General Articles

The Gospel According to Luke: Part 31 :: By Dr. Donald Whitchard

Published on: by RR7

An Exposition

Luke 12:22-34: “Worry is Time Wasted”

“Then He said to His disciples, ‘Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, nor about the body, what you will put on. Life is more than food, and the body is more than clothing. Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap which have neither storehouse nor barn, and God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds? And which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?

“If you then are not able to do the least, why are you anxious for the rest? Consider the lilies, how they grow. They neither toil or spin, and yet I say to you even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. If then God so clothes the grass, which today is in the field and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith? And do not seek what you should eat or what you should drink, nor have an anxious mind.

“For all these things the nations of the world seek after, and your Father knows that you need these things. But seek first the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added to you. Do not fear, little flock, for it is in your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell what you have and give alms, provide yourselves money bags which do not grow old, where the thief approaches nor moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Luke 12:22-34, NKJV).

This passage of Scripture has its parallel in Matthew 6:25-34 as part of what is referred to as the Sermon on the Mount. Luke presents it in his account of Jesus’ life and ministry to show his readers that he affirms Matthew’s eyewitness account and gives legitimacy to other witnesses whom Luke interviewed in writing this gospel at the request of Theophilus, his benefactor and fellow believer (Luke 1:1-4).

Matthew, Mark, and Luke’s writings are known as the Synoptic gospels due to the similar material found in each account. When studying the life of an individual, a scholar or student will not rely on just one source to compose a report or evaluation, but common sense will tell him to attempt and present an objective account of the subject so as to give potential readers a balanced view of what they have presented.

Unfortunately for today, we are awash in biographies and events in history that tend to lean towards the author’s perspective, which often does not show the subject of the book in a favorable light. The Lord Jesus has been the subject of countless biographies and studies from a wide variety of clergy, scholars, skeptics, and public officials since the time of His departure to heaven (Acts 1:1-11). Roman historians tended to mock and ridicule Him, modern skeptics strip Him of His deity, lowering Him to a mere Jewish sage, liberal clergymen write Him off as a teacher whose body is hidden somewhere moldering in the grave for all time, and some degrade Him to the point where many believe He never existed.

The Christian apologist and author of Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis, made it perfectly clear as to where he stood about Jesus Christ, and it is worth repeating here:

  • “I am trying to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him (Jesus): ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I do not accept His claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on the level with a man who says he is a poached egg – or else the devil of hell. You must make your choice. Either this Man was, and is, the Son of God or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit on Him and kill Him as a demon, or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that up to us. He did not intend to.“

Too much blood has been spilled over the centuries concerning the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ to even answer some of the ridiculous and pointless objections and venom that have been thrown at Him. It is sheer laziness and willful ignorance on the part of the skeptic to come down off his pedestal of perceived intellectualism and investigate the facts for himself. I have experienced the grace, mercy, and personal interaction of Him over the years, and I will defend this stand and the validity of the Scriptures for the remainder of my days. What has been written about Him in the Holy Word is His direct and inerrant proclamation, and what we read in Luke 12:22-34 are His exact and precise teachings on a specific topic that speaks to the mind of man today in this fluctuating and unstable world, namely that of worry.

Our LORD states that first, worry is a plain and undeniable lack of faith in God to provide for our needs; and second, worry is the fruit that is produced when seeds of doubt are planted. He gives us two common causes for concern, that of the source of food and clothing and where they can be obtained during times of want and daily life in general. This is prevalent in our nation now as people try to find work in a world where a contagious disease has turned the economy and lifestyle of which we are accustomed into a time of worry, fright, and emotional outcries.

The world can pull its hair out and run to the debt-ridden government as the socialists and secularists call on the public to do, with the intention of controlling their lives in the process, or those of us who say we trust in the provision of the LORD need to demonstrate that what we proclaim does come to pass, and that trusting in Him for our needs is the answer to a lot of the problems that we put on ourselves when we act like the world. There are too many so-called believers who claim that God watches out for them yet will pull out their credit cards in a panic to purchase what they think they need instead of going before the LORD and asking Him to provide for them.

In this consumer-driven atmosphere in which we live, our eyes are too easily taken off the fact that it is the LORD who is the source of our strength and supply, and the Scriptures affirm that throughout their entirety (Psalm 24:1, 50:10, 60:7, 89:11; Jer. 27:5; Matt.6:25, 13:22; Luke 10:41, 12:29, 21:34; Acts 17:25; 1 Cor.7:32, 10:28; Phil.4:6; 1 Peter 5:7). Too bad that a lot of us tend to put the Bible on the living room table for most of the week and then pick it up to take to church on Sunday where we sing about the greatness of God and His Sovereignty over all things.

