it's basically an argument fromthe lesser to the greater, and
so the most simple way that Ican put it is they would say,

(11:43):
they would use this rationalargument and say, hey, if this
lesser thing is true, then howmuch truer is this greater thing
?
So if this is true, this smallthing that we can all see and
observe, then how much moreshould this big thing be true?
If this light thing is true,because call means light and
Homer means heavy, if this lightthing is true, because call
means light and homer meansheavy, if this light thing is
true, how much more is thisheavier one?

(12:04):
It takes something simple andobvious and extends that logic
to something more important.
And so, going back into the text.
Jesus says look at the birds ofthe air.
They don't sow or reap or storeaway, but your father feeds
them.
So the light thing is the birds.
They don't worry about food,god feeds them.
The heavier thing humans aremade in God's image.
How much more is God going toprovide and care for you,

(12:26):
somebody that has value?
And then, in verse 30, jesussays if that's how God clothes
the grass of the field, which ishere today and is tomorrow
thrown into the fire, will henot much more clothe you?
So the lighter thing is grassis temporary, right, it's
fleeting, it's here and it'sgone, but God cares for it, he
clothes it, he cares for thatpart of creation.
The heavier thing you areeternal.
Whether you follow Jesus or not, you are eternal.

(12:48):
And God, if you've placed yourfaith in him.
God has made you his child.
He's going to provide for yourneeds.
And so the emphasis isn't aboutbirds and flowers, it's about
how God values you.
And even more than how Godvalues you, it's about him, it's
about his character, it's about, hey, if God is faithful to

(13:08):
some grass and some birds, doyou not think he's going to be
faithful to you, his specialcreation, his son or his
daughter, made in his image.
Even if you don't have arelationship with him, you still
have value because you weremade in God's image.
Even if you don't have arelationship with him, you still
have value because you weremade in God's image.
You were made for arelationship and to reflect him,
whether you're living that outor not.
And so the point here is that,while food and clothing and all

(13:29):
these other things that we canbe concerned about are important
, you shouldn't try to find yourpeace in them.
Your peace comes fromunderstanding and embodying the
fact that God cares for you, andby holding onto that promise
that God in heaven says you havevalue, he cares for you and you
can have true peace.
And the best example I think Icould come up with this as a

(13:50):
child.
So you think about Leighton, mydaughter.
She's two and a half and shetalks very well and a lot.
She loves to talk, she loves tovisit.
Most of you have probably had aconversation with her at some
point, and you know she doesn'tcome up to me and be like hey,
dad, how are we going to pay themortgage this month?
Like, hey, dad, have you heardabout like all the tariffs and
things Like how are we going toafford like anything?
Like how are we going to affordlike gas prices have gone up?

(14:11):
Like hey, dad, have you seen,like our retirement's probably
not doing great right now, likethe stock market's kind of like
no, no-transcript meal is comingfrom.
She knows that she's going toget it.

(14:32):
And look, that's not a perfectexample.
They all break down.
I know there's a big differencein a two-year-old versus an
adult or a young adult or ateenager with those type of
problems, but I use thatillustration because I think
that's the best picture I cancome up with of this childlike
faith that God is asking for us.
And it's not to say that wedon't take responsibility.
It's not to say that we don'ttry to do our part.

(14:53):
We still have to work, we stillhave to go and provide for our
families.
In fact, scripture is veryclear about that.
But what it is saying is thatmy peace shouldn't come from my
ability to take care of myself.
It should come from God'sability to take care of me.
So I'm not gonna try and findpeace in my own strength and
getting everything together inmy life, but I'm gonna trust
that, even when I don't feellike I can, even when I don't

(15:15):
know what's gonna happen next,even when I'm hurting, even in
the real hard moments of life,when it doesn't feel like God
cares, I'm going to look back atthe faithfulness in his word
and in my life in the past andI'm going to say I trust that he
does and even if I don't see itright now, I believe that he's
going to come through.
And that's a fight.
I'm not saying it's easy, butthat's where it starts.

(15:35):
And so take that and apply itto your fear.
If you're afraid of being leftout, find peace knowing that
you're already fully accepted bythe one who made you.
If you're afraid of being afailure, find peace knowing that
your identity is secure in thefinished work of Jesus, not your
performance, not your abilityto succeed.
If you're afraid of losingcontrol, find peace knowing that

(15:58):
the one who holds all thingstogether holds you in his hands,
that he cares for you.
He's better at running thisthing than we are.
If you're afraid of beingunseen or forgotten, find peace
knowing that you are fully knownand fully loved by the one
whose eyes never leave you.
If you're afraid of the future,find peace, knowing that God
holds the future in his hands,afraid your family might fall

(16:20):
apart.
Find peace knowing that youhave a heavenly father who will
never leave you If you're afraidof getting sick or your body
breaking down.
Find peace knowing that deathis not the end, that Jesus
conquered death, he conqueredthe grave, and that you have
access to eternal life throughhim.
You see what I'm getting here,and I could go on and list
example, example, example.

