“Heart Trouble”

John 14:1-14

April 24, 2005

St. Paul United Methodist Church

Rev. John A. Fleming

Do not let your hearts be troubled. Hmm. I wonder if it is possible to look at someone and notice their troubled heart. I know that you can look into someone’s eyes and see that they are tired, perhaps even weary. I know that you can hear someone’s voice and if it is not as strong as it is supposed to be, if it quivers even a little, we can usually tell that that is the case.

That happened to me just last week. Last week I made a phone call to our District Superintendent, Rev. Phil Hathcock. We were working on a project and needed to touch base on Wednesday. I called him the day before to ask if we should meet in person or if our work could be done over the internet or by telephone. Near the end of our phone conversation, Phil gently asked, “Is there anything wrong?” I paused for a moment. He had to notice that. Then I asked him, “Why do you ask?” He took only a second and said, “You sound tired.” I said, “Maybe I should come and see you.” So the next day I did. Phil’s calling, among other things, is to pastor pastors. I would like for you to know that he does that well. He reminded me of things I needed to be reminded of. Every once and while, in particular seasons of the year, I wonder if I am making a difference in your lives and in the life of this church. So your cards and letters and banners given in love last Sunday morning could not have been more timely. Maybe someone knew that!

So you can see trouble in the eyes. You can notice it in the voice. Wouldn’t it be great if we could see it in each other’s hearts? Somewhere on one of the bookshelves either in my office here or at home, there is a book whose pages contain the powerful story of what one pastor said shortly after his dad died. I searched high and low, but couldn’t find it. It is one of those stories that has taken up residency in my heart, and so I can tell it without reading it. The story’s last line is what I remember the best. This pastor tells that most of his father’s life was troubled. His father was a powerful influence in his life. His dad loved him. In turn he loved and respected his dad. But for most of the son’s life, his father struggled with anxiety and depression. Those who knew the family the best knew that he did, but most of the world, most of their friends, had no idea that that was the case. No one was sure how he died. He just did. The family wasn’t sure what to tell those who asked. They knew that they should have an answer. and so the young son, the preacher to be said this, “Why don’t we tell people that he had heart trouble. That is as true as anything else about Daddy. He had a heart and it was troubled”

Now that I think about it, I have seen a troubled heart or two in my time as a pastor. I have seen them in patients being taken away for surgery. I have seen them in intensive and critical care waiting rooms while family members wait for the next visitation time. I have seen them when bad test results came back. I have seen them after someone has died, but before the funeral home has arrived. I have seen them in teenagers. I have seen them in parents. I have seen them in people who wonder what they are going to do next, which means that I have seen them in just about everyone. I have even noticed trouble in my own heart.

Jesus must have known that his own disciples would struggle with troubled hearts, especially after he was gone. So before he leaves and heads toward the cross, he says powerful things and he does powerful things. As we catch up with Jesus and the disciples in this lesson, they are finishing up the Passover meal. He has already gotten up from the table, walked around it, reached for a basin and a towel and washed his disciples feet in an act of servant hood and encouraged them to live such a life. He has told of his betrayal and Judas has left to do that. He has predicted Peter’s denial. He has told his faithful followers that he is leaving. I think that he looks at one of them square in the eye and then follows the words around the room. Listen to the words as if you were sitting around that table yourself. “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God. Believe in me. In my father’s house there are many rooms. I am going to prepare a place for you and will come back and take you there so that where I am, you will be, too.”

These are the words of Jesus and quite honestly my guess is that it is easier for you to picture them at a grave side service or a memorial service or a funeral service when our hearts are deeply troubled. The Book of Worship lists this lesson as a suggestion for funeral services and asks the pastor to skip around reading verses in the chapter. It begins with Jesus saying, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” It end with, “My peace I give to you. I do not give peace as the world gives peace. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not let them be afraid.”

But our hearts do tend to be troubled and afraid, don’t they? Another word for that is anxious. I read a magazine article this week that gave these facts and figures. It said that one out of every ten people in our country will have some kind of a breakdown or a meltdown in their lifetimes. One out of ten. The famous Mayo brothers of the Mayo Clinic fame said that over half the hospital beds in America are occupied by people whose main problem is anxiety. They said that in their own clinic, in their own hospital, there are fifteen thousand patients who are being treated for stomach disorders. None of these patients, none of them, had any physical cause of their stomach pain. It was all linked to anxiety. One of my dear friends and a member of this church came to see me on Monday afternoon. She had heard that I had been to the doctor and had been diagnosed with high blood pressure. She said to me, “John, you just need to stop worrying.” She was the pot calling me the kettle black. Blood pressure problems can be linked to stress; they can be linked to genetics, too, but also to stress. I listened to what she had to say and then I said, “How do you do that? Tell me how you do that.” Someone asked me at lunch another day this week what stresses me out the most. I quickly answered, “It’s the sermon. It’s getting ready to preach the sermon. No doubt about it.” How crazy is that? I am standing up, week after week, to speak for God and stressed about it. I do not trust that God will come through. I know that that is crazy.

What do we do with worry? One of the problems with it is that it tends to escalate. I think that I have shared one of my favorite Peanuts cartoon strips with you before. But let me do it again. In this strip, Charlie Brown goes to the nurse’s office and waits for her. While he is sitting on the couch, he observes, “Here I am in the nurse’s office.” Then he wonders, “She’ll probably take my temperature and my blood pressure and look down my throat.” Then he worries, “Maybe she’ll take a blood sample. I hope that she doesn’t take a blood sample.” Finally he agonizes, “If she mentions exploratory surgery, I think that I’ll scream!” Besides escalating, worry also has the tendency to divide the mind. The biblical word for worry is a compound of two Greek words (words I won’t try to say!). One of them means “to divide” and the other means “the mind.” So worry splits our energy between today’s priorities and tomorrow’s problems. Part of our mind is on the now; the rest is on the not yet. The result is half minded living. Worry also causes us to lose our perspective. Like the husband I heard of who called his wife’s doctor in the middle of the night. He said, “Doctor, my wife is in labor. The pains have just begun!” The doctor said, “Calm down. Is this her first child?” The man was frustrated. He said, “No, this is her husband!”

So what do we do with our worries? What do we do with our tendencies bent toward anxiety? Jesus gives us the answer in our lesson when he says, “Believe in God. Believe also in me.” So there is your answer, but since I am struggling with the issue of worry, let me also offer these suggestions. First, own your own limitations. This means getting your thinking straight. And it means resigning your position as the chief executive officer of the world. We are simply not supposed to carry the weight of the world around on our shoulders. There is someone whose shoulders are strong enough to do that. Second, get your priorities in order. That is something that I am starting to do. I am doing a lot of thinking about how I work and how I can work better. I am also doing a lot of thinking about my family and how they, too, need me. Jesus wants us to make our lives count for something important. And two of the most important things to me, whether I live like it or not, are at the parsonage most of the time. I expect that out of you and I want that for myself.

I heard of a survey of people ninety five years old and older who were asked what they’d do differently if they could live their lives again. Some said that they would reflect more and think about life more. Some said that they would take more risks, not play it so safe. But most of them said, “I want to leave my mark, a legacy, something that will live longer than I have. Now that’s important!”

Here is the third thing that might help. We should live one day at a time. In the Bible there are twenty-four passages that use the word worry or anxiety or anxious. One of them comes in the middle of Jesus’ sermon on the mountain in Matthew’s gospel. There Jesus says, "So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today.”

Try these on for size. See how they fit. But most of all, do not let your hearts be troubled and do not let them be afraid. Let us pray.