TD Jakes - Anxious for Nothing
Now, I’ve been talking this week about preparing for our pastors and leadership conference, and I’ve been contemplating leadership and what it truly means to be a leader. I am convinced that real leaders must be, as I preached a few weeks ago, steady in the storm, steady in unsteadiness, stable in instability, and consistent in crisis. I prophesied as I was commanded; I didn’t know whether it would work or not, but I did what you told me to do. Success for me is not about raising the bones; it is about obeying the God who said to preach to the bones. It’s my job to preach to them; it’s your job to raise them.
These are trying times—difficult times. I will admit that I am even theologically perplexed because, on one hand, I hear Jesus say, «Take no thought for what you should wear or eat, and where you should live.» It almost suggests that I should be complacent, detached, relaxed—just don’t worry about anything. Then, the Apostle Paul tells us to be anxious for nothing but, in everything, with prayer and supplication, make your requests known unto God. And the peace—that thing right there—of God, which passes all understanding, shall guard your heart and your mind, your emotions.
I need security not just around my body, but around my emotions, to keep away the anxiety, depression, and fear. He’s telling me to be anxious for nothing, and yet, on the other hand, the wise man Solomon in Ecclesiastes tells me to look to the ant, you sluggard, and prepare for winter while it’s summer—not to waste my days in vanity, but to have a strategy that incorporates sustenance for survival. These things seem contradictory to one another. Then I look at Joseph, whose strategy was so complete that he used the seven years of plenty against the seven years of famine. He controlled what was next by the way he thought.
When I look at these two concepts together, I get confused because I’m a strategist by nature, and when Jesus says, «Take no thought,» it goes against everything in me not to take thought. My sister texted me last night and said, «Be sure to leave your water running; it’s going to freeze.» I immediately turned the shower on just a little, just a drip—because we’re old school. That’s why you have to be over 50 to get texts like that. When you’re 20, you don’t get texts like that, but when you’re over 50, you get texts like «leave your water running.» And while I believe God for my pipes and to take care of my house, I still kept my water running. We just came out of a season where there was a national debate about wearing masks. They said if you had faith, you wouldn’t wear them. I believe God, but I noticed that the people who claimed faith to avoid wearing masks still wore seat belts.
So I thought, if you really had faith, take off your seat belt! So what does it mean to lead in turbulent times, and how does faith express itself in perplexing situations? It creates stress, not only because of what we are enduring but also because of how our faith shows up in the crisis. What does that look like? For different people, you will get different answers. Some people say they have so much faith they don’t worry about anything. Well, they don’t have life insurance or health insurance or anything like that. I’m serious—they don’t worry about anything; they don’t go to doctors. They could drive on the wrong side of the road; they don’t worry about any of that. How does faith show up in a crisis? How does faith manifest itself when God Himself tells us to be strategic and rewards Joseph for his strategy?
Joseph becomes the Prince of Egypt because he thinks ahead. And yet Jesus says, «Take no thought.» But if I only take that phrase without reading the rest of the text, Jesus isn’t telling us to be mindless; He is not telling us to be mindless. He is telling us not to worry. He’s not saying we can’t have a strategy; He’s telling us not to worry. He’s managing our emotions against anxiety. When the Apostle Paul says to be anxious for nothing, he doesn’t tell you not to want something. He just says not to be anxious about it. Don’t allow your emotions to make you frantic just because you have a plan. Are you hearing what I’m saying? One of my favorite quotes from then Senator Obama, later President Obama, is in his book «The Audacity of Hope,» where he says, «I now realize that the presence of doubt doesn’t diminish the presence of faith—that it is possible to have doubt and faith simultaneously.»
And I don’t know why I lost some of you because I’m talking about you. There is no question that you believe God, but there are still moments when you stay up at night. How does faith show up in our life amidst a crisis? What do you do when the prophecy was positive but the circumstances have now entered a season of chaos? David is a leader, not just because Samuel anointed him. He is a leader. People cannot make you what you are not. Let me give you further reference: God says to Moses, «Anoint men to be elders who you know to be elders.»
