John Hagee - Why Do You Worry?
We are commanded by Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior and the Prince of Peace, not to worry. Stop worrying about your past. Stop looking at where you have been and start looking at where you can be with God's help. God never consults your past to determine your future. Jesus looked at a career criminal on the cross, and said, "This day you will be with me in paradise". He had an awful, hideous, criminal past. But the moment he said, "Remember me when you come into your kingdom", that was sufficient. And that gained him entrance into the Kingdom of God.
Do you feel alone? Do you feel life has lost its meaning? Go where you are celebrated instead of where you're tolerated. Think about that. Never spend more time on a critic than you would give to a friend. I've seen people, who have a sincere heart, wear themselves out trying to win the friendship of a critic. If they don't like you, leave them alone! Go find somebody that does like you. You are a divine creation. You are royalty. Act like it. You're never going to reach the palace, talking like a peasant. You are a child of God. You are a royal ambassador of the Kingdom of God! Stop worrying! Be happy! Live in the sunshine of God's joy! You are somebody right now! We're commanded by Jesus Christ not to worry.
Five times, Jesus says in Matthew 6, "Take no thought. Do not be anxious". God has given us an owner's manual of the soul. In this owner's manual, it says, we were designed and made by the architect of heaven to function without worry. Life without tension. Life without turmoil. Life without tylenol. Life without stress and strife. Life that is filled with the power, power over the world, the flesh, and the devil. Life that is carefree. Life that is happy. Life that is joyous. How? By casting all of your care upon him: for he careth for you.
The Bible says, "Let not your hearts be troubled. Neither let it be afraid: for he is God Almighty". He is an ever present friend in the time of trouble. He's greater than the crisis that you're in. He's greater than the mountains that you are climbing. He's greater than the giants that seem unbeatable. He's greater than the greatest. He's higher than the highest. He will make a way where there seems to be no way. He's the God of all hope. He is the Prince of Peace. He is our sword! He is our shield! He is our buckler! He is our high tower! He is our all and all! The victory is ours through Christ the Lord! Give him praise in this house!
Jesus conducted this stress seminar in Matthew 6. Five times in this text, he says, "Take no thought. Be not anxious. Don't worry". Verse 25, "Don't worry about life". It's the Greek word "Suke", meaning the temporal physical life. Stop worrying about the physical life. Turn to verse 27. He says, "Which of you by worry, can add one cubit"? Eighteen inches is a cubit. Now if you could add 18 inches to your life by worrying, worry! And then get to be 7'2", and go sign up with the Spurs for a hundred million dollars. But worry won't help you grow.
In this text, the manual of the soul, he is your provider, he is your healer, he is our defender, he is your rock, he is your high tower, he is your shield and your buckler. He is Jehovah Shammah, the Lord who is there. He is there when you call on him. He is there when you need him. God is good all the time. His angels go before you and behind to prepare your way. The president of the United States has a secret service that can shoot a gnat off the back of a fence post. You are surrounded by a squad of angels, invisible, who go before you and behind you. For the Bible says, "He will give his angels charge over you to protect you in all of your way".
You'll have a defense system nothing can penetrate! The Lord of this Bible guides and provides. He leads in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. He makes me to lie down in green pastures. He restoreth my soul. Don't worry, because our God cannot fail. Don't worry, because he made streams in the blazing desert. Don't worry, because he can turn your darkest night into glorious day. Don't worry about your past. It's been forgotten and forgiven. The blood of Jesus Christ has set you free from the pain and the penalty of sin. You are free! For whom the son makes free is free indeed! Give him praise in this house!
Don't worry about growing older. It happens. You know you're growing older when someone compliments your new alligator boots, and you're only barefooted. Good news: you're going to live forever. Fifty million years from now, we're going to be alive somewhere, alive and well, shouting on the hills of glory. I'm going to have a pain-free, perfect body. Dear God, bring it on. We'll be singing songs of victory, wearing robes of righteousness, crowns of life, living in mansions prepared by the architect of the ages, driving down not this asphalt, suicide path you have to get to work here on called a freeway, walking down streets of gold.
"The half has not entered the minds of men what God hath prepared for his own". That's the promise of saint Paul. Therefore, don't worry. Brother, if heaven is half of what my brain has kicked out, God's going to have to stretch it some. It's going to be a wonderful place. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad. Ever notice how worry always comes at a bad time? It comes in a time of crisis. Just when you need a steady mind and nerves of steel to make a great decision, here it comes like a dark cloud to hide the sun, like a leech that drains you of your creative ability to think. Worry is an achievement. You were not born to worry. You achieved worry because you worked at it.
