"Enough Worrying for Today"
Matthew 6:25-34
November 26, 2006
Saint Paul UMC, Little Rock
Reverend John A. Fleming
Have you heard the story of the man who was having a particularly hard and difficult time with his life? His job was full of pressures. The demands of it overwhelmed him most of the time. The pressures, of course, spilled over to his home life. Sometimes all he could do at the end of the day was to drag himself away from his desk, to his car, from his car, and then collapse on the couch at his house. His family tried their very best to be as understanding as they could be, but his wife needed a little help with their two children. She had said to herself and to her husband more than once, "Something has got to change!" By the way, this is not me! The man would often find himself sleeping on the couch when everyone else had gone to bed. Then he would get up, rub his aching back, and make his way back to the bedroom to finish off the night's sleep.
If all that were not bad enough, the man had strange dreams. Sometimes the dreams woke him up. He had many dreams but two distinct dreams were dreamed over and over again. The man finally decided to seek out a professional to help him. It was his first time in counseling and so he was guarded. He wanted to make sure that his counselor was trustworthy before he bore his entire soul to him. He made an appointed and waited for his turn to see the counselor. After sitting in the waiting room for a couple of minutes, he was called to the office. He walked in and made himself comfortable. The therapist started things off with these words, "Tell me what brings you in to see me today." His problem was written all over his face, but still he proceeded with caution. The man decided that a good first step was to share his dreams with the professional. Now church I give you fair warning. Are you ready for this?
The man said, "I have been having strange dreams, two in particular." The therapist said, "Tell me about them." The man continued, "Well, in one of them I am alive in the days of Native Americans. I am their home. I am a teepee. In the other dream I dream that I am a wigwam. The doctor thought for only a second. He pulled out a prescription pad and jotted down something. Then he said, "I am going to treat you for stress and anxiety." The man was surprised at the quick and accurate diagnosis. He wanted to know how he had arrived at it and so he asked, "How did you get that from my two dreams?" He answered (church, are you sure you are ready for this?), "It is obvious to me that you are two tents." Now don't blame me, I warned you twice before I delivered that punch line.
Now that I have your attention by telling such a horrible joke, let me quickly say that stress and anxiety are no jokes. For many of us, and I include myself in that number, we struggle with stress and anxiety and worry.
Charles M. Schultz has given us a great gift in Charlie Brown and the Gang. Maybe you remember the cartoon that shows Charlie Brown and Linus walking together. Linus, as always, has his favorite blanket. It is dragging the ground. Linus turns to Charlie Brown and says, "You look depressed Charlie Brown." Charlie Brown answers, "I worry a lot about school." Then he added. "And I worry about my worrying about school." Charlie Brown realizes what he is saying and adds this, "Good grief! Even my anxieties have anxieties!
If you are calm, cool, and collected, then our sermon today may not speak volumes to you. But if either of the stories that I've just shared speak, if you've ever struggled with worry and anxiety, then our scripture lesson for this morning just might be perfect. In it Jesus says, "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life."
These words of Jesus come in the middle of what we have come to call the Sermon on the Mount, found in the fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters of Matthew's gospel. These words make up Jesus' most famous sermon, and one where every subject is covered. Jesus shies away from no subjects. One of the things Jesus is trying to say in this sermon is this, "You look at the world the way it is. I look at the world the way it can be."
In essence, Jesus says, there are distractions and one of the strongest is that of our money. That was the sermon two weeks ago. Another distraction is worry. Matthew's sixth chapter, of course, if not the only place Jesus takes on the subject of worry. To the Philippian Christians, Paul writes, "Do not worry about anything, but in everything in prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God." Then there is the famous line of Jesus as he prepares his disciples for his departure. In the fourteenth chapter of John's gospel, Jesus says, "Do not let your hearts be troubled."
Here Jesus says, "Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Life is more than food and the body is more than clothing. Look at the birds of the air.....can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life. Consider the lilies of the field."
I don't mind telling you that when I first read these words, then didn't seem all that compelling to me. Birds and lilies don't have a budget to raise. Birds and lilies don't have car payments and daughters to keep safe. Birds and lilies don't have things on their minds that keep them up at night.
Let me ask you, what do you worry about? I worry about upsetting people. I worry about falling on my face up here. I worry that my leadership won't be accepted. I worry about the relationships of my life. These are my worries, what are your worries? So I want to say to Jesus, "Look at the birds? Look at the lilies? Lord, look at the pressure! Look at the bills! Look at the checking account balance!
By studying this week, I've learned some things about worrying. Here is what I learned. The word worry literally means to divide the mind. The biblical word for worry is merimnao. The word is a compound of two Greek words. One is merizo, which means to divide. The other is nous, which means the mind. Put those together and the word literally means to divide the mind. Anxiety, you see, splits our energy between today's priorities and tomorrow's problems. So part of our minds are thinking about now. The rest of our minds are focusing on the not yet. The result is half minded living. No wonder Jesus says, "So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today."
Well, let me bring this a little closer to home for us today. I think that we can admit that many of us worry more than our share. We can also admit that our worries are hard to get a handle on. Our worries are also impossible to give away. You see, no one wants what you worry about. The truth is that you do not want what you worry about.
How can we deal with our worries? You might try what one man did. He worried so much that he decided that he would hire someone to do his worrying for him. He found a man who agreed to be his hired worrier. The agreed upon salary was two hundred thousand dollars per year. After the man accepted the job, his first question to his new employer was this one, "Where are you going to get $200,000 per year to pay me?" The man said to his new employee, "That's what you need to worry about." And speaking of high costs. Worrying isn't a disease, but it causes them. Worrying has been connected to high blood pressure, heart troubles, and a host of stomach problems. Worrying is an expensive habit. If worrying helped, it would be worth it. It doesn't. It seems that our frets are futile.
I ran across a host of sayings on my way to writing our sermon. One of them said this, "Worry often gives a small thing a big shadow." But the more powerful saying was this one, "Today is the tomorrow we worried about yesterday."
Now all of this would fit nicely on a Hallmark card, these thoughts about worrying. One of the realities of our lives is that we can trust God with all things. But putting away worrying isn't easy. We love God. We trust God. But still we worry. Some people spend their lives focusing on their faith. Other people spend an equal amount of time worrying. The two go hand in hand. We trust God. We have faith, but still there are layoffs. Still our health fails. Still we wonder if we can live up to the expectations that people place upon us.
So what do we do? Listen to the last line of our lesson again. "So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today." Maybe the real lesson here is to meet today's problems with today's strength. Don't start tackling tomorrow's problems until tomorrow. You do not have tomorrow's strength yet. You simply have enough for today.
Think about the promises of God. God promises to always be with us. God promises to be a lamp until our feet and a light unto our path. We do not need to know what will happen tomorrow. We only need to know that God leads us so we will find grace to help us when we need it the most. Let us pray.
(Special thanks to the writings of Max Lucado for a line or two, and a story in this morning's sermon).