Sun, Oct 9, 2005 - From Worry to Thanksgiving

Isaiah 25:1-9
Psalm 23
Philippians 4:1-9
Matthew 23:1-13

"Do not worry, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God." Apparently, this verse has great meaning to me, although I’m not sure why. As I was sitting at my computer early this week, getting ready to work on this sermon, I realized that I had written "Philippians 4:6" - the verse that I just read to you - on a post-it note and stuck it to my computer screen a while ago. Now, I have a lot of post-it notes on surrounding my computer screen, with all kinds of cryptic messages on them - important phone numbers, email addresses, that kind of thing. But why I have Philippians 4:6 up there, I have no idea. I don’t remember writing it down, or even having read the phrase before, but there it is.

It is appropriate, though, because I’m a big worrier. I inherited it from my mother, I think. She was a big worrier when we were kids - so much so that one year my dad gave her a plaque that said "Worrying is about as useful as sawing sawdust" and another year I remember giving her worry dolls, those tiny little handmade yarn dolls that you tell your worries to before you go to bed, and they supposedly worry for you so you can go to sleep. So, I definitely inherited some kind of worrying gene from my mother.

But then again, pretty much everybody today worries about something or another. It pervades our culture. We all have moments when we can’t sleep at night, or can’t focus at work, because we’re too anxious about something or another. We worry about the ill health of our parents, or about what kind of lives our kids are leading. We worry about having enough money to pay the bills, or whether there’s going to be a fight at the family Thanksgiving meal this weekend. We worry about school, our jobs, not having enough time to do the chores at home. We worry about our health, about the environment, about the government, some people even worry about whether or not the Leafs are going to have a good season, given their loss last night. Some of these worries aren’t so serious, but some of them gnaw at our stomachs and weigh on our minds until we walk around like zombies, obsessed and exhausted.

But every once in a while, immersed in our worries as we are, we run across somebody who doesn’t worry the way we do. Somebody who, despite all the hardships and difficulties facing them, nevertheless manages to maintain a positive outlook on life, who sleeps well at night, and who is constantly giving thanks to God. We look at them and wonder if they’re all there, if maybe they’re too positive, when things are falling down around their ears and they’re saying hallelujahs, but that doesn’t stop them. They live out the verse, "Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving..." I remember meeting people like that in rural Carolina, where people were so poor they lived literally hand-to-mouth, surviving off the shrimp and fish they got in the nearby river. They had nothing, people looked down on them like they were nothing, and yet every Sunday morning, there they were in church, praising God and giving thanks for the mere fact that they woke up that morning. When you asked them how they were doing, they didn’t respond with a litany about how all their bones ached, which they did, or about how their house was falling apart, which it really was, or about how they were victims of societal racism, which they were. Instead, they would tell you how wonderful they felt, praise the Lord, how good God was to them, thanks be to God, and about how, glory hallelujah, they were blessed with a fine day. And they meant it. Now, don’t get me wrong - they weren’t all like that, some of them would complain instead for hours, but there were some of them who lived lives of joy and thanksgiving despite all the problems in their lives.

So how can we do that? How can we be people who are legitimately concerned about the problems in our lives but at the same time rejoice and give thanks as Paul advices us to, and indeed, as Paul did himself? Don’t forget that Paul was someone who had been beaten, whipped, imprisoned, and almost drowned for his faith - his days were torture and yet he was constantly rejoicing and giving thanks. How can we "not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let [our] requests be made known to God?"
Well, the first thing is to remember that "the Lord is near." If you’ll look at the reading for today, you’ll notice that right before Paul says, "Do not worry" in verse six, he says, "The Lord is near." "The Lord is near. Do not worry." It is crucially important to Paul that not worrying is connected with Christ Jesus being at hand. When the Lord, who died and was raised to new life, who brought light to the deepest darkness, who eased the suffering of the sick around him is near, our reasons for worrying seem to lose their power.

The next piece of the puzzle comes from knowing that in the original Greek that Paul wrote in, the word "rejoice" and the word "joy" have at their root the word "chara." And this word "chara" is also at the root of the Greek word for thanksgiving - a word you’ll recognize - "eucharist." But that’s not all. "Chara" is also at the root of the word for grace - "charis." "Chara," "eucharist" and "charis," - joy, thanksgiving, and grace - are all deeply connected in Paul’s mind. "In everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God."

In using these words so often, and in reminding us that the Lord is near, Paul is pointing us to a larger context for our concerns, to the bigger picture that helps us to turn our worries over to God and yet still give thanks.

And that bigger context is that by the grace of God, because God has made an eternal covenant with God’s people, God takes care of us and, even in times of loss, provides us with what we need in order to live and to love one another. No matter what the troubles in our lives, God is never far away - the Lord is near. When Abraham was living with Sarah, almost 100 years old, worrying about how the family line would carry on, God gave him Isaac and made him the father of nations. When the Israelites were in slavery in Egypt, concerned for their very existence, God sent them Moses, to bring them out of Egypt and into Canaan. When Assyria and Babylon had invaded Israel and carted the population off into exile, God sent King Cyrus of Persia to restore the people to their land. And when the poor and marginalized of the world were crying under the weight of oppression, God sent Jesus Christ to share his power with them and to restore them to God. We have seen, over and over again, that God takes care of God’s people, and simply for that, we can be joyful and give thanks.

But worrying isn’t just about the past - it’s also about the future. After all, we worry about what might happen, or what could happen - we worry about what is to come. But even then we have God’s promises, based on God’s past deeds, given to us by the grace of God that God will continue to take care of us, to remain true to the covenant God made with us, to be near us. We hear it in our reading from Isaiah - "the Lord God will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.. . . This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation." The day is coming when God will take all the things we are worried about and they will disappear and we will be left with only joy. We hear about it in the psalm for today - "Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me." With those promises lying ahead of us, even in the midst of our concerns for tomorrow, we can be joyful and give thanks.

So, "Do not worry, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God." Paul isn’t saying don’t care about things, or don’t be concerned about the people in our lives. Paul is just reminding us of what we already know, that God is taking care of things, and as often as we remember what God has done for us in the past, and what God has promised to do for us in the future, our worries will be eased by the joy we receive in remembering. We really do have so much to give thanks for, not the least of which is a gracious God who is always near. So, as you lift your requests to God with thanksgiving this day and this week, carry Paul’s reassuring words with you, and "the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." Thanks be to God. Amen.