Break The Worry Habit: Live One Day At A Time...

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Special Study

BREAK THE WORRY HABIT: LIVE ONE DAY AT A TIME

Matthew 6:34

Now we come to the final conclusion and cure for worry and anxiety. “Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” One songwriter captured the words of our Lord in the following words of his song:

I’m only human, I’m just a man.

Lord, help me believe in what I could be

And all that I am,

Just show me the stairway

That I have to climb.

Lord, for my sake

Teach me to take one day at a time.

One day at a time, Lord Jesus,

That’s all I’m asking from you.

Just give me the strength

To do everyday what I have to do.

Yesterday is gone, Lord Jesus;

And tomorrow may never be mine.

Lord, help me today, show me the way,

One day at a time.

The great secret of living a happy, healthy, holy and fruitful life is living without worry about the past and without anxiety concerning the future. The true child of God settles the past with God. He has confessed the sins of the past and he has been forgiven. Now he shuts out the past and counts everything belonging to the past dead, buried, never to rise again. Locking the past behind an iron door, he throws the key of remembrance away! The future is yet unborn, so he leaves that with God until it comes. Leaving the past and future with God, he summons all grace received, strength and courage to face the challenges of each day.

1. LEAVE TOMORROW WITH GOD AND HIS GOOD FORESIGHT

Matthew 6:34; Psalm 127:1,2; James 4:13-15;Exodus 16:16-21; Acts 12:5-11; 16:25-35; Jeremiah 10:23; 29:11-13; Isaiah 55:9-11; Lamentation 3:22-26; Deuteronomy 33:25; Joshua 3:5.

“Take therefore no thought for the morrow.” It is an unnecessary distraction to worry or be anxious about tomorrow. There are men who waste their last hours on earth fretting over a morrow they never see! If we are preserved till the morrow, will it not bring with it tomorrow’s God? What good can your worry do? It does not empty tomorrow of its problems and trials, but it empties today of its strength and comfort. Worrying about tomorrow does not enable you to escape future trouble, it only weakens you and makes you unfit to cope with those challenges when tomorrow eventually comes. Worrying about tomorrow often leads to hurtful imagination which produces wrong thinking and self-induced negative prophecies and tormenting fear. Don’t try to cross the bridge before you get there, but cheerfully carry the cross of today and leave the future to God. He will be there before you get there. When tomorrow dawns and its door swings open, the power and promises of God will be waiting for you to welcome you to a new day. “As thy days, so shall thy strength be ” (Deuteronomy 33:25).

2. LABOUR TODAY WITH GOD’S GUIDANCE AND GREAT FAITH

Matthew 6:34; Psalm 118:24; Ecclesiastes 9:10; John 9:4,5; 1 Chronicles 16:37; Ezra 3:4; Psalm 104:23,24; Proverbs 14:23; 2 Thessalonians 3:8-12; 2 Corinthians 6:2.

We have learnt that we are to pray for our daily bread. We can ask for strength to finish today’s duty. Our business is with today; we can have divine supply for today’s consumption. To import the possible burden of tomorrow into the duties of this day will decrease or deplete the strength which is meant for only today’s responsibility. When tomorrow brings its burden, the God of tomorrow will bring with it sufficient grace and strength. Today will require all the vigour we have to deal with its immediate “evils” or problems; there is no need to import cares from the future. To load today with trials that have not really arrived would be to overload it. Anxiety is dangerous, but anxiety about things which have not yet happened is doubly dangerous, an unnecessary venom that poisons and destroys us.

Worry about the future is useless; it achieves nothing. It is a pure waste of energy. Worrying about the future cripples you in the present; it lessens your efficiency with regard to today. The wisest thing is not to spend your energy looking for solution to imaginary problems of the future which may never happen. Everyday has its problems and challenges; everyday has a daily quota of problems. If you want to go through life without being caged under unbearable loads of problems, treat each day as a unit. Do not carry yesterday or tomorrow with you. Live for today in God’s strength and at the end of the day, rest in the Lord.

3. LET TODAY BE A GATEWAY TO A GLORIOUS FUTURE

Matthew 6:34; Exodus 12:14,22,23,28,37,41 ; Genesis 40:6-14,21 with 41:9-13,37-44; Joshua 3:5; Proverbs 31:17-25; Malachi 3:16-18; 2 Corinthians 4:16-18; Luke 23:39-43; Daniel 12:3.

Each day comes with problems and promises, obstacles and opportunities, burdens and benefits, disappointments and daily duties, setbacks and steppingstones. Welcome each day as a new gift from God. It comes with lessons to learn and challenges to face in order to strengthen your moral and spiritual muscles. Welcome the day with a cheerful heart, saying, “This is the day!” (Psalm 118:24). Yesterday is but a dream and tomorrow only a vision; but today well lived makes every yesterday a dream of happiness and every tomorrow a vision of hope. Today is your most precious possession, the only sure possession. It is unproductive to embitter the present by brooding and worrying over things that happened in the past. Worrying destroys our ability to think positively, and to concentrate on making positive changes. Receive each day as a gift from the Hands of your heavenly Father. Go through each day with the “work of faith, and labour of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ ” (1 Thessalonians 1:3). Do something, by the grace of God and through the strength supplied by the Holy Spirit each day. Let today and everyday be a gateway to a glorious future.

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Congregational Songs:

JESUS, I WILL TRUST THEE

LEANING ON THE EVERLASTING ARMS