Don’t Worry Be Happy!

“When the cares of my heart are many, your consolations cheer my soul.” Psalm 94:19

In 1988 there was a song that Bobby McFerrin wrote. It was  the first a cappella song to reach number-one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, a position it held for two weeks. The name of that song was “Don’t Worry, Be    Happy.” The opening lyric was, “Here’s a little song I wrote. You might want to sing it note for note. Don’t worry, be happy. In every life we have some trouble but when you worry you make it double don’t worry, be   happy”. It’s a catchy little tune that made a lot of people, well, happy.

The psalmist who wrote 94 lived during a time when his government was engaged in the promotion of evil and the persecution of the righteous. The wicked arrogantly furthered their interests at the expense of those who were defenseless: the widows, the aliens, and the          orphans (v. 6). We live in a time in which our government promotes evil. What God calls sin, our government protects and promotes. What God calls murder, the killing of babies in their mother’s womb, our government not only allows this to happen, they pay for it to happen. Everywhere we turn, we seem to be facing another crisis to worry and fret about, whether it is Covid,  inflation, food shortages, fear of war, or the beginning of the persecution of the Church.

Yet, this is nothing new for God’s people. Despite all of the troubles of this world, we are commanded not to worry or live in fear. Jesus told His disciples, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?” (Matthew 6:25).  “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” (John 14:27).

Until the Lord comes, there will be wars and rumors of wars (Matthew 24:6), persecution (2 Timothy 3:12), and hatred  towards believers (John 15:18). But, take heart, believer, don’t worry, and be encouraged that we can have joy     knowing that our salvation is secure and nothing can        separate us from the love of Christ Jesus our Lord through  all the difficulties we face. Let us take comfort in the words of Christ to Paul, the apostle, “But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake  of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults,  hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am    weak, then I am strong.” (2 Corinthians 12:9–10).

Your shepherd,

Pastor Mark