The Birds of the Air
Matthew 6:25-34
Do Not Worry
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink,[a] or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to your span of life?[b] 28 And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. 30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ 32 For it is the gentiles who seek all these things, and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33But seek first the kingdom of God[c] and his[d] righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 “So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.
Vast Stillness
The writer, Edward Abbey, wrote his book, Desert Solitaire, while he was a park ranger at Arches National Monument in Utah. In the book, he describes his experience of vast stillness. He writes,
“Above the mesa the sun hangs behind streaks and streamers of wind-whipped clouds. More storms coming.
But for the time being, around my place at least, the air is untroubled, and I become aware for the first time today of the immense silence in which I am lost. Not a silence so much as a great stillness—for there are a few sounds: the creak of some bird in a juniper tree, an eddy of wind which passes and fades like a sigh, the ticking of the watch on my wrist—slight noises which break the sensation of absolute silence but at the same time exaggerate my sense of the surrounding, overwhelming peace. A suspension of time, a continuous present. If I look at the small device strapped to my wrist the numbers, even the sweeping second hand, seem meaningless, almost ridiculous. No travelers, no campers, no wanderers have come to this part of the desert today and for a few moments I feel and realize that I am very much alone.” From Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey.
Birds in Maine
I like birds. Here in Maine we have so many beautiful birds. Each morning I enjoy seeing birds in the trees around our house. Our neighbors have bird feeders in their yard, and they attract a lot of birds. Yesterday morning there was fresh snow on the ground, and the birds were enjoying the seeds in the feeders. A single bird perched on top of the privet hedge and just stayed there. So still. Just resting there quietly. I watched him from the kitchen window until he flew away.
Chronic Anxiety, Chronic Tension
In the introduction to his book on mindfulness and stress reduction called Full Catastrophe Living, Jon Kabat-Zinn writes, “We are apt to get so caught up in the urgency of everything we have to do, and so caught up in our heads and in what we think is important, that it is easy to fall into a state of chronic tension and anxiety that continually drives our lives on automatic pilot. This stress is only compounded when we are faced with a serious medical condition, with chronic pain or a chronic disease.”[1]
Our scripture reading this morning is about anxiety. What is anxiety? Anxiety is a feeling, a feeling of dread that something bad is going to happen. You are worried about something that might happen. Anxiety comes from asking the question, “What if?”
What if I run out of food? What if I don’t look good in the clothes I wear? What if people don’t like me? What if others judge me on how I look? What if I can’t find a job? What if I lose all my money and become homeless? What if someone I love gets sick? What if someone I love dies suddenly and unexpectedly? What if, what if, what if???
Returning to Zero
But just notice. Here we are. I am talking. You are listening. I am standing here. You are sitting there. You can feel the church pew underneath you where you are sitting. You can feel the floor where your feet are touching. You can feel the air touching your skin. You can feel you are breathing. As you inhale, the air moves through your nose, into your throat, down into your lungs, and then back up through your nose as you exhale. Breathing in. Breathing out. Just notice this. As you sit, notice this. One breath. Breathing in. Breathing out.
Sitting here. Breathing. Just being.
This is returning to zero. Do nothing. Return to zero and allow the mind to be empty. Rest in stillness.
Notice. Maybe you can notice that for one split second, even just a split second, when there is no thinking. There is a gap. There is some space in the stream of thinking. This is returning to zero. This is resting in stillness.
Never Ending Thoughts
Our thoughts are like a river, a continuous river, always flowing. One thought after another. And our thinking, this river of thinking, is the source of our anxiety. What if this happens? What if that happens? On and on it goes. It’s like a wheel. “Round and round it goes and where it stops nobody knows.”
Our thoughts are like a wheel. An uncontrollable, fast, speeding, spinning, wheel. And our thoughts are repetitive. Our thoughts are repetitive. Over and over: what if, what if…And this round and round, this repetitive wheel of thinking can be a horrible trap, a horrible prison. You feel like you will never get out of it. You feel like it will never stop.
You know, people do all kinds of things to try to stop their thoughts, to try to relieve their anxiety. Drugs and alcohol, you know. Take a drink, take a pill. Or food, or sex, or work, or even exercise. Watch tv. Watch endless hours of tv. Scroll on your phone for endless hours. “Doomsday scrolling,” they call it. So many ways to try to escape the thoughts, to try to break this endless cycle, to try to stop the wheel spinning. What if, what if, what if…
But notice, just notice, you are still sitting here. Your thoughts might be going a hundred miles an hour. Maybe you are feeling the anxiety of the whole situation. The world, the news, an illness, a problem, a death in your family. Maybe your car is broken down. You need to take it to the garage to get it fixed. Maybe your children have lots of problems and you don’t know what to do. But still, you are here. Sitting here. Breathing. Alive. Right now.
We are here right now
Like the birds of the air. Like the lilies of the field. You are here. Alive. Breathing. Heart beating. Right here.
You see, there will never be a time when there are no problems. But in the midst of all of it, there is THIS. THIS. This life. This BEING. This breathing in and out.
This section of Matthew, the Sermon on the Mount, is the very first lesson in discipleship. It is Jesus’s “How to.” How to be his disciple. Remember we said that Matthew organized his Gospel into 5 sections, 5 major teachings of Jesus. And the Sermon on the Mount is the first one of those. Chapter 6 is the heart of this sermon. Chapter 6 is a wonderful reading for Lent. If you don’t do anything else to observe Lent this year, the invitation is to read Matthew Chapter 6. And to Be. Be like the birds of the air and the lilies of the field. Just be. Do nothing. For a few minutes, rest in stillness. Be like the birds of the air and the lilies of the field.
May it be so for you.
Amen? Amen.
[1] Jon Kabat-Zinn, Full Catastrophe Living (New York: Bantam Dell, 1990) page xxvii.