Confession of a Worrier

Glimmers
July 31, 2009


“I will never fail you. I will never abandon you.”( Joshua 1:5, Hebrews 13:5)

I am a worrier. There, I said it. I have heard all the reasons why a person of faith shouldn’t worry. I even have a little poem I memorized from a sermon I preached twenty years ago about worry; “Worry never climbed a hill, worry never paid a bill, worry never led a horse to water, worry never did a thing you’d think it oughta.” And still I worry.

I used to worry if I’d get a job when I finished college. Then I worried about finding someone to share my life with me. I worried about our children (well, I still worry about them-the hazards of being a parent) and I have worried over my career. Now, I worry about retirement a lot. Will I be healthy enough to enjoy it? Will I have enough money?

I remember a corny joke, the kind that’s safe for preachers to tell from the pulpit, about worry. As the plane ascended the airline hostess noticed the man gripping the armrests of his seat so tightly that his knuckles were white. And so was his collar. “Reverend, why are you so afraid?” she asked. “ Doesn’t the Bible say ‘I am with you always?’” Tightening his grip, he looked up at her and said, “NO!” “It says ‘LO I am with you always!’”

In the last Glimmers, I talked about The Shack, written by Wm. Paul Young and how the statement “if anything matters, everything matters” had been such an encouragement to me. Another passage in the book caused me to smile and repent in quick succession. Jesus is talking to Mack and says, “Mack, do you realize that your imagination of the future, which is almost always dictated by fear of some kind, rarely, if ever, pictures me with you”(p. 144).

Ouch.

Blessings to you all,

Jerald