Context: For Lent this year, I am self-reflecting about the tendency towards fear and worry, which I'm considering an acceptable meditation for Lent based on the Maundy Thursday text, "Do not let your heart be troubled."
This week my meditations considered the portions of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount addressing fear and worry. This is the section which contains the memorable quote, "Which one of you, by worrying, can add an hour to life?" And we know that worry and stress tend to shorten a life, rather than adding to it. So my instinct to worry can be harmful, and my natural tendency to stress can be a form of self-sabotage. The worry won't give me even one more hour, so how many hours should I allow it to take away?
When I continued to read the portions on worry, it became clear that the topic had been part of the surrounding topics of the same sermon even before worry became the leading topic. "No one can serve two masters ... no one can serve both God and money" seems to address my wish to have things both ways. I structure my days around financial security, and the sideways eye on my account balance is never sure whether there will be enough. Jesus' sermon contains a long arc developing that theme. Is Solomon's appearance ("Consider the lilies of the field") meant to be a cameo of someone who served two masters, or someone who had incredible wealth (or lots of troubles) but couldn't compete with a patch of wildflowers?
From "Do not lay up treasure on earth" where it is easily eroded or taken, there is a theme that our sense of security is misplaced. We stress because we know that our security is misplaced. I look sideways at an account balance knowing that I cannot control the cost of a broken appliance, or of a car repair, or how long any material thing will last. I cannot control whether the currency will hold its value or whether a retirement account will hold its value. Come to think of it, there are significant expenses for car insurance, home insurance, and health insurance -- the cost of buying off future financial disaster. And yet on average most people lose more to the insurance than they would have lost to disasters (which is how insurance companies are profitable). Our fear of disaster has created its own kind of disaster. ("Insurance: disaster on the installment plan" -- said no advertisement ever.) Taking an honest look, knowing that my security is misplaced, does not alleviate my stress.
"Consider the birds of the air. They do not plant or harvest or store the harvest in barns, and yet your heavenly father feeds them. Do you not excel them?" This world is overflowing with life, which (unlike human financial systems) will continue as long as life endures. The providence of nature is part of our security. The love of God is its backing.
"Consider the lilies of the field. They do not toil or spin, but not even Solomon in all his splendor was arrayed as one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass -- which is here today, and tomorrow is fuel for the fire -- how much more will he clothe you, little-faiths?" This week I found myself mentally translating "O you of little faith" (little-faiths, I think, in the Greek) as "toddlers in the faith". I get the impression that Jesus didn't mean it unkindly. The abundance of life is not something that belongs to the appliances. I will never be as grateful for my appliances as I am for the little patch of wildflowers under the crepe myrtle tree, no matter how much the community association may fuss as I mow around them in the spring. (I've toyed with the idea of putting up a tiny cordon with a sign reading "wildflower sanctuary". It wouldn't make the community association leave me in peace til the spring bloom is past, but it would bring me a smile, and maybe the neighbors too.)
The human systems on which I rely (though do not necessarily trust) are built precariously. Considering their fragility can bring fear, or it can remind me to stop misplacing my confidence.
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4 comments:
Well said.
Well said, indeed, but you touch on some stuff I find pretty important, and touch on it too briefly for me to be sure what you mean. So, I'm going to spray a couple random challenges out there. I worry when people get too down on worry.
"And we know that worry and stress tend to shorten a life, rather than adding to it."
Actually, we don't know that. People who ignore concerns tend to die of them, too. People don't worry about their health and they lose it. People don't worry about life insurance and their widows live decades in poverty. People don't worry about drinking and they ruin their lives. A lack of forethought, which is nothing but worry upon which people don't heap disdain, shortens life.
"And yet on average most people lose more to the insurance than they would have lost to disasters (which is how insurance companies are profitable). "
OK, I'm not an insurance expert, but this is not mathematically true. All the scads of money the insurance people hold is out making money and they make tremendous profit off interest. It's not a zero sum robbery where they collect X dollars and pay out X-Y dollars while pocketing the rest.
But, even were that the case, insurance is people doing the work of the church. It's an actuarial way of giving all of us a chance to help out those in need, and know we'll be helped when it's our need. It's community care where no one loses out. It's driven by sinners, just like government, but it actually works for the net good of all involved or the most clever among us would be laughing it off. The idea started when some Scottish ministers did the math to make sure no pastor's widows would ever want, and it worked so well it spread throughout the world like wildfire. It's really the work of the church in absolute terms.