God can also provide for someone’s needs by some of His children prying open their wallets and paying for the groceries of an elderly couple or a single mother with her kids in tow at the checkout stand of the store. We can also be a blessing by paying for the meal of a serviceman or veteran in a restaurant, or a police officer who is all too often the recipient of hatred by society. We can provide for the needs of a homeless man on the street by going into a nearby store and buying a bottle of water and a sandwich for him, telling him about the God who does care for His creation, and you end up winning him to Christ. The city rescue missions need someone to give a destitute individual some kindness and the love of Jesus when they have dealt with a lifetime of abuse or other circumstances.

All too often it is a case of “bless me, LORD” and not “How can I be a blessing to others?” We want others to do the work that God has assigned to us. Stop and think for a moment. God may be calling upon you to ease and rid someone of worry by being the provider and friend they need to have at that moment (Psalm 41:1; Proverbs 14:21, 19:17, 28:8, 27; James 1:7, 2:1-4).

I am not speaking from an ivory tower as I write this lesson. I have been on the receiving side of assistance from brethren, and I have experienced blessings from being a provider impressed of God to serve Him in ministries that a lot of people might not consider. I grew up in a poor neighborhood and went to work in my teen years, trusting that God would open doors for me to accomplish this priority. For those of you who are looking for work and reading this, stop and ask the LORD for His direction and guidance, and wait on His timing to provide you with the job you need or get unexpectedly.

Jesus tells the crowd to consider the birds and the flowers of the fields and see that they are not worried about where their next meal or nourishment originates. Their instincts, given to them by the Sovereign God of Creation, points them in the direction to receive what they need each day. Jesus tells the people that if God can do this for His animals and plants, we are far more important and valuable in His sight. We were appointed the stewards of the earth, and we can talk to our Creator and have fellowship with Him. He will always be our loving Father and the source of our needs, NOT OUR WANTS! There is a wide difference between the two, and we need to remember that as we go through life.

The greatest need anyone can have is to be forgiven of their sins, repent, and place their faith in the Lord Jesus for salvation and peace with God. As the late singer and man of God Keith Green wrote in one of his songs, “He’ll take care of the rest.” Trust in God. He knows your situation, so quit worrying already. He is good all the time, even now.

donaldwhitchard@gmail.com

www.donaldwhitchard.com

 

Devices and Dementia :: By Terry James

Published on: by RR7

This commentary will, I anticipate, meet with considerable eye-rolls and head-shaking.

What a fuddy-duddy, I can imagine the thinking will be behind the eye rolls and the head shakes. (The very fact that I use the term “fuddy-duddy” makes me a candidate for the very dementia to which I, at least cursorily, link their beloved devices.)

By the term “dementia,” I refer to a spiritual condition rather than a physical-mental one. Although medical studies put forth that total absorption in the cyberspace of the devices that are everywhere we look can cause organic disturbances, the spiritual damage might be, in my view, incalculable.

Smartphones and the many other devices that demand all but total allegiance to their human automatons are used by the powers and principalities in high places in their wicked endeavors. That is, the observably, highly addictive instruments turn the already-fallen minds of people, young and old, to directions other than toward God, who created humankind to fellowship with Him and to be His family for eternity.

We’re seeing the results of Satan having brought about the Twitterverse—a generation of social media-transfixed people who now have or are rapidly moving toward thinking in any direction other than God.

Of course I’m not referring to everyone in social media. Not every user of Facebook, Twitter, or other social media venues engage within the arenas of anti-God thinking. Many ministries use these as tools to put forward teachings from the Bible and the saving gospel message (that is, if their posts or tweets or whatever aren’t banned or taken down).

However, the vast majority of device users are held in what seems to be inescapable gravity. Those caught in the grip of cyberspace, by and large, think and communicate in terms that encompass anything but things of God and the Bible. The result is fulfillment of Bible truth. When people get away from principles of how to live God’s way, upside-down or reprobate thinking becomes the norm.

The devices have evolved from instruments for entertainment to those designed to evoke and cultivate a collective mindset that more and more embraces anti-biblical actions and activities. I believe it explains, at least in part, the insanity we are witnessing in every direction we look.

