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SUNDAY OF ALL SAINTS OF BRITAIN Matt. 6: 22-33 Last time we celebrated the Divine Liturgy our attention focused on the man born blind and what this passage revealed about human fear, manifested in the behaviour of the man's parents towards the Jews "lest they be expelled from the synagogue". And this contrasted with the man's new found faith and joy in God, which was so great that not only was he accepting of the fact that he had been expelled but also he was critical of the Jews for pretending to be so knowledgeable about religion on the one hand, yet palpably unable to explain Jesus' act of healing. Today's passage concentrates on an equally diabolical emotion, worry or anxiety, and it is clear from the way it is linked in the text with Christ's words about sound spiritual vision and materialistic preoccupation, that there is a deep underlying connection affecting our spiritual health. "Therefore I tell you do not be anxious about your life…."
That we all worry excessively is, to our shame, not in doubt. I am not simply talking about stress and tension, which are a natural concomitant of our jobs and daily routine, or genuine concern for others but about that force that pursues, harasses, truly enslaves us and draws us down from the heights of faith and joy in Christ to the state of helpless, despairing human victims. This is a highly complex emotion. We worry about all manner of things: jobs, loved ones, pensions. We worry about the present, the future and the past. We worry about worrying and we worry about not worrying. In every sense it is like Jesus' description of the person who banishes one demon in order to invite more in. When we have rid ourselves of one worry we hasten to invite more in to fill the gap. In a very real sense we are not happy worrying but we are even less happy not worrying. It is a psychologically and emotionally complicated experience and it is clear that it is one of those very real demons with which we all regularly have to struggle in this life. We shall overcome it on one occasion only to find it suddenly appearing to taunt us again. How crafty are the ways it employs to attack us! There are no easy answers, since our battles will be prolonged, individual and variable in form and intensity but there are keys in today's passage as to how we may proceed to defeat this evil force.
One of those keys is faith or lack of it. "Will He not much more clothe you, O men of little faith?" Christ says that the source of all our worries is very simply insufficient or wanting faith. These words bring us back to the basic tenets of our faith, namely that God has called us individually in his love for us. He has planted the Holy Spirit in us at baptism and that our journey of faith towards Him is under his guidance and protection. In a sense this is all we need to know. The reality is that what He has started will be brought to fruition if we remain faithful. "He who endures to the end will be saved", as it is expressed later in St Matthew's gospel chapter 10. Of these spiritual facts we need to remind ourselves constantly in order to counter anxiety.
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Another key is the prevalence of material possessions and preoccupations. "You cannot worship God and Mammon." In fact most of us need quite a lot of the latter and the Lord's words are very realistic on that score. "Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all." But the commands of Christ are unmistakable. We must always keep the spiritual as our primary aim. "Seek first his Kingdom and his righteousness and all these shall be added unto you." Anything else will mislead us and cause our spiritual eye to wander and become unclear. The more we can strip ourselves of the material in an inner sense and an outer one (if that is possible for us) the more we shall experience peace, freedom and the nearness of God. How easy in some ways to adopt a vow of poverty and retire to a monastery and how difficult our path is to embrace inner poverty while amassing and dealing with worldly possessions as an everyday occurrence. Live as if each day were your last. Live as if you were poor, owning nothing. These are the preconditions for living the life of the Kingdom of Heaven. With great difficulty does a rich man pass through the eye of a needle because of the multitude of distractions to his soul. Failure to remind ourselves of the limitations of earthly things subtly but inescapably draws us down into the bog of worry.
Now the opposite of worry is peace, deep inner peace from knowing that God is in control of us and his world. It is the peace which enabled people like St Alban, whom we commemorate today with the other saints of Great Britain, to go joyfully to their deaths rejoicing in their glorious vocation of sharing in the sufferings of Christ. This takes real peace. And if we want to see this bipolarity or contrast of peace and worry exemplified in a real situation, we need look no further than the boat on the Sea of Galilee with Christ asleep in the stern and the disciples panicking lest the boat, which is already filling up, be totally overwhelmed by the storm. "Peace! Be still," says Christ to the elements and there is a great calm. "Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?" These words are directed at us too.
"Let us now lay aside all the cares of this life" is what we shall pray in a few minutes, "that we may receive the King of All who comes invisibly attended by hosts of angels." May God grant us that peace in Him for which we pray at the inception of every Great Litany and which truly drives away earthly worries and leaves us standing in simple trust, humility and obedience before our Lord and Master Jesus Christ.
Welsh Newton 20th June 2004
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