Daily Lesson for May 13, 2015

Today's daily lesson comes from Luke chapter 12 verses 22 through 29:

22 And he said to his disciples, "Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, nor about your body, what you will put on. 23 For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing. 24 Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds! 25 And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? 26 If then you are not able to do as small a thing as that, why are you anxious about the rest? 27 Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 28 But if God so clothes the grass, which is alive in the field today, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith!"

Our times are so filled with anxiety-producing news designed to keep us in a perpetual state of fear and insecurity it is actually an act of resistance to go out and look at a flower or the birds. 

Sure, it can seem a little naive not to worry about what we are to eat or wear. Only a child would take this literally, actually considering the lilies of the field and the birds of the air and worrying about nothing. The grownup reads this and goes, "Well, wait a minute, those lilies which bloomed back in late April have already died -- they didn't worry about things because they didn't have long to live."

And our grownup thoughts make sense -- until we stop and ask ourselves, "Do we really have that long to live either? And do we really want however long we live to be consumed by worry?"

Of course, we're going to act responsibly. We're going to feed and clothe ourselves and our children. But the lesson here is not to obsess ourselves with a sense of insecurity. In a time when the medical community says what we eat and drink is everything to a long life, Jesus says worrying about it won't add a single hour. In a time when the news says we need to stay tuned because the sky is falling, Jesus tells us to look up there into the sky and see the birds are still flying.  And in a time where a lot of us are working way overtime to be ready for retirement, Jesus tells us to look at a flower and see how she's enjoying what she's already got today and not obsessing about what she probably won't have tomorrow. 

So, go out and look and look at the birds of the air and the lilies of the field. It's an act of resistance against the insecurity of our time, and it's a necessary reminder that if we spend our whole lives working and worrying because of what might be tomorrow we will surely miss the joy of what is today.