Short Views
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Among the manifold improvements in the Westminster Revision, we are happy to find that our Lord's discourse against sinful worrying is given in the right English. Our common version of the closing portion of the sixth chapter of Matthew has always been very misleading to the average reader. Christ never commanded us to "take no thought for the morrow"; such counsel would contradict common sense, rational prudence, and other explicit commands in the Bible. What our Lord so emphatically forbade—was sinful anxiety, or the overloading of today's work with worry—about the day that has not yet come. The revisers have hit the nail exactly on the head, by introducing the word "anxious" into a half-dozen verses of that portion of the Sermon on the Mount. "Be not anxious for your life—as to what you shall eat," etc. "Which of you by being anxious can add one cubit to the measure of his life?" This whole remonstrance against borrowing trouble in advance—is summed up in the happily translated sentence, "So don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today's trouble is enough for today."
We may be sure that our blessed Lord knew what was in man—when He gave so much space in His sermon to this one tormenting sin, and repeated six times over, His entreaties to avoid it. Worry is not only a sin against God—it is a sin against ourselves. It sometimes amounts to a slow suicide. Thousands have shortened their lives by it, and millions have made their lives bitter by dropping this gall into their souls every day. Honest work very seldom hurts us; it is worry which kills. I have a perfect right to ask God for a strength equal to today—but I have no right to ask Him for one extra ounce of strength for tomorrow's burden. When tomorrow comes, grace will come with it, and sufficient for the tasks, the trials, or the troubles. God never has built a Christian strong enough to stand the strain of present duties and all the tons of tomorrow's duties and sufferings, piled upon the top of them. Paul himself would have broken down!
There is only one practical remedy for this deadly sin of needless worry—and that is to take short views. Faith is content to live "from hand to mouth," enjoying each blessing from God as it comes. This perverse spirit of worry runs off and gathers some anticipated troubles and throws them into the cup of mercies—and turns them to vinegar! A bereaved parent sits down by the new-made grave of a beloved child and sorrowfully says to herself, "Well, I have only one more left, and one of these days he may go off to live in a home of his own, or he may be taken away; and if he dies, my house will be desolate and my heart utterly broken." Now who gave that weeping mother permission to use the word "if"? Is not her trial sore enough now, without overloading it with an imaginary trial? And if her strength breaks down, it will be simply because she is not satisfied with letting God afflict her; she tortures herself with imagined afflictions of her own! If she would but take a short view, she would see a living child yet spared to her, to be loved and enjoyed and lived for. Then, instead of having two sorrows, she would have one great possession, to set over against a great loss. Her duty to the living would be not only a relief to her anguish—but the best tribute she could pay to the departed.
That is a short view which only takes in immediate duty to be done, the immediate temptation to be met, and the immediate sorrow to be carried. My friend, if you have money enough today for your daily needs and something for God's treasury, don't torment yourself with the idea that you or your family may yet get into a poor-house. If your children cluster around your table, enjoy them, train them, trust them to God, without racking yourself with a dread that the little ones may some time be carried off by the scarlet fever, or the older ones may yet be ill-married or may fall into disgrace. Faith carries present loads and meets present assaults and feeds on present promises—and commits the future to a faithful God. Its song is,
"Lord, keep my feet;
I do not ask to see
The distant scene;
one step's enough for me."
We shall always take that one step more wisely and firmly and successfully, if we keep our eye on that one step alone. The man who is climbing the Alps must not look too farahead, or it will tire him; he must not look back, or he gets dizzy; he has but to follow his guide, and set his foot on the right spot before him. This is the way you and I must let Christ lead, and have Him so close to us—that it will be but a short view to behold Him. Sometimes young Christians say to me, "I am afraid to make a public confession of Christ, I may not hold out." They have nothing to do with holding out; it is simply their duty to hold on. When future trials and perils come, their Master will give them help for the hour, if they only make sure that they are His. The short view they need to take is a close, clear view of their own spiritual needs, and a distinct view of Jesus as ever at hand to meet those needs.
If the fishermen of Galilee had worried themselves over the hardships they were to encounter, they might have been frightened out of their Christian labors, and their eternal crowns. We ministers need to guard against this malignant devil of worry. It torments one pastor with a dread lest, if he preaches certain truths boldly, he may offend his rich pew-holders and drive them away. Let him take care of his conscience—and his Master will take care of him. Another is worried lest his cruse may run dry, and his barrel fail. But his cruse has not yet run dry. Oh no, it is his faith which is running low. Some of us, at the beginning of a year's work, are tempted to overload ourselves with the anticipation of how much we have to do; we need not worry if we will only remember that during the whole year, there will be only one working day, and that is TODAY. Sufficient to each day, is the labor thereof.
Once more we say—let us take short views. Let us not climb the high wall until we get to it; or fight the battle until it begins; or shed tears over sorrows that may never come; or lose the joys and blessings that we have—by the sinful fear that God will take them away from us. We need all our strength and all the grace God gives us—for today's burdens and today's battle. Tomorrow belongs to our Heavenly Father! I would not know its secrets if I could. It is far better to know Whom we trust, and that He is able to keep all we commit to Him until the last great day!
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