If you're an excellent musician, or if you're an excellent golfer, you were not born that way. You practiced. You practiced. You hit that little white ball till you could get it on that green up there with the flag without saying ugly words. You got to be good by practicing. Worry is an achievement. You practice it. Stop it! Stop it! Look at this manual. Read it! Let this fill your heart and mind. Brother, just about 20 or 30 minutes in this book, and you will transform your mousy personality into a ravenous lion. You have the power in Jesus Christ to be more than a conqueror over anything that you are facing or going to face.
Worry is a killer. Say that with me, worry is a killer! It makes cowards out of aggressive men. It will fill your face with wrinkles and apprehensions. Ladies, are you listening? Those wrinkles in your face that you're spreading the miracle cream that cost God knows how much, to get them off, were created by worry. It paralyzes the mind so that it can't produce the better idea or to solve a problem. It robs your body of sleep at night. It sends you to work shattered and second rate. It sends you to work on the naked edge. Someone says, "Good morning", you say, "Good morning"!
Medical science confirms that worry produces cancer, heart disease, high blood pressure, ulcers. It's not what you're eating: it's what's eating you that makes the difference. Worry has sent millions of Bible-believing Christians to the cemetery long before their time, because they did not trust that Jesus Christ was the Prince of Peace. Think about that. Jesus said, "Do not worry". "Do not worry". "Take no thought", "Let not your hearts be troubled". "I am the God that never fails, never fails". I am the God that will never forsake you. You will not call on me one time and I won't be there. I'll be there every time. I am who is from everlasting to everlasting. I am the God that will defeat your enemies. I am the God that knew your problems before you ever knew there was going to be a problem. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad! Shout for joy! "Clap your hands all you people". "Shout unto God with a voice of triumph". Our God reigns! Our God reigns! Give him praise in this house!
I repeat, "Worry is a sin". Worry is practical atheism. Worry proves you don't believe that God can take care of you. Worry is faith in fear. Think about that. Worry is faith in fear. It's not a compliment, I don't think, to be called a person of great faith when you're talking about God. We serve a God who has never failed. It doesn't take great faith to believe in something that never fails. It takes great faith to believe in something that only works once in a while. Our God never fails. Faith is believing that God will do it, now, for you, according to what you have asked.
Two words in Jesus' ministry was "Fear not". Don't fear the past. Your past has been forgiven and forgotten. Your sins have been buried in the deepest sea, never to be remembered anymore. One Hebrew translation reads, "It will not be dredged up again". Believe me: your relatives will dredge it up again, but God won't. One thing God cannot do is remember sin that has been washed clean by the blood of Jesus Christ.
Don't fear your past. Don't fear the present. "I will never leave you nor forsake you". Joshua 1:9 says, "Be not afraid: for the Lord thy God is with you whithersoever you go". David said, "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for thou art with me". The shadow of death is harmless. The shadow of a lion cannot hurt you. The shadow of a snake cannot bite you. The shadow of a sword cannot cut you. The shadow of death has been so crushed at the cross that it's now nothing but a harmless shadow. And when you leave this earth, you pass through it into the arms of God, redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ. "The Lord is the strength of our life: of whom shall we be afraid"? "The Lord is my helper. I will not fear what man can do to me". Do not fear death: for he is the risen Savior. And because he lives, we shall live also! Give him praise in the house of God!
Don't fear other people. Fear not your enemies. The Bible says, "I will make your enemies to be at peace with you". How would you like to have a p.R. Firm that could get that done? "I will make your enemies to be at peace with you". How does God do that? Believe me: God can do anything. God sent Moses into Pharaoh, and he said, you tell Pharaoh that if he'll let my children go, my first son, which was Israel, that I will not bother him. But if he does not let my children go, I'm going to take the firstborn in every family. Pharaoh thought that was a joke. He didn't let them go. And God took the firstborn in every Egyptian family that did not have blood over the doorpost. He took the firstborn in the field of every animal. God started wiping out their food and he started wiping out their choice citizens, the citizens of tomorrow.
You will defeat the undefeatable foe when God is with you. "A thousand shall fall at your left hand, ten thousand shall fall at your right hand". David said, "I will fear no evil: for thou art with me". Worry is trust in the unpleasant. The apostle of worry says, between pollution, the socialist politicians, the coming nuclear war, fake news: there is no future. Worry is a polluted stream that goes through your mind, and it drowns optimism. Worry drowns faith and hope. Worry is interest paid on trouble before it ever happens. One old man said, "Most of the trouble I've had in my life never happened". How many of you've done that? You've worried about something, and then it just didn't occur. What do we worry about?
The average husband worries about what his wife spends and what the government spends. The difference is he's afraid to criticize his wife. But he's not afraid to criticize the government. We worry about being unfavorably compared with other people. Let me shock you, lady. There will always be some woman around prettier than you. Mister, there will always be a John Wayne hanging around to remind you just how average you really are. There will always be a better salesman, a better lawyer, a better athlete, a better teacher, a better doctor, a better preacher.
