I used to worry a lot. I was always on my toes and was often
nervous. I was worried about what others would think of me, most especially,
the ones whose opinion I deemed important in my life foremost of whom was my
father. I was anxious about measuring up to expectations and worried that I might
fall short. This basic fear of not being
appreciated or loved because of the feeling that even my best was not good
enough spawned a lot more forms of useless worrying that made me quite unhappy.
But everything has changed. The change all started when God became real
to me—when I learned that what matters most is how God sees me, when I began to
trust in God rather than in my own creativity, when I realized that God
embraces me still lovingly even when I am at my worst. Allowing God to be God of my life has given
me tremendous peace of mind and joy in my heart. Indeed, there’s no use worrying
when God is one’s refuge and fortress, God, in whom one
trusts (Ps 91:2).
Today’s readings affirm my own journey to freedom. With confidence, I extend to all with open
minds and hearts the invitation of our Lord in today’s Gospel reading: STOP WORRYING. TRUST IN GOD. Our readings
offer us three assurances that free us from our worthless anxieties:
Stop worrying
because God never forgets. The people of Israel were suffering in exile
during the Babylonian captivity. They were losing hope and were ready to
concede that God has abandoned them as recounted in our first reading (Is
49:14-15): Zion said: “The Lord has forsaken me; my Lord has forgotten me.” But
through the prophet Isaiah, God spoke his assurance: “Can a mother forget her
infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she
forget, I will never forget you.”
God somehow is compared here to a mother. A mother always cares for her child. But still
a mother’s love may fail sometimes. We experience this failure more and more in
our contemporary culture of death, when millions of mothers reject the baby in
their womb. Then God assures us that even if a mother’s love fails, his love
never fails. God never forgets his people.
When we experience being forgotten or unrecognized, we
naturally worry about pleasing significant others in order to catch their
attention. Worse, when we are abandoned by people who ought to care for us, we
live day by day in insecurity, fear, and even anger. Today, God offers us
freedom. He assures us that He has not
forgotten us. He cannot abandon us. Our names are etched in his palm.
Stop worrying. Seek the Lord. Open your heart to God. He
has never forgotten you.
Stop worrying
because God always provides. In this
consumerist society we have now, we worry a lot about material amenities in
life. We worry even about things we actually do not need but want. So we work like a horse not because we enjoy
it but because we worry about many things. Or even if we are not really materialistic, we
still worry that we might not have the things we need to support ourselves and
our family. Hence, many are tempted or
misled to serve mammon rather than God.
Jesus assures us in today’s gospel reading (Mt. 6:24-34)
that God always provides. So he invites us to stop worrying. Nature shows indubitable evidences of God’s
sustaining care for the birds, the grass, flowers, etc. We have to accept that we are far more
important to God than these. We are his
children in Christ; He ensures all the more that we have what we need.
This assurance, however, does not encourage indolence or irresponsibility.
Let us remember that the Lord praises the responsible steward. The Lord does
not say “stop working.” What he says is “stop
worrying;” stop enslaving yourselves to your material pursuit to the point of
ignoring God. Only the non-believers
worry for provisions in life because they do not believe in God. But we continue
to work and plan for our present needs and that of the future without worrying.
Let us trust in the providence of
God. God surely brings our labor into
fruition.
Stop worrying
because God sees the goodness in your heart. We worry about what people say of us; we
stressfully live up to other’s high expectations of us. We worry about proving
ourselves to others—that we are good or we are the best. We worry because we
crave for the approving pat on our shoulders. We worry because we have come to
believe that what others say of me matters most.
St. Paul, in the second reading (1 Cor 4:1-5), testifies
that he does not worry about what other say of him: “It does not concern me in
the least that I be judged by you or any human tribunal; I do not even pass
judgment on myself; I am not conscious of anything against me, but I do not
thereby stand acquitted; the one who judges me is the Lord” (v. 3-4). For St. Paul, what matters to him is how God
sees his heart. He believes that the Lord “manifests the motives of our hearts,
and then everyone will receive praise from God” (v. 5).
Hence, we can stop worrying about what people say of us.
Let us be good. Let us be good even if nobody gives us a pat on the back or
even if others may maliciously misinterpret our goodness. Let us be good and not worry. God sees the
goodness in our hearts. This is what matters.
Again, we can drastically improve the quality of our
lives through the secret that Jesus has revealed to us: STOP WORRYING. TRUST IN GOD.
