Deacon Marty Garwood, Proper 3 Yr A

What does it mean when we are told not to worry?

If you are anything like me, sometimes just being told not to worry causes me to worry even more. After all, if someone thinks they need to reassure me, there must be a reason why.

We are told in this morning’s Gospel not to worry. We are told that not once – but three times! It is enough to make me worry. I worried about being able to understand the message in these words that Matthew’s Gospel recorded for us. I worried about how I was going to write a sermon telling all of you not to worry.

So I did what I usually do when something causes me to worry – I procrastinated. I do procrastinate better than I worry. But eventually yesterday, I could put it off no longer. And when I did sit down and start to sort out all my thoughts, I realized that in many ways, I had been thinking about this subject all week while I procrastinated.

I thought about it when I stopped at the gas station on Wednesday to put fuel in my car. The cost of gasoline is nearly $4.00 per gallon. The rising price of oil has caused prices to rise not only at the gas pump but also in the grocery store. It seems as though the price of nearly everything is increasing by leaps and bounds. But our wages are not increasing at any where near the same rate – especially for those members of our society who are on fixed incomes.

I thought about the topic of worry as people I know and love were traveling this week - either by airplane or driving long distances. Things can happen in a heartbeat. Whether due to a mechanical failure or a split second of inattention – accidents happen so suddenly and lives are altered forever.

We have been in a drought for a number of years and have longed for rain. In the past few days, we received a significant amount of precipitation. Questions run through our minds. will the roof leak – will there be water in the basement again – will the hard rain either wash out the newly planted crops or make it too muddy to even get into the fields to plant? We wonder if the standing water will become a breeding place for mosquitoes and if there will be an increase of West Nile Virus. For those of us who lived in the Rapid City area in 1974, our worries are also mixed with memories – memories of how the landscape looked before it was changed by the power of rampaging water on a dark night and memories of family and friends who died on that night.

Whenever I picked up a newspaper, turned on the news, or checked the Internet headlines this week I was reminded that there are many things to worry about. This country is in the middle of a war in Iraq with no end in sight. There will be an election in November – our lives will be affected by the decisions that we make concerning all the issues and persons on the ballot. Education opportunities are being cut because funding is not available. I’m reminded that children and the elderly are often victimized – and that it is not only strangers who hurt them but also far to often the very people they should be able to trust. I’m reminded that the environment is being damaged in irreparable ways by the greed and carelessness of a culture that values immediate gratification over responsible stewardship.

Are we really meant to not worry over such things? Are we really as carefree as the birds of the air and the flowers of the field?

Worry comes as a natural response to the ability to care deeply. Being able to love is a part of who we are. We have been created by a God who loves us deeply – we have been created in the very image of that loving God. The ability to love is a part of our genetic make up – a part of our God-like DNA if you will.

That gift of love is often expressed in terms or actions of concern. And out of concern comes worry. A certain degree of worry is a part of our human nature. We find it nearly impossible to adopt a carefree whatever will be will be attitude towards people we care about or even about our own lives.

It seems to me that by the very nature of our Baptism vows, there is an inherent amount of worry. If there is not concern as well as an ever-present awareness, then why or how should we work at being a part of a faith community? Why or how should we work at resisting evil and why should we long to return to the Lord when we have fallen away? Why or how are we concerned about living out the example of the Good News of God in Christ? Why or how should we seek Christ in others and love them as ourselves? Why and how should we care about striving for justice and peace or even respecting the dignity of every human being? We don’t attempt these things solely because they are written in the Book of Common Prayer. We attempt them – with God’s help – because we know that it is what we are called to do as participants in God’s love.

St. Makarios of Egypt was astonishingly realistic about the concept of worry. This 5th century desert monastic wrote, “I am convinced that not even the apostles, although filled with the Holy Spirit, were therefore ever completely free from anxiety.” He continued with this statement; “contrary to the stupid view expressed by some, the advent of grace does not mean the immediate deliverance from anxiety.”

It is when our normal fears and anxieties become so all consuming that we have no time or energy left for anything else that we are cautioned about our behavior. As with anything else in our lives that separate us from a relationship with God, we are called to stop the behavior and turn back – again and again and again – to our source of life.

As Christians we do not belong solely to ourselves. We have been called by name as beloved daughters and sons by a God who takes delight in us. In and through the waters of our Baptism we are marked, as God’s own forever. We have been called to a different set of expectations and priorities.

In a culture that extols the benefits of living life to the extreme – we often lose sight of that perspective. When we begin to rely more on those worldly excesses than on the grace we are freely given through our relationship with God, then we separate ourselves from the value of life lived in the Kingdom of God. We forget who we are and whose we are.

Part of the weather phenomenon we experienced this weekend was dense fog. I had to drive in that fog on Friday evening. It was an alarming experience – and yes – I was worried. I was driving a section of highway that I know very well. It is a section of road that I thought I could probably drive blindfolded or on automatic pilot. Being wrapped in an excess of thick moist air was like being blindfolded and my automatic pilot was not working. I had absolutely no clear idea of where I was. I could barely see a few feet in any direction. I felt disoriented and disassociated from my normal world. I had no focus and it felt like no destination.

If we allow the worries of our lives to become all-consuming then we become lost in the fog. We become disoriented and disassociated from the very Light and Love that is meant to guide our paths.

We must constantly be on the alert to not divide our loyalties. We simply can not belong to the world and ourselves at the same time we belong to God. We can however live our lives in the world as children of God. There is a difference.

In the Kingdom of God, in which we are called to live, there is an abundance to be shared. There is enough to go around. We are called on to share out of our time, talents, and treasures. It is our responsibility as well as our privilege to be good stewards and share the bounty of our lives.

The world, however, teaches a psychology of scarcity. There is a sense that there is not enough to go around and that it every person for themselves. Grab what you can when you can and don’t even think about the needs of others.

Comedian George Carlin has made this observation: “We spend more, but have less. We buy more, but enjoy less. We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values. We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often. We’ve learned how to make a living, but not a life. We’ve added years to life, not life to years.”

A novel was recently recommended to me by a Lutheran pastor. William Young’s book entitled “The Shack” is the fictional story about a man who was invited to spend the weekend with God. I found both the premise and the story itself to be intriguing. Mack, the main character in the story, had been through a rough patch in his life and he was now unsure of many things. Mack asked God why it was so hard for him to not be afraid. God responded by asking where Mack spent most of his time in his mind: in the present, in the past, or in the future? Mack thought for a moment and answered that he spent little time thinking about the present, and although he spent a big piece in the past, it was in the future that he spent most of his time worrying about – in trying to figure out the future. God responded that in dwelling with us, God does so in the present. Not in the past, although much can be remembered and learned by looking back. And God does not dwell in the future that we usually visualize or imagine because we spend so much time wrapped in our fears and trying to gain control or power over a future that isn’t yet real and may never be real, that we allow no room for God. Mack was left with much to think about when God said, “The person who lives by their fears will not find freedom in my love.”

We have been offered life with a capital L. We have a choice. If we allow ourselves to be seduced into a life of constant and unfettered worry and anxiety we will lose our way. When we accept the radical love freely offered to us by God, we are given a freedom from that burden of anxiety. Within that radical love we are newly created with the same loving care as the birds of the air and the flowers of the field. We are fed and nourished in love and we are clothed in the aura of beauty that God intends for us.

Lest you are beginning to worry that this homily is going to go on for ever, I leave you with these words spoken to Julian of Norwich in a vision from God. “I can make all things well; I will make all things well; I shall make all things well, and thou canst see for thyself that all manner of things shall be well.”

Amen.