Stop worrying about what you're not and start enjoying who you are! You are unique. Really: there's not another person on the earth just like you. When you were born... I see a woman out there looking at her husband, and says, I read lips. You are unique. When you were born, the genius of God made you a divine original. Don't die a cheap copy of trying to mock somebody else or live like somebody else. You are a master piece! Enjoy who you are! Lift your head. Square your shoulders. Conduct yourselves like royalty. You are a child of the King of kings. You are a king and priest unto God. You are ambassadors of Christ on planet earth. You are somebody! Hallelujah to the Lamb of God!
Don't ever worry about things you can't change. The prayer of Niebuhr says, "Lord, grant me the courage to change the things I can, the grace to bear what I can't change, and the wisdom to know the difference". That is a brilliant, awesome prayer. Don't worry about the collision of the planets. Don't worry about the federal government. Don't worry about the global economic crash. Don't worry about your teenagers that are driving you crazy. Go home, eat three tacos, a couple of jalepeño peppers, a diet Dr. Pepper. God's in charge. The sun will come up in the east tomorrow. It will set in the west. God is on his holy throne, and everything is going to be all right!
You've heard me say, many times, "You can never change what you will not confront". "My children won't mind me". Confront them about their conduct. A wife says, "My husband won't talk to me". Confront him about it. Husbands say, "My wife won't stop talking to me". "She calls me ten times a day". It don't do her any good to confront her. Don't worry about what you can change. Don't worry about what you can change. Change it. Don't worry, period. It's an absolute waste of time. Worry is like a rocking chair. It gives you something to do but it will not get you anywhere. God's word says, "Don't worry about food, fashions, or the future". Why? Because he can supply anything that you need. He can supply anything that you need.
Some of the wealthiest people I know are afraid they're going to run out of something to eat, something to drink, and something to wear. What do you need? God has it, and he's ready to give it to his children. "Ask and you shall receive". Say that. "Ask and you shall receive". "For whatsoever you ask the father, in my name, he will do it". Now if that verse is true, you have a carte blanche card to open the treasury of heaven and get everything God has on this earth. Jesus used field sparrows to demonstrate his concern for you. Field sparrows, then and now, are very common, meaning have very little value. But the Bible says, "God attends the funeral of every sparrow that falls". That's a verse that stretches my mind. And then Jesus said, are you, and you, and you, aren't you much more valuable than that?
The point is, if God takes care of the birds, he will take care of you. He'll take care of your family. He'll take care of your business. He'll take care of the crisis that you're facing. He'll take care of the medical situation that's confronting you. He'll take care of the worry that's filling your heart and mind while I'm talking. Birds do not read books on how to relax. Birds don't say, "Next year, I'm going to build a bigger nest. I'm going to have a patio. Eight-foot screen on the back. I'm going to store more worms". I'm going to say, "Bird, eat, drink, and be merry". They don't do that. Birds never overindulge. Birds only get fat when someone puts them in a cage.
There's a sermon there for another day. Whose cage are you in? Hum. Men do. Men get greedy. They stockpile. They horde it up. They ignore God as their source. And when they have put together a sizable fortune, they start calling lawyers, and doctors, and CPA's: living on volume and Maalox because they want to get all they can and can all they get. They buy binoculars and they walk out into the country to watch the birds, birds that have absolute trust and confidence that God's going to take care of them: birds without one worry in the world: birds who do not have high blood pressure, ulcers, or three names of 14 doctors. Are you worried? How many of you in this room right now are worried about something that's going on in your life or the life of your family? It's concerning you enough that it disturbs your peace. Let me see your hand. That's half of you. Leave your hands up.
How many of you are worried about your past? Your future? How many of you are worried about a business venture that you're trying to make? Your business future? How many of you are worried about your marriage? Its sustainability? You're worried about your children, your family. You have a personal problem for which you can see no answer. Some of you here have lost a loved one and the grief seems unbearable. You feel alone. You feel insignificant. You feel that life is meaningless. I assure you: it's not. How many of you feel that right now, any one of those things in your life? Would you raise your hand? That's 90% of this congregation. I want you to stand to your feet. I want you to pray this prayer with me. Everyone pray this prayer. Lift your hands.
Heavenly Father, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, I receive freedom from every form of doubt, and fear, and concern that destroys my peace. This morning, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Prince of Peace, I receive his peace, peace that surpasses understanding, peace that allows me to sleep at night without concern of tomorrow or yesterday. Lord Jesus Christ, from this moment forward, I'm casting every care upon you, because you are my burden bearer. Whom the son sets free is free indeed. And today, in the authority of Jesus' name, I am free from worry.