(16:40):
If you need help, whatever yourfear is like hey, you didn't
say that one Find me afterservice and I would love to show
you where scripture speaks tothat.
But I also want to say thatinformation alone does not
guarantee you'll have peace.
Information alone has nevertransformed anybody.
You can know a lot of things,but it does not guarantee that
your experience in life is goingto be any different.
You have to have a way to getthat information into your DNA,

(17:03):
get it into your body, toactually live it out, and that's
what Jesus says in verse 31.
He says so do not worry sayingwhat shall we eat or what shall
we drink or what shall we wear,for the pagans run after all
these things, and your heavenlyfather knows that you need them,
but seek first his kingdom andhis righteousness, and all these
things will be given to you aswell.
And so he summarizes hisargument and he tells us what

(17:25):
we're not supposed to do, don'tworry, saying what shall we eat,
what shall we drink, what shallwe wear?
And then he tells us what to doinstead, what to replace that
with.
He says seek first his kingdomand his righteousness, and all
these things will be added toyou as well.
And this is incredibly helpful,because so many of us think
that we can just think our wayout of anxiety.
Right, if I can just believethe right things, if I can

(17:46):
repeat the right things in mymind, I can just think my way
out of it All to realize itdoesn't work, like I was on that
hamster wheel for so long,because there might be thoughts
that need to be redirected,there might be beliefs that you
have that you need to change,but the reality is you can't
think your way out of somethingyou didn't completely think your
way into right.

(18:07):
An example if you're afraid ofbeing left out and you try to
find peace in the approval ofothers, you might've thought
some things that got you there,but that Instagram habit of
comparison, of doom scrollinglike that got you there too.
Those friends you have thatlike to tear each other down
based on their material goodsthat contributed.
So we don't just think our wayinto this anxiety.

(18:27):
There's patterns of behaviorthat get us to that type of
person.
We didn't get there overnight.
I mentioned earlier that I had alifelong struggle with anxiety
and one of the ways I would tryto fight is I just try to learn
everything I could aboutwhatever I was scared of.
So I have a lot of really dumb,random information about
tornadoes and airplanes.
Don't know why, but it's allstored up here and you know it
would help for that immediatestruggle.

(18:49):
But the reason I bounced aroundso much is because it would
only help for that one thing.
I was still a fearful person.
I didn't think myself intobeing fearful.
I practiced my way into it thatI would fuel my fear on social
media.
I would overschedule myself totry and run from my fears.
Maybe if I can just be busyenough, I won't actually have to
sit with my thoughts and dealwith it.

(19:09):
I would try to controleverything and then when I
couldn't control it or Icouldn't run fast enough, I
would just self-medicate withsocial media, lust, anger,
whatever it is that would try tojust distract me from that fear
that was underneath everything,and then I would try to deal
with it all in isolation.
And so all of those habits, Ihad also turned me into that

(19:30):
fearful person, and that wasn'tgoing to change overnight.
But through the power of theHoly Spirit, I had to practice
my way out of it.
So these practices and thingsare not just me self-helping my
way into peace, but it wascreating space in my life for
God to come in and change me.
Things like putting limits onmy media and social media,
practicing Sabbath and solitude,just getting unplugged from all

(19:52):
the noise of things that wouldmake me even more anxious.
Recently and this is a journeyI'm still on practicing, fasting
, building that discipline, andnone of those things changed me.
But they created space in mylife for God to meet me there
and he would change me.
And so part of the solution thatJesus offers is not just to
hold a set of beliefs or tothink really hard about why you
shouldn't be anxious, butinstead to embrace those beliefs

(20:16):
, live those beliefs out and toseek first the kingdom of God
and his righteousness.
And so what would that looklike for you?
You might need to make thatfirst step of getting into
community, like tonight hit uptwo or three trustworthy
followers of Jesus maybe amentor and just open up to them.
Guys, just talk to them.
I got two guys in my life thatI have no secrets with.

