Matthew 6:24-34
24 "No one can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.
25 "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? 26 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? 27 And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? 28 And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. 30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you--you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What will we eat?' or 'What will we drink?' or 'What will we wear?' 32 For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today."
Matthew 6:24 is a saying on serving two masters. The source is Q. We can note the three-step argument of the saying. First, 24 “No one can serve two masters, for it creates an impossible situation. Second, Second, the result of the impossible situation is divided loyalty, for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. Third, consequently, one must make a choice: You cannot serve God and wealth (μαμωνᾷ, an Aramaic word meaning wealth or money).
We can note the three-step argument of the saying. First, 13 No slave can serve two masters, for it creates an impossible situation. Second, the result of the impossible situation is divided loyalty, for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. Third, consequently, one must make a choice: You cannot serve God and wealth.” In context, this conclusion gives the proverb an unconventional twist. The popular view was that prosperity was a sign of divine favor. In this saying, Jesus may have encouraged the poor while at the same time challenged the rich. The saying is terse, pithy, and memorable. Choosing between serving God and serving money is the most pointed polarity of this passage. Apathy to a servant’s master is not an option. Hatred and love, devotion and despising are the language used here. In a striking way, the passage puts God and money on opposite sides of the spectrum of service. The oneness of God and the love of God with all that one is becomes the basis for the divine claim upon our lives for exclusive loyalty in our personal lives. [1] Confronted by revelation of the God of Israel, and our embrace of that revelation by faith, we recognize that everything has changed. The times and seasons have changed for us. We recognize that we now have our brief time on this earth only in God.[2]
Service is the basic determination that in the New Testament makes the disciple a disciple, the apostle and apostle, and the Christian a Christian, whether as or . They express in their own ways, but in ways in which their meanings are very close and merge into each other. The latter meant a servant, assistant, or waiter. A Christian must have such an attitude in relation to the Lord. Quite early, it described an office in the church, the deacon. The former word refers to one who is the property of the master. It emphasizes the personal nature of the relationship of dependence in which the slave finds himself or herself in relation to the master. This passage speaks of the impossibility of being a slave to two masters. In other contexts, one can become a slave to sin, Law, elemental spirits, mammon, the belly, and wine.[3]
Belonging
Is a human longing.
It once secured us to
Our mothers
And later
Moves us toward others.
Aloneness can be such a fear
That we become less cautious
About who we are near.
Who we choose to follow
Is akin to deciding
What to swallow.
—David A. Reinstein, LCSW,
If the reader has some interest in the word mammon, here is a little background. A transliteration of the final word of this saying is “mammon.” Let us discuss that word for a moment. For Greek readers of Matthew, the use of Aramaic may have had an intensifying effect. It calls for them to see money in a different light, showing the negative ways in which it could be a master. God and money are the only choices, seeking the loyalty of those who will serve them. The word mammon appears in both the Greek original and this English translation as a loan word from either Hebrew or, more likely, Aramaic. There is wide agreement among lexicographers that the word literally denotes “property” or “wealth.” There are examples of its use with those meanings in both the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Mishnaic Hebrew of later rabbis. The disagreement arises regarding its connotations. Are condemnations of “property” and “wealth” as evil implicit in this particular word that are lacking from other Hebrew and Aramaic words used to refer to “property” and “wealth”? Barth thinks it refers to the sum of the material possessions that distinguish one person from another, but by implication, it is no less certainly the sum of all such possessions. It includes the enjoyment of the authority and power exercised by such possessions.[4] Some dictionaries point out that there are much later uses of the word in figures of speech employing personification (as may be the case here in the conjoining of “God and mammon”) where it becomes a proper name for the demon “Mammon.” In those contexts, “mammon” is clearly condemned in and of itself. Other dictionaries, however, question whether such a negative association applies already in its use in the first century. The only other occurrences of the word in the New Testament are in Luke, where it appears three times. Luke 16:13 is an exact parallel of Mathew 6:24, but the word has already been used twice in preceding verses (Luke 16:9 and 11) with the modifier “dishonest,” or perhaps “unjust” or “unrighteous” (adikia). Clearly, then, in the passage from Luke the word mammon has strongly negative connotations. However, one could argue that Luke has to form those strongly negative connotations by twice using expressions meaning “dishonest wealth” because the word “mammon” in itself was more neutral. What indications are there here in Matthew that would suggest what connotations the word has within the Sermon on the Mount?
Matthew structures verses 25-33 to highlight the pointlessness of one’s worry and the provision of God. The construction of almost every phrase lifts up the comparison between people, “you,” and the object of “your” worry.
