BibleProject | Sermon on the MountSample

Wealth and Worry

In today’s section of the sermon, Matthew 6:19-34, Jesus talks about how to do right by God and others in our personal relationships.

First, he talks about the way we think about and relate to our money and possessions—our stuff. He starts here because physical resources often command our attention and allegiance, causing us to embrace a way of worrying. Will I have enough? How can I get more? What happens if I lose what I have? The worry is real. Therefore, our relationship to our stuff can be one of the biggest obstacles to healthy relationships with God and other people. So Jesus tackles the whole idea head on.

To learn more, let’s watch episode 8, Wealth and Worry.

Video Reflection Questions:

1. What false promises are we prone to believe about possessions and wealth?
2. What is Jesus trying to communicate about physical possessions in Matthew 6:19?
3. According to Jesus, what are some examples of sky stuff (or heavenly treasure)?
4. According to Matthew 6:22-23, how can our perception of wealth shape us?
5. How can wealth or possessions be like tyrants?
6. In Matthew 6:25-34, how does Jesus’ appeal to the birds of the sky and flowers of the field invite us to shift our perspective about worry and possessions?

Let’s read Matthew 6:19-34. Below is the BibleProject Scholarship team translation, and we also encourage you to read this passage in other translations.

19 Don’t store up for yourselves stored-wealth on the land,

where moth and nibbler can ruin,

and where thieves break in and steal.

20 But store up for yourselves stored-wealth in the sky,

where neither moth nor nibbler can ruin,

and where thieves can’t break in or steal.

21 For where your stored-wealth is, there your heart will be also.

22 The lamp of the body is the eye;

so then if your eye is genuine-and-generous,

your whole body will be radiant.

23 But if your eye is bad-and-greedy,

your whole body will be dark.

If then the light that is in you is darkness,

how great is the darkness!

24 No one is able to serve two masters;

for either he will hate the one and love the other,

or he will be devoted to one and despise the other.

You are not able to serve God and wealth.

25 Because of this I say to you,

do not worry about your life-being,

what you will eat or what you will drink,

not even about your body,

what you will put on.

Isn’t the living-self more than food

and the body more than clothing?

26 Look at the birds of the air,

how they don’t sow seed,

and they don’t harvest,

and they don’t gather into barns,

and yet your Father in the skies feeds them.

Aren’t you all much more valuable than they?

27 And who among you is able to add an hour to your life-span by worry?

28 And about clothing, why do you worry?

Pay attention to the lilies of the field, how they grow.

They don’t labor, and they don’t weave cloth.

29 But I say to you all

that not even Solomon with all his honor clothed himself like one of these.

30 Now, if the grass of the field,

which is there today and tomorrow is tossed into the furnace,

is clothed this way by God,

won’t he much more clothe you all, who have so little trust?!

31 So then, don’t worry, saying,

“What will we eat?”

or “What will we drink?”

or “What will we wear for clothing?”

32 For the nations, they constantly seek for all these things,

and your Father in the skies knows that you need all that.

33 Rather, first of all seek for his kingdom and doing-what-is-right by him,

and all these things will be added to you.

34 So then, don’t worry about tomorrow.

Tomorrow can worry about itself!

Each day has enough trouble of its own.