(20:37):
When I'm anxious, when I'mangry, when I'm struggling, when
I'm tempted, they know it andthey hold my feet to the fire
and they keep me accountable.
And sometimes we just have toget together and talk.
But stop trying to deal with iton your own.
You're not made to do that.
Talk about it, think about it.
We all raised our hands in hereyour adult leaders, your youth
pastor, your friends.
We all raised our hands that westruggle with anxiety and worry

(20:57):
.
So why do we try to hide it?
To save face, to pretend likeeverything's okay?
Why Don't run?
Don't try to hide.
Find people you can trust andopen up.
Step into community.
Maybe it's developing a practiceof prayer and silence.
Give God space in your life tospeak.
Sometimes we feel like God'ssilent, but we don't spend more
than half a second a day withhim, and so how do we create

(21:21):
space in our life to be able tolisten, to be able to hear from
him what he might have to say tous, to remind ourselves that
he's God, not us, but also tohave him just meet us there with
his love and his care.
It might be reading andmeditating on scripture, right,
and I'm not just saying memorizeBible verses for the sake of
memorizing them.
But if so much anxiety comesfrom these false narratives,

(21:41):
like we create this falsenarrative in my head of if I
don't make this grade, then I'mnot going to get into this
college and then I'm going to bea failure and then I'm going to
be homeless, so what we have todo is we have to fight those
false narratives, those falsestories, with the one true story
the story of the God who madethe universe and everything in
it, and the story of the God whopursued us to redeem us, to

(22:02):
give us freedom, to be hischildren, to give us value.
We have to get that story intowho we are and submit our view
of the world to that, to how Godviews the world, because he's
the one that made it.
It's the truth.
Maybe it's putting guardrailson your social media or your
friends, or whatever it is thatgot you to the place you're at?
Don't just keep doing thatthing, expecting a different
result.
And just keep doing that thingexpecting a different result.

(22:27):
And I have to make a disclaimer,guys.
I'm not trying to tell you thatyou're going to be worry-free
in two weeks.
You're going to leave heretonight and never be anxious,
ever again.
I'm 26, married, two kids and Istill struggle with anxiety.
Fairly frequently, your adultleaders would tell you the same
thing it's not perfection thatwe're going to see on this side
of heaven, but we can seeprogress, and that's what Jesus
says in verse 34.
Therefore, do not worry abouttomorrow, for tomorrow will
worry about itself.
Each day has enough trouble ofits own Peace.

(22:51):
For tomorrow he's not sayinghey, you're never going to worry
again.
You know you'll be perfect,you'll be great, life's going to
be easy.
He's saying I'll give you peacefor today and we'll worry about
tomorrow.
Tomorrow and we'll worry aboutthe next day.
The next day he says meet mehere, trust in me here, have
faith in me here.
You're not walking alone.

(23:12):
Can you imagine that?
Just human me for a second,close your eyes, just, everybody
, put your heads down.
I'm not doing an invitation,but I just want you to think
about for a second what would alife where you're actually
starting to get some freedomfrom that anxiety look like?
What would it feel like to notwake up with that feeling of
dread every single morning?
What would it feel like to lookto the future with hope and joy

(23:38):
?
What would it look like?
Just imagine that for a second.
Let yourself have someimagination.
Some of you haven't imaginedsomething in 10 years, but God
cares about our imagination aswell.
Like, really, just think aboutthat.
What would your life be like ifyou were just even starting to

(23:59):
experience some freedom fromanxiety and worry?
And I'm up here to tell youtonight I'm not selling snake
oil.
I'm not trying to rip you off.
I'm not trying to sell yousomething that I don't know
anything about.
This is something I'veexperienced.
That freedom is real and it'savailable.
But it's not available by yourown power.

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It's not available by somefive-year plan.
It's not available by someamount of money in your bank
account.
It's not available by somefive-year plan.
It's not available by someamount of money in your bank
account.
It's not available by somedream relationship.
It is only available throughJesus Christ, the way, the truth
and the life.
There is no access to theFather except through him.
But through him you can havepeace, you can have healing, you
can be set free from the changeof anxiety and that weight

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that's held you down for as longas you can remember.
It's real and it's available inJesus, because we talked about
this last week.
Jesus was a real human being.
He was God in flesh.
He is God who came to our mess,came to our muck.
He lived a perfect life and hewalked into Jerusalem to
announce himself as king, allfor them, a week later, to drag
him outside of the city, nailhim to a cross and hang him up

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naked for all to see.
But it wasn't a mistake, itwasn't an accident, it was on
purpose, because scripture saysthat on that cross he became our
sin, your sin, my sin, that lie, that lust, that anger.
He became all of it so thatwhen God punished him on that
cross, crushed him, it was forour sins, so that your sin was
paid for.