I have confession to make, however. I worry about the passage of time. It seems like it goes so quickly. I am not one to worry about such matters. It is just another year. Still, I worry. I worry about how time keeps slipping away.
I worry that life is too busy. Sometimes, it is forced upon me by circumstances. Sometimes, I keep it that way intentionally. If I do that, I might not have to spend time with myself and maybe have to learn or change.
I worry because I want more. It seems like I have so much. I have a beautiful home and family. I have nice cars and a good life. Yet, there is always more I could have, like more clothes, a better computer, and other electronic gadgets which would make life more interesting, if not easier.
I worry about our nation. Enough said on that.
You see how it works? Worry crowds out all the reasons I could have for praising and giving thanks. I can focus on these kinds of things, and it will lead me on a downward spiral.
25 "Therefore (“for this reason” NASB), stressing the connection this verse and the previous one, stressing that the question of which master one has will lead to a life of worry. I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Followers of Jesus are not to consider the necessities of life as identical with the purpose of life. This statement begins to show the re-evaluation of a life serving a different master: not material goods and money, but God (cf. vv. 19-21). When I read this question of Jesus, I hear him telling us to slow down, to not spend so much time worrying about what we possess, or how well our careers are going, and get on with what is genuinely important in life. Carl Jung has said that one third of the people he had as patients had no specific cause of suffering, but rather experienced something more vague: the senselessness and emptiness of their lives.[7] Is there more to life than eating, sleeping, working, raising families, as important as what these are? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Each starved bird seems to refute Jesus. If we add to that the famines and wars, Jesus seems soundly refuted.[8] Yet, is this the way to read Jesus here? The notion of Father is important to Jesus, including here, as God is Father by showing care for the creation, thereby bringing the Father within the realm of goodness as well. Among the attributes of divine love is that the goodness of the Father leads to care for all creatures.[9] The point of the comparison is simple: If the Father can feed these birds, then the Father can feed “you.” This argument from a minor point to a major point is common in Greco-Roman rhetoric, and this part of the Sermon on the Mount will repeat it (cf. vv. 28, 30, 32). Are you not of more value than they? This may sound presumptuous or simplistic. One should read it as neither. It is a way to reinforce this comparison from the lesser to the greater and to show God’s care for all creatures, humans included. 27 And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?[10] The point is that one can achieve nothing by worrying. Jesus reiterates this question of control in the next three comparisons. First, 28 And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. Thus, God not only provides the minimum for creation, the Father also can provide more than the wealthiest, most glorified monarch can (cf. I Kings 10 for descriptions of Solomon’s wealth). Money cannot compete with the glory of creation, which does not even work (toil or spin) to produce its beauty; beauty is a gift from God. Jesus uses the hyperbole of the situation, adding time or height to a person, to show that the control over life, over food, over clothes and over money that humans think they have is entirely an illusion (cf. the introduction to this passage in Luke 12:13-21). 30 The second comparison of these three is intentionally parallel to the first. However, if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow one throws it into the oven, will God not much more clothe you? Jesus at least seems to suggest that humanity has only ethical problems to face and no economic problems. Yet, is that his point? Not only is nature more beautiful than clothing that money can buy, nature’s beauty is even fleeting. This produces another argument from the lesser to the greater, as humans, fortunately, experience greater longevity than the grass of the field. Therefore, they have no reason to doubt that God will care for them as well. Even so, the accusation at the end of this verse raises doubts for the audience --you of little faith (). Matthew often uses this phrase to describe the actions of the disciples. After he calms a storm, Jesus asked his disciples, “Why are you afraid, you of little faith” (Matthew 8:26) and continues to describe the doubt or questioning of the disciples in this manner (cf. 14:31; 16:8). is where fear and doubt meet faith. The doubts of the disciples and the doubts of those who heard these words of Jesus may register as fear. After all, the words of this passage do not make sense on the surface. How can Jesus compare humans to birds, lilies and grass? If humans did not work, how would they eat, drink or wear clothes? (6:31; cf. 6:25). Faith as trust in God will not call forth necessities of life out of thin air, but it will direct us toward a just vision of life in which we have what we need rather than are being enslaved to needing what others have. How can Jesus compare humans to birds, lilies and grass? If humans did not work, how would they eat, drink or wear clothes? However, throughout the passage, the problem is not with the “property” or “wealth” of having food and drink to nourish the body or clothing to cover it — but with the idea of identifying life itself with the necessities of life. Yet people who mistakenly confuse these necessities of human life with the purposes of life consume themselves with “worry.” Such worry indicates a deficit of trust (“you of little faith,”) that God cares for humanity, just as God cares for the rest of creation — from the “birds of the air” to the “lilies” and “grass of the field.” So are human beings to adopt the patterns of “the birds of the air” and no longer “sow nor reap nor gather into barns” and let God feed us like animals who survive on what they find within their environment? Are we to “neither toil nor spin” to have clothing and instead adopt the mindlessly natural state of plants in the field? Of course not. Life is about striving, about working toward something. The issue, in the end, is: To what are we devoting our efforts? 31 Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What will we eat?' or 'What will we drink?' or 'What will we wear?' 32 For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things. This statement may have less of a basis in what the Gentiles actually did with their time and more of a function of what boundaries needed to be drawn around the community. In order to “serve God” (v. 24), this community could not seek after the things which would serve Mammon (money) (v.24).
