Wednesday, September 23, 2026

For the anxious heart counting tomorrow’s costs

Therefore I tell you, don’t be anxious for your life: what you will eat, or what you will drink; nor yet for your body, what you will wear. Isn’t life more than food, and the body more than clothing? See the birds of the sky, that they don’t sow, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns. Your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you of much more value than they? “Which of you, by being anxious, can add one moment to his lifespan? Why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They don’t toil, neither do they spin, yet I tell you that even Solomon in all his glory was not dressed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today exists, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, won’t he much more clothe you, you of little faith? “Therefore don’t be anxious, saying, ‘What will we eat?’, ‘What will we drink?’ or, ‘With what will we be clothed?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first God’s Kingdom, and his righteousness; and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore don’t be anxious for tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Each day’s own evil is sufficient.
Matthew 6:25–34

Jesus sets material anxiety before us as a calendar page: one square marked today, another marked tomorrow. The coming square is real, but it has not yet been assigned today’s troubles. Tomorrow has a square, but it has not been given today's burden. Christ’s question is therefore searching: can anxiety add even one moment to life? It can fill the present, but it cannot furnish the future.

The Lord does not mock the needs named here. Food, drink, and clothing matter, and our heavenly Father knows that we need them. Yet anxiety reverses the order of love, making these needs the first pursuit and God’s Kingdom a distant remainder. I confess that I often treat imagined shortages as more certain than the Father’s knowledge. Jesus calls that fear “little faith,” not because the need is imaginary, but because the Father is nearer and greater than the need.

This care rests finally on Christ, not on our ability to quiet ourselves. At the cross, the Son bore the guilt beneath our anxious grasping; in his resurrection, he secured life that food and clothing cannot preserve. Therefore the Father’s care is not a promise of an untroubled tomorrow, but grace for this day from the crucified and risen Christ. He is the living proof that we are known, valued, and not abandoned to our fears.

Tomorrow has a square, but it has not been given today's burden.
Prayer

Heavenly Father, when we are anxious for our life—what will we eat, what will we drink, or with what will we be clothed—teach us to seek first God’s Kingdom and his righteousness. Lord Jesus, because your cross has borne our guilt and your resurrection gives us life, keep us in the care of the Father who knows what we need.