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God's not just sweeping itunder the rug.
He's not saying it's no bigdeal.
He's saying I looked it in itsface and I washed it clean.
So if you would place your faithin Jesus, you make him King and
Lord and you follow him for allthe rest of your days.
If you place your faith in himthat you'd be saved, you'd be
his child, and that you'd besaved, you'd be his child and

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that you would begin walking inpeace, in freedom, one step at a
time.
And it all begins with adecision.
So if you say that's me like,I'm there, I'm struggling, I've
been scared for as long as Iknow.
I've tried to hide it, I'vetried to run from it, and it's

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just made me more anxious, morehopeless.
My invitation for you tonightis to stop running, stop hiding,
step into the light.
It's good here, it's real.
You can be free from it all.
Just place your faith in Jesus,and it's not going to happen
overnight, but step by step,foot by foot, day after day, you

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can become someone who is fullof peace and full of joy and
full of hope, not just so thatyou can live your best life, but
you can point other people backto the God who set you free.
And so, real quick, I'm notgoing to have anybody move
around or look around If you sayhey, that's me.
I'm here and I am wracked withanxiety, I am desperate, I am
broken, I am hurting and I havenowhere to go.

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But I know that I needsomething more and I believe
that that something more isJesus, here in just a second.
I just want everybody to slipup your hand.
I'll tell you when to do that,and I'm not going to have you
stand up for surrender.
Say, for the first time in mylife, I'm going to stop trying
to hold it all together, I'mgoing to stop trying to
manufacture my own peace and I'mgoing to give it to the Lord.

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If you say that's you, for thefirst time tonight, I want to
place my faith in Jesus, I wantto make him king.
So, on the count, praise God, Isee you, I see you.
I see you.
Praise Lord, I see you.
Praise God, I see you.

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You can go ahead and put thosehands down.
I'm just gonna change things upa little bit tonight.
Here in a second, we're gonnastand and we're gonna sing, and
the song we're gonna sing isjust the words we just read.
It's the Lord will provide.
That's the scripture.
We're just singing it over eachother.

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And if you said, hey, I need tomake this decision Before we
sing this song, I'm just goingto lead you through a quick
prayer.
There's nothing magical aboutthe words that I'm going to say,
but it's the posture of yourheart.
It's where you are at beforethe Lord.
You say I'm going to bow theknee, I'm done, just
acknowledging you exist, god,but I'm going to live my life
like you exist.
I'm going to live my life likeyou're my king.
You'll be saved, you'll be setfree.

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And I'd encourage you for maybethe first time, this will be
the opportunity for you to singin faith the Lord will provide
and to believe that in yourheart.
And if that's you, and if you'vemade that decision for the
first time, I'd love for you togo find us.
I'll be in the back, we'll havesome leaders in the back.
Find us after the service,because we want to walk through
that with you.
We're not meant to do this inisolation.

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Anxiety thrives in isolation.
You have to bring other peopleinto the fight.
So if that's you and you say,hey, I need to make that
decision for Jesus for the firsttime tonight, I just want you
to pray this in the quietness ofyour heart.
Again, there's no magicalformula, but it's something to
the effect of this Lord, I cometo you today and I know that I'm

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a sinner.
I know that you made me, butI've gone my own way.
I've tried to make myself God.
But tonight I'm done with allthat.
I want to trust you, I want toplace my faith in you.
I want to follow you for therest of my life.
I believe that what you did forme on the cross was enough to

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forgive me of my sins and I praythat you would save me, make me
your child.
In Jesus' name, I pray amen.
If you just prayed that prayer,you're free.
You're saved, you're a child.
You're not a slave to anxietyand worry and fear anymore and,
like I said, it's not going tohappen overnight.

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It's a step-by-step thing, butit starts there and as we stand
up and sing the song, if youwant to reach out to one of us
so we can counsel you throughthat, please do that.
Or maybe you just need prayer.
Maybe you got saved a long timeago.
You've been following the Lordand you're just like man.
I need help.
I'm in the middle of it.
Stuff's gone wrong, someone'ssick.

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I got a phone call last weekand I just need somebody to talk
to.
We're here for you for that.
Your small group leader's herefor you, but I'm going to pray
for us and then Aaron's going tolead us in the song.
Lord, god, I thank you so muchfor tonight and I confess, lord,
that I feel quite unworthy topreach this message to these
wonderful men and women, lord,because we are all so quick to
worry and to be anxious and tobe fearful God, and none of us

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have it all figured out on thisside of the heaven, lord.
But I pray that everybody,under the sound of my voice
tonight, would at least leavehere tonight knowing, god, that
you offer us freedom.
And it's a process and it'smessy, but it starts with
knowing that you are good, thatyou care for us, that you will
satisfy us in a way that nothingin this world can offer.
And so, father, we love you andwe praise you and we give you

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all the glory.
I pray that you would change usfrom the inside out and that
you give us freedom to respondin worship right now.
Praise things in Jesus' name,amen.