Most of us have, at one time or another asked ourselves a dangerous question. A question might come to us while we are driving home from work, or getting ready for bed, or sending the kids off to school, or retiring from what has been our job for many years. You may even lead a happy life. Yet, the question still comes to you: "Is this all that there is?" Jesus is asking that type of question here.
In fact, your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. Showing they were also not to become ascetics. The question is not whether food, drink and clothing are important. The question involves whom we trust to provide these things. Thus, it involves the question of what we will need to form our identity, what we will need to integrate into the self that God wants to form in us. God knows our destiny,
The anxiety described here fixes on the self and leads to the concern expressed here. Jesus thus opposes this fixation upon self with concern for the reign of God.[14] For Jesus the goodness of the Creator and the paternal care of God are an answer to the human tendency to be anxious.[15] Based upon these verses, it rules out the possibility of any creature having less significance for God, as if it could be just a means to the higher ends of the divine government of the world. Every creature is an end in the work of creation, and therefore an end for world government as well. The care of God extends to the relations of the parts to each other.[16]
Jesus addresses the saying to those preoccupied with day to day existence rather than with political or apocalyptic crises. Jesus believed that God would provide for human needs. Jesus depicts the providence of God who cares for all creatures -- birds, lilies, grass, and human beings. Fretting about food and clothing does not produce food and clothing. Serene confidence that God will provide undergirds Jesus' lifestyle as an itinerant, without home or bed, without knowing where the next meal will come from. This complex of sayings is consistent with other sayings on wealth. Many ancient sages taught that life consisted of more than eating and clothing.
Let us admit that one takes a great risk in preaching from this passage. In reality, how can we help caring for our lives? How can we model ourselves on the birds of the air and the lilies of the field? How can we seek the first the reign of God and divine righteousness in the assurance that food, drink, and clothes will be added to us? How is it all possible?[17] We can realize the absolute quality and seriousness of the divine command if we remember the important place that such statements as we find in verse 25 and 32 hold. We are simply not to be anxious or fearful. The anxiety and fear so strongly forbidden reveal that instead of going forward in confidence and hope, we have allowed ourselves to have the burden that can slow us down, looking upon a threat that confronts us, and by the considerations that one lets this threat obtrude on one. Anxiety is a little fear, while fear is great anxiety. Anxiety deals with the things of this world that we can more or less envision. It focuses upon questions we have our future in this life. The anxious person longs for certainty in a world that will never be such. Anxiety and fear are the opposite of what the New Testament envisions as freedom. Fear and anxiety can determine what we do now, and thus, restricts our freedom of action. What we see in the future means for us that we are free for the present, even while we can only actually live in the present. It means we are not facing the truly essential. We have not advanced to that real love. We have permission to act, rather than hold ourselves in anxiety or fear over future possibilities. We are not a prisoner or slave to what we envision.[18] Further, from one perspective, such as advice as we find in verses 25 and 32 undermine the basis of the economy, without even seeking to replace it with anything else. This advice shakes “the basic pillars of all normal human activity in relation to the clearest necessities of life.”[19] The command for Sabbath rest has its basis here. Followers of Jesus are not to be anxious about life, food, drink, clothing, or the morrow. “Do not be anxious, do not worry” refers to the distress, burden, or tension that humanity accepts as inevitable but which one really inflicts upon oneself arbitrarily by believing that on has to speak the essential and decisive word in this matter by one’s own achievements in affirmation of one’s existence. One assumes responsibility to regulate the future envisioned in one’s own work. Yet, the real Father, by feeding the birds and clothing the lilies of the field, shows how graciously and mightily the Father cares for each person. This type of anxiety must cease. Anything done in anxiety is not done right as such.[20] The Heidelberg Catechism, question 26, says, “In whom I therefore trust, not doubting but He will care for my every need of body and soul, and turn to good all the evil that He sends me in this vale of woe, seeing that He can do this as an almighty God, and therefore will do it as a faithful Father.”[21] Our anxiety has no basis, and is empty and futile, because our Father indeed knows what we need.[22] This teaching of Jesus is not just a parable or picture of the divine order of creation. God orders the history of created beings in relation to the history of the covenant. We have here the true theme of the Christian doctrine of providence.[23]