Again, here are the apostle Paul’s words that frame the matter. It’s an all-encompassing and powerful indictment from on high, to be sure.

And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, Without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful. (Romans 1: 28-31)

Just like in the case of any human invention, the devices are not in themselves evil. In my teenage years, I heard all the warnings that TV would be the ruination of the nation with entertainment from the devil-influenced minds in Hollywood.

Well, I’m not so certain that those warnings weren’t well placed. I sure didn’t think so at that time. Neither, I’m sure, will the youth or even the more mature device users of today agree with my thoughts here.

But to anyone who looks around and is honest, this world suffers from a dementia that grows progressively worse. It has brought about a divide, a schizophrenia, within the culture in America.

I maintain that it is the electronic device instrumentalities that have at least exacerbated, if not engendered, the cultural and societal divide I propose it is the all-pervasive electronic devices that are culpable in the matter of the reprobate mindset that has developed in this time so near the end of the age.

I was recently sent an article that, in my estimation, helps explain how Satan and his minions, both human and demonic, have been able to induce anti-God thinking through the ubiquitous electronic devices of our time.

The article was by a person who worked within mental institutions of earlier times.

What is happening today in the West increasingly reminds me of what I saw in that long-stay mental hospital many decades ago, but is less humane.  Today, when a person displays signs of deviating from political correctness, the cultural overseers leap into action and denounce the behavior and the culprit, whose guilt is incontestable.  If confession, contrition, and penance are not instantly forthcoming, the only sentence is to be declared a “far-right bigot,” with the likely result that the mainstream news media will then pick up the story and try to ruin what is left of the pitiful target’s life.  Only the most courageous and resourceful will stand fast to their values and principles and defy the modern Maoist cultural revolutionaries of the radical progressive liberal-Left.  The task of enforcement by the latter is, however, made considerably easier by the almost ubiquitous Smartphone, which makes social conditioning extremely easy.

The Smartphone functions as a virtual Skinner box.  The original Skinner box was constructed of clear Perspex inside which a hungry pigeon pecked at a lever.  A reward of grain was delivered only for the desired behavior.  Today the box is virtual, as humans tap the keys of their smartphones.  Usage of social media from these smartphones appears to be highly addictive, and can turn even previously well-adjusted people into obsessive narcissists who crave ‘likes’ and will leap onto any bandwagon in an attempt to increase their virtual popularity.

Combine this with the credulousness and gullibility of willingly impressionable youth and one has the ideal material for social conditioning.  Hence the smartphone as a virtual Skinner box.  The radical progressive liberal-Left have—with great enthusiasm—seized upon this opportunity to socially-condition the young and anyone else with high suggestibility, and are intent on turning tens of millions of people into compliant instruments of their political will.

The astonishing feature of all this is that the involuntary but mostly compliant subjects of this vast experiment in social engineering appear to lack any insight into what is being done to them.  They have surrendered their critical faculties to invisible minders who program them to feel emotions, think thoughts, deliver utterances, and commit acts at the behest of hidden controllers who can avoid taking any responsibility for what ensues.  And, perhaps most alarming of all, these cultural automatons are voluntarily giving up their cultural history, allowing it to be replaced by political propaganda which misrepresents the past.  The result is that such people live in a present that is created and controlled by someone else, as is their future.  Their lives are no longer their own, yet they are oblivious of this. (“The West is One Vast Social Engineering Experiment,” Len Wryte, American Thinker, https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/08/the_west_is_one_vast_social_)

Although there is more than enough anti-God thinking and behavior to go around—in both major political parties in America—one, in particular, is manifesting dementia that can’t be missed. Even the person chosen to be its presumptive candidate in the upcoming presidential election is front and center in exhibiting the reprobate thinking. And I don’t mean to be cruel with my assessment.

The proposals and rhetoric of this particular political party go against practically every former rationale in the political process for appealing to Americans who love and want the best for their nation. This proves, I’m convinced, the degree of reprobate thinking that now infects their ranks.

That party’s leadership apparently insanely believes that a majority of Americans now want to tear down the nation’s founding and rebuild with ideology and structure of a socialist/Marxist sort.

I don’t think it to be taken out of context to use the following in the matter of devices and dementia. Neither do I mean it to be taken as a pun or tongue-in-cheek. God’s Word is truth.

Lest Satan should get an advantage of us: for we are not ignorant of his devices. (2 Corinthians 2: 11)