NEW Today’s Spiritual Food for Thought is provided by Pastor Yohan Lee, a friend of AMI who had served as a staff at several AMI churches. He is a graduate of University of Pennsylvania (BA) and Cairn University (MA).
Spiritual Food for Thought for the Weekend
“No Worries”
Matthew 6:25-34
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? 28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
I got into a fight with my youngest daughter Abbie last week; she’s eight. It was concerning her Halloween costume. She was going as Xialing, Shang Chi’s behind-kicking sister (my apologies if you’re not a Marvel fan). We got her costume from the Disney Store, and just like all things Disney, we had to pay more for extras. In this case, no weapons. So my daughter asked me if I could make Xialing’s rope dart. After looking it up on the Internet, I found out that a rope dart is nothing more than an arrowhead on the end of a 5-to-10-foot length of rope. On a scale of ten, the difficulty in making a craft rope dart is maybe a two if I somehow lost the use of my left hand. Some rope, red duct tape, cardboard, and 30 minutes—it’s that easy.
On the Wednesday before Halloween, we sat down together to start making the dart head, and Abbie started questioning my plan, “Pa, are you sure you know what you’re doing?”, “Pa, I don’t think this is gonna look good.”, “Pa, I think we should use metal.” After about three minutes of this badgering, I got up and told my girl, “Abbie, if you don’t trust that daddy can do this, then I’m not going to help you.” Then I walked away.
Try to ignore my childishness while I explain what I was feeling. Overall, I was a little hurt and saddened because at her core Abbie was questioning my ability to care for her and to a lesser extent my love for her. Understand that in my house, I’m the go to person for arts and crafts (this and sports are the only arenas where the kids prefer me over mom!), and I can tell you with genuine humility that I am really good at crafts. Even in her limited life span, Abbie has seen me make incredible school projects, over-the-top cheerleading posters, movie-prop worthy costumes, you name it. She has no excuse not to believe that I could pull off a simple rope dart. In fact, if anything, she should have thought this project was beneath me. Second and more importantly, I was hurt because Abbie didn’t think I cared enough to make something awesome for her. Look, Abbie is my last child, my baby girl; she’s the only one in the world who calls me “Pa”, and she gives the best cuddles. She should know that her father is not going to send her to school on Halloween to face soul-eaters, the Dweller-in-Darkness, or worse yet, third grade boys without some kind of weapon.
I don’t want to make the mistake of portraying my shortcomings and insecurities on to God, but I am willing to bet that when we worry, God feels a similar holy offense. In essence, when we worry, don’t we doubt his ability to provide for our needs and/or his love and willingness to do so? But this type of thinking is silly, is it not? As Jesus pointed out, since our Heavenly Father takes care of the birds of the air and the flowers of the field, doesn’t it stand to reason that He would take care of you, his beloved child, even more so? In fact, God loves us so much that He sent Jesus to die on a cross to pay the penalty for our sins. So, to paraphrase Paul in Romans 8:32, if God was willing to give us something of infinite worth like his Son, how could we think he’d be too stingy to provide anything else? I believe with all my heart he is not going to hold out on us, and he genuinely wants what’s best for us. So trust Him; He’s more than capable and more than willing.
Have a great weekend everyone!
*As a disclaimer, if you are suffering from clinical anxiety or similar difficulties, I do not mean to imply there is a faith problem. Please see a mental health professional.
Prayer: Heavenly Father, remind me to worry less and trust more! Open my eyes to see that You are a wonderful provider and that I need not be given to worries of this life. Amen.
Bible Reading for Today: John 6-7