Lesson for the Lord’s Day
Casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for you. 1 Peter 5:7
The salmon fisherman stood on a rock on the riverbank, and began working his line to get more and more of it out of the reel. The line whipped back and forth in the air until the fisherman was finally satisfied, then with a mighty heave, he shot his rod forward and allowed the fly to reach out and land in an eddy in the middle of the river. He breathed a sign of relief as he saw the fly land where he wanted it to. It was obvious that this fisherman was an expert at the art of casting. When it comes to our cares, it’s an art that Christians would do well to learn and practice.
Only one other place in our Bibles is this word ‘casting’ used, in Luke 19:35: ‘And they brought him to Jesus: and they cast their garments upon the colt, and they set Jesus thereon’. It is the Greek word ‘epiripto’, which means to violently throw or hurl on top of something. There is nothing in the word that suggests or even allows a brushing off, a setting aside, or a handing over of our cares. No, the thought is for us to cast them with vigour onto the Lord. It might be easy for the fisherman to just drop his fly into the water next to his rock, but he would never catch a salmon that way. It might be easy for us to just push our cares aside, but we would never have the assurance that our Lord was carrying the entire burden of those cares. And note that our text tells us that this applies to all of our cares, not just most of them. We must not keep one little care for ourselves to fret and fuss over and to keep us worrying. No problem is so big that the Lord Jesus can’t handle it, and no problem is so small that He doesn’t care all about it.
There are two reasons why we should cast our cares on the Lord Jesus. Firstly, we are not able to carry all those cares ourselves. Those cares will prey on our minds and on our bodies, causing us to be discouraged and tired. Our health, both mental and physical, will suffer. Casting our cares on our Lord frees us from their destructive effect on us. Secondly, we don’t have to carry those cares, because the Lord Jesus is both willing and able to carry them for us. He Who bore the great burden of our sins to Calvary is surely able to bear the burden of whatever cares we are experiencing today.
Here is another reason for us to love our Lord: He loves us so much that He will handle all of the cares that we can cast upon Him. -Jim MacIntosh