I.

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 money.
A. The word serve relates to bondage or slavery, not to employment. In such systems, the
servants belong completely to a master, to whom they must give exclusive service at all
times (i.e., no part-time service connoted).
B. Jesus does not say that we shouldn't serve a master other than God, but that we cannot serve
two masters, his point being that God is inevitably our master and that we can decide
whether or not we want to enslave ourselves to a not-so-good master.
C. Jesus does not present a middle-ground, an in-between gray area in which someone can
sometimes serve one master and sometimes serve another. In reality, it's a strict black and
white: We can either be completely for God or completely against him.
D. Consider the scientific laws of nature: Gravity, for instance. God is evident in his creation,
and like God, gravity is not selectively obeyed. We can try and jump, but as the saying goes,
What goes up must come down. Choosing to obey God is no different. We can make a
temporal choice to try and run away, but in the end God will have his way. He, after all, is
our Sovereign Lord and Master.
E. Does that mean our individual choices don't matter?
i. Of course not. We can choose to jump forward, backward, side-to-side, into a pool, off a
building, and the temporal results will be different, but in the end, we always end up
back on the ground.
F. Naturally, Jesus doesn't stop there, but continues into a short discourse on Anxiety and
worry in verses twenty-five through thirty-four.
II. Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink,
nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than
clothing?
A. These verse about the birds and the lilies references the Fall of Man written out in Genesis
3. The anxiety about finding nourishment and clothing originates in the curses laid out in
Genesis 3:17-21. Throughout this whole passage, Jesus emphasizes the sufficiency of the
grace of God and the comfort we can find in the sovereignty of God.
B. These are the choices regarding the bare necessities of life.
III.
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 a single hour to his span of life?
A.
The birds of the air are give a more specific name in a similar sermon presented in Luke
12, that of the ravens, which is the first type of bird that is specifically mentioned in the Bible,
in Genesis 8 and the account of the Great Flood. In both cases, the ravens are used to highlight
the fact that God provides, that your heavenly Father feeds them.
B.
If you look at the Wikipedia entry for Ravens, you can see some interesting parallels
between Ravens and Humans:
i.
Relationships between common ravens are often quarrelsome, yet they demonstrate
considerable devotion to their families.
ii.
Common ravens are omnivorous
iii.
Juveniles begin to court young, but may not bond for another two or three years. Once
paired, they tend to nest together for life, but there are instances in which males visit a
female's nest when her mate is away.
iv.
Common ravens can be very long-lived, relative to other birds
v.
They display ability in problem solving, as well as other cognitive processes such as
imitation and insight.
vi.
Juvenile common ravens are among the most playful of bird species. They have been

observed to slide down snowbanks, apparently purely for fun. They are also one of only a few
wild animals who make their own toys.
C.
And yet, most ravens weigh only about two and a half pounds. Our heads alone weigh, on
average, ten pounds. And the ravens weren't created in God's image.
D.
If the sovereignty and goodness of God apply to this small bird, then how much more so
will they apply to us when we choose God?
IV.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 you of little faith?
A.
1 Kings 10:14-29 give an account of Solomon's Great Wealth. For starters' he commissioned
200 large shields of gold, each weighing fifteen pounds; he had an ivory throne overlaid with
gold with six steps, armrests, and fourteen chiseled lions. All of his cups were gold. None were
of silver; silver was not considered as anything in the days of Solomon.
B.
This is the same man who later cried out Meaningless! Meaningless! Utterly meaningless!
Everything is meaningless.
C.
The word consider here translates from the Greek katamanthano, which means, literally,
learn thoroughly. An expanded English definition gives: To think of especially with regard to
taking some action; to gaze on steadily or reflectively. Basically, it means stop and look.
D.
Statistics taken last year estimate that the average person will spend, either online or instores, three hours shopping for clothes every week. That amounts to nearly 170 hours clothesshopping annually. The Word of God, in its timelessness, urges us to stop and study God's
marvelous creation.
E.
The lily is no simple thing.