33 Nevertheless, strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. The “giving” of these things is the same word as the potential “adding” of height or time to one’s life. Thus, what is impossible for humans in this discussion can be accomplished by God, who gives “all things.” If we took God as seriously as Jesus suggests, we would have undivided devotion to the rule of God rather than undivided devotion to earthly goods.[24] The type of anxiety about Jesus has concern would see if we took God this seriously. Soren Kierkegaard tells the story of the candidate to the ministry. He "first" seeks a royal position as a pastor, but to get there he must "first" pass examinations, "first" the candidate's and then the Seminary, then he must have a wife so he "first" gets engaged and finally, after he "first" bargained for his salary, stands in the pulpit and preaches on the text, "Seek 'first' the kingdom of God." The bishop was present and was impressed by the sound doctrine he proclaimed. Kierkegaard's comment: "But it did not seem to the Bishop that in this instance a correspondence between speech and life would be desirable."[25] Jesus is offering a strong challenge to us. The liberation that comes in personal history, regardless of meaningful and powerful, is never the end of the ways of God, for the concern of God is for the rule of God, which should also be the concern of the Christian.[26] The summons to subordinate all concerns to seeking the reign of God implies a conversion to God.[27] The call of Jesus that we should commit ourselves totally to the rule of God was the orientation of his ministry.[28] The uniqueness of the God who comes to rule excludes all competing concerns. If one is open to this rule, God already comes with this divine rule.[29] The issue in the end is: Are we, like those still not reconciled with God (the “Gentiles”), striving for these material things as if they were the sole purpose of life? Or are we striving “for the kingdom of God and his righteousness,” a realm of justice in which not only we ourselves but all of God’s creation is nurtured and sustained? If we take care of all people and all of creation, “all these things will be given to [us] as well.”
This passage walks a fine line between apathy and perfectionism, and between living in and out of this world. Instead of declaring that material goods do not matter, Jesus proclaims that one should see God, the Master, as the who can provide the “things” that are necessary (for an extension of this idea, see Matthew 25:31-46, where the focus has shifted from receiving “things” to giving these “things” to others). Rather than exhorting people to withdraw from the world as ascetics, God “knows” that these things are essential for survival, but they are only secondary to seeking God’s kingdom and righteousness (cf. Matthew 7:7). In this way, Jesus transforms our vision of both money and God, in order that we, rightly seeing, may rightly serve.
34 So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today." This admonition seems inescapably naïve. There is an inescapable quality to worry in this life. How can we leave tomorrow and its anxieties and confine ourselves to the troubles and joys of this day?
[1] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology, Vol. I, 445)
[2] Barth (Church Dogmatics, I.2 [14.1) 67)
[3] (Church Dogmatics, IV.3 [71.4] 602-3)
[4] (Church Dogmatics IV.2 [64.3] 169)
[5] Verses 25-33 are from the source Q.
[6] (Ulrich Luz, Matthew 1-7, 402-403).
[7] (Modern Man in Search of a Soul)
[8] (Ulrich Luz, Matthew 1-7, 402-403).
[9] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol. I, 259)
[10] As the NRSV text note says, one can also translate this verse, “Can any of you by worrying add one cubit to your height?”
[11] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol. III, 640)
[12] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol I, 379)
[13] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol. II, 35)
[14] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol. II, 249)
[15] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol. II, 129)
[16] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol. II, 53)
[17] Barth (Church Dogmatics IV.2 [65.2] 470)
[18] Barth (Church Dogmatics II.2 [37.3] 597-599)
[19] Barth (Church Dogmatics IV.2 [64.3] 178)
[20] Barth (Church Dogmatics III.4 [55.3] 554)
[21] Barth (Church Dogmatics III.1 [40] 39)
[22] Barth (Church Dogmatics IV.2 [65.2] 469)
[23] (Church Dogmatics III.3 [48.3] 40)
[24] (Schweizer, Matthew, 164)
[25] Kierkegaard, Attack Upon Christendom, 208-209
[26] Barth (Church Dogmatics IV.3 [71.6] 654)
[27] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol. II, 311)
[28] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol. II, 329)
[29] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology Vol. II, 330)
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