"This world is overflowing with life, which (unlike human financial systems) will continue as long as life endures."
Sort of (ignoring the tautology and reading the intent). It's been millennia since the human populace could be sustained by hunting/gathering. We're too populous now. If the farms shut down and we could miraculously have all the forests and fields back in all their pristine glory overnight, we'd starve in massive numbers. There's not enough life in the world, without human care, to support humanity.
So, where do you draw the line between counting the cost of the tower you're about to build and worrying about it?
Jesus said something extreme here, and he meant it. He also meant we should poke out our eyes and cut off our hands and fear hell fire if we've ever been angry without cause.
I'm in every way a worrier. I can read this passage and throw faith at it until I'm blue in the face, and do nothing good for myself. I can fear God's anger because I can't believe well enough to enjoy all his bounty, but adding fear to worry never seems to help. I'm too aware of all too many things that really can happen, and that God really will allow, and that I can often mitigate with wise care, to accept these words at face value. I draw the line at the difference between grieving the very real need for fear and trying to pretend God has promised me a minimum living standard in exchange for maximal faith.
God has an agenda, and I trust him. I want what he wants. I believe we'll both be happy when what he wants comes to pass. Until then, I think we both grieve and there are things I need to think about at some length.
Hey Martin
Thank you for reading, and for the encouragement.
Take care & God bless
Anne / WF
Hey Kevin
Good to see you, & good to have a conversation here. (Side note: I'm skeptical about the insurance but I'll do some reading to see what comes up. Bracketing that, back to the conversation about worry.)
You bring up counting the cost of towers; let's go there. Even if Jesus was working toward another point at the moment, he used counting the cost as a positive example.
Planning is good; worry is not so good. Sure, I often do them at the same time. But it's not a choice where "skipping the stress" is the same thing as "ignoring legitimate concerns". Full disclosure: I have been known to skip planning unless I'm worried. But too much stress is unhealthy; that's not "maybe" but definitely. And there's no good reason for me to procrastinate on the planning until I'm worried. For most things that I worry about, stress is a poor substitute for planning or doing something useful. And when I tune out the worries, it only makes them get louder. If I decide I'm not going to do anything about it until the stress reaches a certain level, then I've named my own terms and the stress will eventually reach that level. I'm trying to move into "doing something useful" earlier in the game, before the concerns are over-sized.
Let's say I wasn't even procrastinating. Let's say that a surprise comes along fairly quickly -- maybe the budding threat of a pandemic, as a random example. Stress will leave me more susceptible (though possibly in an irrelevantly-small way in these circumstances); planning will leave me better prepared. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that I don't stress. I'm saying that I consider it counter-productive once it has done its job of motivating me to act.
Re: The necessity for agriculture, given the current population. Sure, we can't go back to hunter-gatherer on a large scale. And yet it's not like the farms have gone off-line, or even the stores. Help doesn't have to be wild food; it can be a kind neighbor. Take yesterday, for example. I saw that the pre-flu buying rush was on at the local grocery store. (Sigh; I can't afford to be the only one who doesn't stock up while the stores still have stuff, so I went.) Some people were ... you could feel the stress pouring off of them. The thing was, in their stress they were making bad decisions. There's no point in getting more than I can eat before it expires. There's no point in getting an adrenalin rush or an anxiety attack over the store being out of hand sanitizer. And why were the medicines almost all in stock? How many people placed 100% of their marbles on staying healthy and none of them on riding out a long bout of flu?
I have my bona fides in worrying; it's how I came to be focusing there for a Lenten meditation. I'm learning that "worry" and "addressing my concerns" are not the same thing. The positive contribution of worry is motivation. If I sit on it, I rob it of its value. Once I'm moving, its value has run its course.
Fwiw, "Consider the birds and the lilies" doesn't seem like hyperbole to me. Granted, Jesus knew how to work a figure of speech. But "Solomon's best clothes had nothing on a field of flowers" -- well, I feel the same about Oscar gowns on celebs, so I take that at face value.
Am I still under the length limit? Let's find out.
Take care & God bless
Anne / WF
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