Do Not Be Anxious About Your Life
A Reflection On Matthew 6:22-33
The Lord said, “The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is not sound, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!
No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.
Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor about your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add one cubit to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O men of little faith?
Therefore, do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear? For the Gentiles seek all these things; and your heavenly Father knows you need them all. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.”
Matthew 6:22-33
Today, on the Third Sunday of Matthew, we hear a reminder from our Lord concerning the care He continues to show toward us all. This Gospel emphasizes what we miss when we become anxious about the things we need and how we darken our lives when our priority is not Him and His love for us. By trusting in God’s provision, we can replace worry with faith, helping us focus on Christ and deepen our peace through the ultimate peace He offers us.
Anxiety in our modern age is rampant, and as someone who has struggled with it for much of my life, I know its effects firsthand. Anxiety—or, as it may better be understood, an alarm—is our body’s response to deeply rooted stressors. Often, we are not even sure what is causing the stress we feel, yet the alarm within us still sounds.
When I have reflected on my own sense of alarm, I have often observed that it is rooted in a fear of the unknown and a desire to control what is beyond my control. Such tension has led me to work tirelessly in an attempt to quiet the alarm. Yet I have found that this lifestyle does not eradicate the feeling; rather, it merely dampens it. The alarm continues in the background despite our efforts to silence it, like a fire alarm covered up while the house keeps burning.
We cannot solve our own alarms, nor can we extinguish the fires they are warning us about. Yet we can make space for the alarm and discern what it is trying to reveal to us. When we breathe deeply, pray the Jesus Prayer, and search for what weighs heavily on our hearts, we begin to see the roots of our fears. Yet as I have uncovered my own roots—such as a desire for control over what lies beyond my control—the next experience has often been a sense of helplessness.
It is in the calm recognition of our helplessness that we begin to recognize the gifts our Lord offers us in the midst of it. Thus, He calls us to keep our eyes fixed on Him so that we may not only see the gifts He has been offering all along, but also bring to Him the struggles that weigh heavily upon our hearts, allowing Him to transfigure them and extinguish the fires of our passions.
Practically speaking, this can mean pausing for prayer or Scripture reading when anxiety strikes, actively seeking God’s Kingdom first in those moments.
It is for this reason that our Lord tells us in today’s Gospel:
“The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is not sound, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!”
If our eyes are fixed upon the light of what our Lord offers us, then our bodies and the whole of our lives will be illuminated by the gifts He continually provides. Yet the inverse is also true. If we keep our eyes fixed solely upon the darkness of our struggles, we will miss the light He offers us, thereby centering our lives in darkness.
Remember that the darkness of sin and death has no final hold upon us because of Christ’s Resurrection. Trusting in His victory over anxiety and despair allows His light to illumine our path with hope.
Our Lord continues by telling us:
“No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.”
If we live for the master of our own pride while attempting to serve our Lord, we will miss Him altogether. I have seen this reality in my own life whenever I try to live according to my own will apart from God’s will. I can speak endlessly about living my life in Christ, yet if I desire to be the one in control, then I am merely serving mammon—the things of this world—while failing to recognize how everything within it, including my own life, is being transfigured by Christ.
It is easy for us to feel as though we must have total control over our lives, especially in our highly individualistic society. Yet we cannot control sin and its consequences. We cannot control the circumstances into which we are born, our families, the geopolitical realities around us, or even when our lives in this age will come to an end.
Yet in our experience of helplessness, when we become aware of our lack of control, our Lord reminds us:
“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor about your body, what you shall put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?”
This reminder assures us that our Lord continues to provide for our needs. Although the experience of alarm is real, He is ultimately the One who offers us the light of His loving gifts in the midst of our darkness.
Further, He tells us:
“Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add one cubit to his span of life?”
When we look to the birds of the air, we see that God provides them with all they need. We have been given the gifts of reason and self-awareness, yet the temptation that accompanies these gifts is to focus more upon our own will than upon the will of God.
This state of alarm is often perpetuated by our desire for ultimate control. Seeing this temptation, our Lord asks whether we can truly add anything to our lives through anxiety. In reality, it seems that anxiety detracts from our lives rather than adds to them, for our alarms exhaust, age, and burden us.
Further, our Lord tells us:
“And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O men of little faith?”
The things of this life are passing away, for this age is not permanent. Yet when we look to nature, we see that despite its impermanence, our Lord provides all creation with what it needs.
If God places such value upon things that are passing away, how much greater is the value He places upon us by offering His own life for ours? Thus, we are called to follow our Lord in faith, for He has promised us eternal life in His presence and has claimed us as His people.
With the coming of our Lord, our lives take on new meaning. By entering into His creation, Christ has begun its renewal through reunion with Himself. Yet we remain free either to receive and participate in these transfiguring gifts or to reject them. The promise, however, remains before us.
Thus, our Lord tells us:
“Therefore, do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear? For the Gentiles seek all these things; and your heavenly Father knows you need them all. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.”
Truly, our heavenly Father knows what we need. It is through seeking first His Kingdom and centering our lives in His righteousness that we discover all that we need is already being provided.
We cannot simply will away our sense of alarm. Yet when we sit with the anxiety we feel and uncover its roots, we can offer it to our Lord for transformation.
Our alarms, fears, desires for control, and struggles are all parts of us, yet they do not have to define the whole of our being. Whatever we struggle with, our Lord provides for in abundance. He gives us the freedom to offer these struggles to Him as we faithfully follow His promises, and He also gives us the freedom to neglect that call. Such freedom is itself one of the greatest signs of His love.
It is in our freedom to choose that we see our Lord’s love most clearly, for love is absent where there is compulsion. God gives us the freedom to choose Him just as freely as He provides for our every need. It is within this freedom that we become participants in the salvation He offers each and every one of us.
We are not the center of our own universe. We do not possess ultimate control over our lives, and that is actually a good thing, for it relieves us of the burden of believing we are our own saviors.
We have a Savior, and the salvation He offers is greater than anything we could ever accomplish apart from Him.
It is therefore our calling to seek first the Kingdom of God and to desire to be righteous in His sight by living lives centered in His love, peace, and light. Keeping our eyes fixed on Christ allows Him to illumine whatever darkness we may find ourselves in, revealing the saving gifts He continues to offer freely.
The gifts of salvation have been offered to us, and it becomes our calling to seek them and live them faithfully with the whole of our lives. Our Savior has come to alleviate all that makes us anxious, providing for our every need as we journey the road toward salvation in His loving and saving presence.
For this reason, to Him be all glory, honor, and worship, now and forever and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
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