earthly
treasures, or in anxious care. These are the same plant, only the one is
growing in the tropics of sunny prosperity, and the other in the arctic
zone of chill penury. The one is the sin of the worldly-minded rich man,
the other is the sin of the worldly-minded poor man. The character is
the same in both, turned inside out! And, therefore, the words, 'ye
cannot serve God and Mammon,' stand in this chapter in the centre
between our Lord's warning against laying up treasures on earth, and His
warning against being full of cares for earth. He would show us thereby
that these two apparently opposite states of mind in reality spring from
that one root, and are equally, though differently, 'serving Mammon.' We
do not sufficiently reflect upon that. We say, perhaps, this intense
solicitude of ours is a matter of temperament, or of circumstances. So
it may be: but the Gospel was sent to help us to cure worldly
temperaments, and to master circumstances. But _the_ reason why we are
troubled and careful about the things of this life lies here, that our
hearts have taken an earthly direction, that we are at bottom heathenish
in our lives and in our desires. It is the very characteristic of the
Gentile (that is to say, of the heathen) that earth should bound his
horizon. It is the very characteristic of the worldly man that all his
anxieties on the one hand, and all his joys on the other, should be
'cribbed, cabined and confined' within the narrow sphere of the visible.
When a Christian is living in the foreboding of some earthly sorrow
coming down upon him, and is feeling as if there would be nothing left
if some earthly treasure were swept away, is that not, in the very root
of it, idolatry--worldly-mindedness? Is it not clean contrary to all
our profession that for us 'there is none upon earth that we desire
besides Thee'? Anxious care rests upon a basis of heathen
worldly-mindedness.

Anxious care rests upon a basis, too, of heathen misunderstanding of the
character of God. 'Your heavenly Father knoweth that you have need of
all these things.' The heathen thought of God is that He is far removed
from our perplexities, either ignorant of our struggles, or
unsympathising with them. The Christian has the double armour against
anxiety--the name of the Father, and the conviction that the Father's
knowledge is co-extensive with the Father's love. He who calls us His
children thoroughly understands what His children want. And so