For He Careth For You

The word “care” from the original language is translated to mean something that concerns the heart and fills the mind with serious thoughts. There are cares in daily life. We experience them within and we see them around us. They touch the life of every person living upon this earth. How many cares there are for providing food for our table and for enough money to pay our bills. There are special cares concerning the health and well-being of self and family, and cares concerning children who have chosen the path of the world and no longer have a desire to sit under the truth of God’s Word. Who can number all the cares that we have day after day?

When Peter writes this letter to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Capadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, he addresses those people who are God’s favored people, people who are chosen by God out of all people of the earth. They were loved from the stillness of eternity and called in the fulness of time out of darkness unto His marvelous light. They are the ones who have experienced what the Lord promises in Hosea 2, “Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her. And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope.” They are a people kept by His power unto His salvation. Reader, what a blessed people they are. And perhaps you say, “Do those people still have cares?” Yes, Peter clearly states this in the words, “Casting all your cares upon Him, for He careth for you.” There he shows us that those people also have manifold cares.

Do you want to hear about the cares of a child of God? A child of God is filled with care concerning his eternal welfare. Their eyes have been opened to see that they are travelers to eternity and that they have a never-dying soul. Daily they feel the iniquity that lives within. When they may look back upon their life, they will say, “How is it possible that the Lord can have pity upon such a one as I am? I have sinned against all the admonishments of God’s servants. For many years I have sought my life in the world. Oh, Lord, for such, is it possible that his sins can be forgiven?

Satan brings every weapon he has against such a newly-begun child of God. One thing he cannot hinder, and that is that it will drive such a one to cast himself at the feet of the Lord with the prayer of the Canaanitish woman, “Lord, help me.”

Do you know such cares? They are one of the marks in the life of God’s children. Such a one has cares concerning the state of his own heart. He feels that even after grace received, his heart cleaves so much to the world and sin that it causes him to say with Paul, “O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” Often they repeat the prayer of David, “Out of the depths have I cried unto thee.” Reader, are you a stranger to such cares? They are one of the marks in the life of the children of God. Often such a one has cares when he comes to experience what it is to stand afar off. That means that the soul experiences an infinite distance between God and self. I will say here that this is one of the cares that cuts the deepest in the life of God’s child. This is one of the most painful feelings a quickened soul can experience.

The ungodly—who are really afar off—are not troubled by this for they have never been brought spiritually near. They have never felt that alluring out of darkness. There was never a time in their life when they felt something of the love and the mercy of God for a wretched and lost sinner.

But God’s children come to experience, “Lord, to be far from Thee is death, far from a sweet token of Thy love and mercy, far from the time that it was so different for my soul, when I could believe and trust that Thy salvation was mine.” Oh, to see the blessed Lord and not be able to draw near to Him, to view the atoning blood from such a distance, that it gives no assurance within, to miss that blessed communion for his soul, those are the greatest cares in the life of the child of God as he passes through this life. And I believe that, especially in our day, God’s people feel this care very deeply. There is not much nearness in our day where God’s presence is felt and experienced, when the tokens of His love are felt, when His communion fills an empty heart or when we may hear of a visit from above yesterday or even last week. Not that there is not a great deal of speaking about this. There is an abundance of people today who profess to know and experience the sweet tokens of His love and the blessed instruction from above. But the fruits of this are so different from what the Lord has set forth in His Word and what our forefathers have spoken of them.

There we see and have heard that the more the soul may experience from above, the deeper such a soul may bow. Then the sinner becomes less and less, becomes nothing, and God becomes more and more, becomes everything. No, then we must say that it is a dark and cloudy time in which we live.

Reader, is that a sorrow in your life— being far away from the blessed communion and the nearness of God in Christ? It is one of the marks in the life of the child of God. Are there other cares that oppress the children of the Lord? Yes, they have cares when they think of the eternal welfare of others. They think of the children the Lord has entrusted to them and must say, “Oh Lord, that my children may be converted.” Also a minister has soul concern for his people and says, “Oh Lord, bless Thy Word in our midst. Give that sinners may be drawn out of darkness to Thy light.”

Do you know the cares that mark the life of a child of God? Then you will also know the command concerning all these cares. Peter gives instruction to those burdened and heavy-laden ones in our text when he says, “Casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for you.” Casting means to take those cares and cast them upon someone else, someone who can carry them for you. No, casting all your cares upon Him does not mean that then you are a carefree person. For as long as we are in this world, we will have cares. Sin always produces bitterness. Cares will always be necessary so that they may drive the child of God out unto Him who careth for His people. Casting means seeking a place of refuge, a place where I may pour out all my complaints. Then such a one comes to experience what Peter knew, in John 6:38, “Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life.”

“Casting upon Him” for the believer means to constantly look upon Him and not lean unto our own understanding. It means to bow at His throne of grace and mercy and to pour out all those cares with the knowledge that He can and will care for me. It means to take refuge with Him, to place it in His hand, for He alone knows what is good for me. It is a praying for deliverance, and when there is not a speedy deliverance or an immediate answer upon prayer, not to give up, but to continue in the casting of all those cares upon Him who alone can care for you. It is making a pleading ground of the promises which lie in the past.

He cares for each individual child of His.

Reader, that is the privileged place of the children of God who are so often burdened and laden with cares. Where do you go with your cares? Is it to the world? That is a poor place, for the world will only add to your cares. Is it your own strength? That is also a poor place, for the Word of God says that your strength is only weakness.

Notice now what a blessed place God’s children may have where they may come with their cares. Peter says, “For He careth for you.” He who is almighty, all-sufficient, who is filled with love and care for His people, He who in Christ, is filled with concern for you.

Do you question this? Do you say, “When I see those people, I see much strife in their life; I see them as often having only a meager portion of worldly goods as they go through this world. When we look back in history, we see them as being oppressed and persecuted.” When it is all added up, perhaps you will say, “Does God care for His people?” Yes, He cares for each individual child of His. He cares that they do not become too wealthy for that would harm them for they are only weak, frail human beings. They are so prone to kick back at their Benefactor when they are full. He cares for them each time when in an hour of need He delivers them. Then they may know they have received from out of His hand.

He cares for them so that under all the fiery assaults of Satan they will never perish. He cares for them when each care He places upon their shoulders is measured out by Him and is never heavier than His child can bear. He cares for them each step of the way as they travel upon the narrow way which leads unto heaven’s gate. They will never perish of hunger or by the hand of the enemy, for He careth for them.

Reader, does He care for you? Or are you traveling for your own account? True, in an outward way He still cares for you, for it is still the day of grace. He still comes to admonish you that a wonder from heaven must take place within you, that by the grace of God you must become one of those strangers. For unto those Peter says, “Casting all your care upon Him; for He careth for you.”

Rev. J. Den Hoed is pastor of the Netherlands Reformed Congregation of Rock Valley, Iowa.

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