What ifs…
“What if” questions fuel worry in us, and worry is a lens that can change our perspective on life. Good days become gloomy days, beautiful moments are tinted with grey, and fears are amplified. In August 2018, Barnes & Noble announced a huge surge in the sales of books about worry; a 25 percent jump on June 2017.
One person described their worry situation like this:
‘I have a list of possible problems in my head. If all the real problems are solved, I turn another one into a problem so that I can worry about it. These are constant facts of life. It is not increasing. It has always been like this.”
Some of us worry a lot about what people think of us, even though, as someone wisely said, ‘we would worry less about what people think of us if we knew how little they actually think of us’.
Ronald Rolheiser: ‘It is no easy task to walk this earth and find peace. Inside of us, it would seem something is at odds the very rhythm of things, and we are forever restless, dissatisfied, frustrated and aching. We are so overcharged with desire that it is hard to come to simple rest.’
The word worry comes from the Greek term merimnao. It is a combination of two smaller words, merizo, meaning “to divide,” and nous, meaning “the mind.” In other words, a person who is anxious suffers from a divided mind, leaving him or her disquieted and distracted.
The English word worry comes from an Old English word that means "to strangle.”
In the midst of this Jesus says, ‘Don’t worry’.
Notice, He doesn’t say, ‘Don’t worry, be happy’ - these are the words of the famous song, sung by Bobby McFerrin, based on a slogan by the Indian mystic Meher Baba, whose last words when he died in 1969 were ‘don’t forget that I am God’ which of course was entirely wrong.
Jesus speaks into the reality of life. He was a realist, speaking to a people living in a land occupied by the Romans, living under crushing tax burdens, and in the midst of political uncertainty.
Jesus was not suggesting a Disneyland life where the sun always shines if you have enough faith. ‘In this world you will have trouble’ (John 16:33)
But whatever we’re in, this is for us! Are we ready to listen to Jesus, or do we just say, this is the way I am?
Corrie Ten Boom: ’Worry is like a rocking chair-it keeps you moving but doesn't get you anywhere’.
In conclusion, I try to adopt this ‘night prayer’ from New Zealand to establish peace at the end of the day:
’It is night after a long day. What has been done has been done; what has not been done has not been done. Let it be. Amen’.