Matthew 6:26 (DRB)

Passage

Behold the birds of the air, for they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns: and your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not you of much more value than they?

Nearby Context

Matthew 6:24 No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.

Matthew 6:25 Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat: and the body more than the raiment?

Matthew 6:26 Behold the birds of the air, for they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns: and your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not you of much more value than they?

Matthew 6:27 And which of you by taking thought, can add to his stature one cubit?

Matthew 6:28 And for raiment why are you solicitous? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they labour not, neither do they spin.

Study Lenses

The verse centers on "behold", "birds", "neither", "reap", "gather", "barns", "heavenly", and "father". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "behold" and "birds", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.

The nearby context moves from verse 25's "Therefore I say to you be not..." into verse 27's "And which of you by taking thought...", so "behold" and "birds" belong inside that flow. In Matthew context, the local focus is Christ, faith, and discipleship.

A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "behold" and "birds" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.