24. _Therefore take no thought for the morrow._ Not only, take ye no thought, how to lay up treasures on earth, how to increase in worldly substance; take no thought how to procure more food than you can eat, or more raiment than you can put on; or more money than is required from day to day, for the plain, reasonable purposes of life: but take no _uneasy_ thought even concerning those things which are absolutely needful for the body. Do not trouble yourself now, with thinking what you shall do, at a season which is yet afar off. Perhaps that season will never come: or it will be no concern of yours: before then you will have passed through all the waves, and be landed in eternity. All those distant views do not belong to _you_, who are but a creature of a day. Nay, what have you to do with _the morrow_, more strictly speaking? Why should you perplex yourself without need? God provides for you to-day what is needful to sustain the life which he hath given you. It is enough: give yourself up into his hands: if you live another day, he will provide for that also.
25. Above all, do not make the care of future things, a pretence for neglecting present duty. This is the most fatal way of _taking thought for the morrow_. And how common is it among men? Many, if we exhort them to keep a conscience void of offence, to abstain from what they are convinced is evil, do not scruple to reply, “How then must we live? Must we not take care of ourselves and of our families?” And this they imagine to be a sufficient reason, for continuing in known, wilful sin. They say, and perhaps think, they would serve God now, were it not that they should by and by lose their bread. They would prepare for eternity; but they are afraid of wanting the necessaries of life. So they serve the devil for a morsel of bread: they rush into hell, for fear of want; they throw away their poor souls, lest they should some time or other fall short, of what is needful for their bodies.
It is not strange that they who thus take the matter out of God’s hand, should be so often disappointed of the very things they seek; that while they throw away heaven, to secure the things of earth, they lose the one, but do not gain the other. The jealous God, in the wise course of his providence, frequently suffers this. So that they who will not cast their care on God, who taking thought for temporal things, have little concern for things eternal, lose the very portion which they have chosen. There is a visible blast on all their undertakings: whatsoever they do, it doth not prosper. Insomuch, that after they have forsaken God for the world, they lose what they sought, as well as what they sought not. They fall short of the kingdom of God and his righteousness; nor yet are other things added unto them.
26. There is another way of _taking thought for the morrow_, which is equally forbidden in these words. It is possible to _take thought_ in a wrong manner, even with regard to spiritual things; to be so careful about what may be by and by, as to neglect what is now required at our hands. How insensibly do we slide into this, if we are not continually watching unto prayer? How easily are we carried away, in a kind of waking dream, projecting distant schemes, and drawing fine scenes in our own imagination! We think, what good we will do, when we are in such a place, or when such a time is come! How useful we will be, how plenteous in good works, when we are easier in our circumstances! How earnestly we will serve God, when once such an hindrance is out of the way.
Or, perhaps, you are now in heaviness of soul: God, as it were, hides his face from you. You see little of the light of his countenance; you cannot taste his redeeming love. In such a temper of mind, how natural is it to say, “O how I will praise God, when the light of his countenance shall again be lifted up upon my soul! How will I exhort others to praise him, when his love is again shed abroad in my heart? Then I will do thus and thus: I will speak for God in all places: I will not be ashamed of the gospel of _Christ_. Then I will redeem the time. I will use to the uttermost every talent I have received.” Do not believe thyself. Thou wilt not do it then, unless thou dost it now. _He that is faithful in that which is little_, of whatsoever kind it be, whether it be worldly substance, or the fear or love of God, _will be faithful in that which is much_. But if thou now hidest one talent in the earth, thou wilt then hide five: that is, if ever they are given; but there is small reason to expect they ever will. Indeed _unto him that hath_, that is, uses what he hath, _shall be given, and he shall have more abundantly. But from him that hath not_, that is, uses not the grace which he hath already received, whether in a larger or smaller degree, _shall be taken away even that which he hath_.