The worthlessness of worry – Part 4

Several years ago, a family friend gave my mother and father a handmade Amish rocking chair. I love the thing. I just love it. Every single time we visit my parents, the only place I want to sit is in that rocking chair. I’d love to buy one for our home, but after “test driving” dozens and dozens of different chairs, I can’t find one that sits (or fits) just like theirs. I have told my parents, after the Lord takes them on to Glory, my brothers can have anything in the house – but I want that rocking chair! I just love sitting in that thing and rocking back and forth.

Having said that, let me state an obvious truth: a good rocking chair sways smoothly, but no matter how much it rocks, it will never actually get you anywhere. While they are great for comfort and conversation, a rocking chair is a terrible mode of transportation. Regardless of how many miles you rock back and forth, after hours of effort, you are still sitting in the same spot. The Bible scholar, Dr. Rod Mattoon so accurately stated, “Worry is like a rocking chair … it requires an investment of your energy, but it doesn’t get you anywhere.” How true indeed! Mattoon went on to say, “Worry never moves you one inch closer to a solution. In fact, it creates more problems. Worry cannot change the past or control the future; it only makes you miserable today.” Amen my brother, right again! Worry is absolutely worthless.

Yet, if you are like me, even though I know this is both Biblically and practically true, still I find myself given over to hours of overwhelming anxiety. Many of us are far too acquainted with sleepless nights and restless hours. I’m not seeking to justify my seasons of little faith, but instead simply striving to be honest about them. In previous articles we noted that worry is unhealthy and unreasonable. Now, let us consider how immeasurably unprofitable it is to worry.

Overanxious friends and family hear this: worry is useless, fruitless, senseless, pointless, ineffectual and impractical. Which is exactly the point Jesus makes over and over again in the Sermon on the Mount. In fact, in Matthew 6:27 Jesus asks yet another rhetorical question intended to provoke solemn thought. The Lord is endeavoring to get His hillside hearers (and us by extension) to seriously consider how utterly futile it is to worry. Note what Jesus asked His audience, “Which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?” (Matthew 6:27). The answer no one gave, but all knew to be true; is of course, no one. No single human on earth is going to live one minute longer by spending endless hours worrying. Then why do it? Those of us who are prone to the self-inflicted wound of worry, need to meditate on this. Frankly, we don’t give enough weight to these words of Christ. Reader, slow down and consider the wise counsel of the Master Teacher. Answer His inquiry … what profit is there in worrying about things you cannot control?

Or, let me ask it like this: what benefit is there in allowing your mind to concoct and replay countless frightful scenarios? When in truth, we rarely even face the outcomes we invent. I wonder … how many of us have climbed monstrous mountains built by our own frightened imaginations? How many of us have cowered before storms we never end up enduring? Jesus asks us, why? What good does it do to allow your fear-stricken mind to die a thousand deaths? Which of you, by worrying is going to grow one inch taller, or live one minute longer?

The next time you find yourself given to anxious thoughts and breath-snatching dread, ask yourself: what will dwelling on this matter actually change? What of significance will be accomplished by fretting over things that are out of my finite hands? There is immense peace-giving wisdom in the teaching ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. The only thing worry produces is wrinkles and warts! Hear the gentle correction of the Lord Christ. You are not going to live one minute longer by being anxious. Worry is unhealthy, it is unreasonable and it is unprofitable. Worry, like a rocking chair, won’t get you anywhere and certainly isn’t going to improve your quality of life.

Charles Spurgeon once wrote, “our anxiety does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, but only empties today of its strength.” The song-writer said this, “Oh what peace we often forfeit, oh what needless pain we bear. All because we do not carry, everything to God in prayer.” Friend, find courage and faith in the finished work of the Risen Messiah, for He alone is a sure anchor for the soul.

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