The title is meant to be an oxymoron, mutually exclusive, non-sense, contradictory.
Faith and worry do not work with each other.
One conquers the other.
Either you worry, and worry wins; or there is faith and faith wins.
Faith is a gift from God, a gift of the Holy Spirit; it is yours. But you can choose worry, and faith is blocked.
Now I hear your brain alarms going off… “ya but…”
Believe me, mine are ringing too; this message is as much for me as for anyone else.
Aren’t there things as parents, or grandparents, or patriots, or environmentally concerned citizens, or the financially savvy retirement bound, or pharmaceutically informed consumers, or even spiritually-attuned-to-the-end-of-the-world believers, that we ought to be worried about?
Is there a place for healthy concern? Fill in the blanks with your own examples:
Parents _____________________
Grandparents ___________________
Patriots _______________________
Environmentally concerned citizens _________________________
Pharmaceutically informed consumers __________________________
Spiritually-attuned-to-the-end-of-the-world believers _________________
But where is the line between worry and healthy concern?
Last Sunday in church we heard Jesus’ own words on the matter: (Matt 634 ) So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today.
The psalmist's chant from Psalm 131 are shaped to calm the anxious soul: “Like a child upon its mother’s breast, my soul is quieted within me.”
And Isaiah’s ancient prophesy in chapter 49 are his timeless description of the care God gives, even in the face of severe worry and doubt: “The Lord has forsaken me, my Lord has forgotten me!”
God answers any worry, any doubt, any fear from any source: “See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands!”
That is enough to quiet my “ya but”!
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Release Point
It hardly seems possible. June. Here. And there was so much I was going to get done in the early part of spring!
But, zoOOom! It’s gone.
Of course, with the weather being what it was, it hardly seems as if there really was a spring. As I blog this that seems to have changed for the better at any rate; perhaps winter really has released its grip.
This June is particularly poignant for our family because it marks a major change in our lives. Our youngest is graduating from High School and our household is returning to one location. For the past 5 years my wife and kids have been spending the school and work week 2 and a half hours west of here. It was the only school the kids had known (we’d lived there for 13 years) and Sandy (my wife) has a thriving massage therapy business there. They’d come home for weekends and holidays, including summer, and I’d go there (to Pelican Rapids) for sports events and school events and stuff. With Hannah graduating that will stop, and that is a good thing to release.
But it is bitter-sweet because it also puts us on the edge of the “empty nest.”
There was so much I was going to do before that time came….
Through the mist in my eyes, it is hard to see where the time flew, and we are faced with letting go and releasing our hold more fully into God’s hands. We face a release point.
The life of faith calls us to very similar “release points” all the time. It might not be as big as letting kids go, or watching parents return to their Creator, or feeling our own physical bodies decline. But time and time again God calls us to release our cares, release our lives, release our love, release our grip, so that God can do what God would do. So that we and those we love will bathe fully in the blessings God would rain (reign) upon us.
Time and time again God calls us to release our anger, our pain, our grudges, our worries, our frustrations.
God calls us to release our joys and plans and hopes and celebrations and hearts and souls.
When we do it, God’s care flows more fully, God’s healing comes more completely, God’s Spirit guides more deeply.
And I want that, really I do. But at the moment just before the release there is an ache, a hesitation, a “holding back.” Part of my heart longs to hold on: sometimes in the name of human love; sometimes in the name human pride; sometimes in my own sinful stubbornness.
But the Spirit gently tugs and the world turns and the release point comes. And in trust, I open my hands, my heart, my soul, and God takes hold. Really. I will.
On the journey with you,
Pastor Chris
But, zoOOom! It’s gone.
Of course, with the weather being what it was, it hardly seems as if there really was a spring. As I blog this that seems to have changed for the better at any rate; perhaps winter really has released its grip.
This June is particularly poignant for our family because it marks a major change in our lives. Our youngest is graduating from High School and our household is returning to one location. For the past 5 years my wife and kids have been spending the school and work week 2 and a half hours west of here. It was the only school the kids had known (we’d lived there for 13 years) and Sandy (my wife) has a thriving massage therapy business there. They’d come home for weekends and holidays, including summer, and I’d go there (to Pelican Rapids) for sports events and school events and stuff. With Hannah graduating that will stop, and that is a good thing to release.
But it is bitter-sweet because it also puts us on the edge of the “empty nest.”
There was so much I was going to do before that time came….
Through the mist in my eyes, it is hard to see where the time flew, and we are faced with letting go and releasing our hold more fully into God’s hands. We face a release point.
The life of faith calls us to very similar “release points” all the time. It might not be as big as letting kids go, or watching parents return to their Creator, or feeling our own physical bodies decline. But time and time again God calls us to release our cares, release our lives, release our love, release our grip, so that God can do what God would do. So that we and those we love will bathe fully in the blessings God would rain (reign) upon us.
Time and time again God calls us to release our anger, our pain, our grudges, our worries, our frustrations.
God calls us to release our joys and plans and hopes and celebrations and hearts and souls.
When we do it, God’s care flows more fully, God’s healing comes more completely, God’s Spirit guides more deeply.
And I want that, really I do. But at the moment just before the release there is an ache, a hesitation, a “holding back.” Part of my heart longs to hold on: sometimes in the name of human love; sometimes in the name human pride; sometimes in my own sinful stubbornness.
But the Spirit gently tugs and the world turns and the release point comes. And in trust, I open my hands, my heart, my soul, and God takes hold. Really. I will.
On the journey with you,
Pastor Chris
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