I cannot make you something by giving you a title or desk or office or position; if you are not that, you are not that. Let me go deeper: a degree doesn’t make you a teacher. You can have a degree in education and still not be a teacher. A teacher is something that’s in you. Oh, oh, I’m going to go deeper: a ring doesn’t make you a wife. You can put a ring on a man’s hand, but it doesn’t make him a husband. You can put a ring on a woman’s hand, but it doesn’t make her a wife. The Bible says, «Whosoever findeth a wife findeth a good thing,» so she has to be a wife when I find her. If I don’t find her a wife, I can’t make her one. David is a king; he is a leader. However, the situations in the text do not reflect the magnitude of his capacity to lead.
What do you do when your life doesn’t look like who you are? What do you do when you go through a season in your life that stands in the face of your prophecy and mocks it, like Ishmael mocking Isaac? You look out the window and can see the promise and the problem playing in the same backyard. Have you ever had your promise and your problem playing in the same backyard? There are times, my brothers and sisters, that you preach powerfully and drive home crying. There are times when you say to those you are responsible for leading—even if they are just your children—"Don’t worry, baby, everything’s going to be okay,» and you go to bed thinking, «Oh Jesus, can I get a witness in here?» Are there any moms or dads in here who told their kids, «Don’t worry about it; that’s not yours to worry about. It’s going to be fine»? And then you went back, got in the car, and drove around in circles, saying, «Touch this moment before us.»
Now David has come to the cave of Adullam. He has escaped Gath. Gath is a city among the Philistines, and at the time, David went to hide there because the people he was leading and the army he was once the captain of is now hunting him. Y’all didn’t get that. His own folks are hunting him to the degree that he is safer with the enemy than he is with his family. I know you can’t say anything because your family might be watching on TV, but the holidays are coming, and you have mixed emotions about them arriving.
Not all of us have the kind of families we see on TV. You know they’re all coming over, inspecting everything, tasting everything, complaining about everything, asking you why you haven’t had children yet or why you’re not married yet. They’ll question what you put in the dressing, where you got this from, and why this turkey is so dry. You will have to deal with the point that you may be safer with the enemy than with your own folks. Oh, come on! Everybody’s got some relatives that you are related to but don’t truly care for. Their rejection of him, after all his loyalty, service to them, and his kindness, has driven him to run to Gath—the place where the giants dwell, where the Philistines lived. He thought they wouldn’t recognize him, but he couldn’t stay among them long, as you can only run so far before they discover you.
David is so gifted and creative that he pretends to be insane or he would have been murdered. Sometimes, you have to go a little crazy to get out of it. Y’all don’t understand what I’m saying. Sometimes, you have to go a little crazy—not crazy-crazy—to get out of it. People try to take you out, and you just have to flip a switch. I know there’s maybe about ten people here who’ve ever been pushed till you almost lost it. I mean, been in a situation where you had to pull your wig off, kick off your stilettos, and say, «Okay, you want to play? Let’s play.» It’s not good to push us too far. Don’t think because we’re anointed we won’t flip on you. Don’t let the «Hallelujah» fool you.
I was talking to God, not you. If you push me into a corner, don’t make me show you why He anointed me in the first place because I need this anointing. If I don’t get this anointing… I told someone who was messing with one of my children, «Now, I know who you think she is, but she’s not who you think she is. If you push her far enough, she’s going to go to foaming on you. And let me tell you, all the muscles in the world won’t help you if she goes crazy on you.» Is there anybody in here who’s ever had to go a little crazy because someone was trying to dominate, control, intimidate, destroy, curse, humiliate, or degrade you?
You’ve been as nice as you knew how, but finally, it gets to a point where you say, «That’s not working. I’m going to have to turn into something I don’t even like being to make you understand who you’re talking to.» The king of the Philistines came down and said, «Why have you summoned me when you can clearly see this man is crazy?»
I’m just discussing what the text says, and I know that’s not politically correct, but that’s what the text says. So, David escaped. Have you ever escaped? Didn’t have time to pack, had to escape without doing your hair or getting your nails done? No time for any of that cute stuff—no shave, no trim, no line—because you had to escape. The first word was «left» and then it says «escaped.» It’s one thing to leave; it’s another thing to escape.
Some of us are here today because we escaped. If we had kept on the path we were on, we would have been destroyed, but we escaped. The reason we are dancing is because we were thinking back, remembering how we escaped. Oh, when I start thinking about all the things I escaped and all the near calamities and disasters… When you need to escape, you have to scale down, even if it means giving up the palace to live in a cave. When enough is enough, I’ll live in a trailer. You’re not going to intimidate me with what you have because I can break it down in here. And he escaped to the cave of Adullam.