Friday 18 February 2022

Psalm 80

Background

Sometimes it feels as if our politicians and media have read this text and decided to work as hard as they can to give us things to worry about. Perhaps they fear the consequences for their privilege and wealth if the population is free of worry and fear.

Scientific knowledge is clear that worrying will take days from our lives rather than add to them. Yet so many of us find it so hard to respond to either the teaching of Jesus or of science.

I’m guessing that many of us will know some individuals who don’t seem to be plagued by worry and they are generally seen as happier and more carefree than others. Yet there are few things they get my mind more into a tangled web of worry than telling myself not to worry. It is weird how easily we can be worried about worrying.

The only qualification I have for writing about this text is failure. However, I suspect part of the reason for that is the way we separate biblical teaching into these small chunks. Alone these verses are more of a wake up call, a diagnosis rather than a course of treatment. We need to look wider than this text (and the one for tomorrow) and put them into a wider context.

A community of disciples that is living by the Sermon on the Mount and which is reaching out in love to serve and welcome everyone, is a community that will be non violent. The focus won't be on the rat race to gain security from wealth. The focus will be on things that build them up, and no one will be left behind or belittled or become the victim of prejudice and hate. In such  a community, what will there be to worry about? Certainly not the fundamentals of whether there will be food, clothing and shelter.

To Ponder:

•  What can we do to contribute to shaping the communities we are part of to cause less worry?
• Which other elements of the Sermon on the Mount might help reduce our tendency to worry? How might we include them in our lives?