First Things First

Isaiah 49: 8-16a; Matthew 6: 24-34

FPC; 5-25-08

          Remember how a cloud of anxiety descended upon our nation on September 11, 2001.  In the days that followed, we remained apprehensive as we listened to breaking news reports on radio and television. We worried when the alert rose to the orange level and as discoveries of anthrax were made and breeches of security were revealed.   

          Sometimes worrying is a corporate experience.  An event threatens the well-being and peace of an entire community and, like a strong under current of the ocean, submerges us in a dangerous tide of anxiety. 

          While worrying can be a communally shared experience, it can also be known on a personal and individual level. 

          My brother, Jonathan, emailed me a couple of days ago.  He was asking if we had heard from Meredith who, as most of you know, has been in China this week along with Lea Anna, Hannah and the rest of a delegation of students and faculty from Triton. The last statement on his email was “Don’t worry too much.”   In my reply, I told him that we had gotten two emails from Meredith and that she and the rest of the group are doing well.   By now, they have left the Pearson Airport in Toronto and are en route back home.  “Don’t worry too much.”  In Jonathan’s mind, it is a given that I am harboring some anxiety; his words were meant as encouragement not to allow the anxiety and the worry to consume me. 

          Sometimes the anxiety is corporately experienced; and sometimes it is experienced on a more personal level.

          Remember the anxiety of your first day at a new school…your first date…your first time in the batter’s box.  Can you recall the worry involved as you waited for the test results, or in anticipation of the job interview, or as you waited to hear from your travelling son or daughter that he or she has arrived safely? 

          To the corporate community of faith and to each Christian disciple, Jesus says, “Don’t worry”.   As one commentator has suggested, the word Jesus uses for worry means “extreme angst-(it is a word) for anxious worrying-for being so full of oneself and one’s survival that the world shrinks to me, myself, and I.”[1]

          In the first verse of today’s gospel reading Jesus says “No one can serve two masters.”   So, the question becomes: “will worries and anxieties be our lord or will Jesus be Master and Lord of our lives?  Can we turn over the control panel of our living to God and let God be God?” 

          Jesus raises two illustrations that are intended to assuage our anxiety:

          “Look at the birds of the air.” 

          Birds are free of worry and the heavenly Father cares for them.  The heavenly father watches over them and meets their needs.  We humans experience God in a similar way.  For us, God is the compassionate Father who, not only cares for the birds of the air, but, also, cares for us.

Jesus then says “Consider the lilies of the field…”  

          This past week I took special notice of the tulip that, I think, one of the children planted years ago.  It is located in a landscaped area close to the car port.  It bloomed and blossomed, as it always has over the course of these years, without any effort from me.  That tulip is part of God’s creation. If God takes such good care of that flower, why wouldn’t God take care of me and my loved ones?   

          Next, Jesus encourages us to seek first the kingdom of God.  He is instructing us to live life, not according to our own whims and desires, but to live for God, in spite of life’s anxieties.

          Is death staring you or a loved one in the face?  Live life anyway.  Is the aging process robbing your body of energy?  Live a life of gratitude anyway.  Do you feel as though you are on the edge of losing a relationship dear to you?  Live a life of faithfulness anyway.  Expect that God is about to do something new in your life.[2] 

          The only prescription for anxiety is trust; not trust in our own power to rectify the ills of the world, but trust in the God who has created the world and knows all things good for us. 

          This past Monday night I went to Triton High School for a program.  I arrived ten minutes early, so I had an opportunity to speak with a woman whose granddaughter is part of the group that went to China. 

          The theme of worry came up in that conversation.  I was asked if I was anxious.  I said that I was.  She said something like, “I’m anxious, too. But we are people of faith.”

          Yes, we are people of faith.  In the face of life’s anxieties seek first the Kingdom of God, people of faith; people of faith, know that the Lord’s love is greater than all of our needs and his goodness exceeds all of our worries.   People of faith, don’t allow life’s anxieties to imprison you; experience the freedom that results from a life of trust. 

          As people of faith, there is no guarantee that the worries and anxieties of this world will disappear.  But there is Jesus’ promise that, if we live in his righteousness and allow God to be God, our lives will be controlled by God and not by our worries. 

          A while back, I saw The Pianist an Oscar-winning movie set during the Holocaust.  While many films of that setting focus on the concentration camps, this particular film highlights the life of a Polish Jew who, according to one movie critic, “through grace escapes boxcars and spends years hiding out in the shadow of Warsaw”.  Since his days as a child, the man has been gifted as skilled pianist.  “So he has a purpose that transcends his own life and feeds the soul of a whole people.”  Through horrifying scenes of torture, hunger, loneliness, and spiritual abandonment, I watch as he survives. He survives because his love of life is stronger than his anxiety about death.  And through it all, are “the scores in his head, the melodies in his soul, and the silent music in his fingers that, by God’s grace, sustain him.  He strives for the kingdom of God even in the midst of the horrors around him.  He lives in an inner place of trust and hope that no anxiety can control.”[3]

          A poet invites you and me to imagine.

          “Imagine God standing at your front porch…

          God knocks at your door…  “Rent is cheap”, you say.

          And God says, “I don’t want to rent.  I want to buy.”

          You say, “I might let you have a room or two.”

          “Thanks,” says God.  “I like what I see.”

          “I’d like to give you the whole house, but I’m not so sure-“

          “Think on it,” God says.  “I wouldn’t put you out…You’d have more space than you’ve ever had.”

         Shaking your head in bewilderment, you then say to God, “I don’t understand”.

“I know”, says God, “but I can’t tell you about that.  You’ll have to discover it for yourself.  That can happen only if you let me have the whole house.”

“A bit risky,” you say.

“Yes”, responds God, “but try me…”[4]

          Try God.  Give God a chance.  Seek first God’s kingdom.  Trust in him and the worries of this life will loosen their grip and surrender their power.    Amen.