Thursday, March 25thMatthew 6:25-34
Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink,or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? 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? And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. 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? Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
'So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.'
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Reconnecting with Creation
Rev. Dr. Troy Troftgruben
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I love being outside. It’s a place where we tend to encounter the reign of God.
In Matthew 6:25–34, Jesus talks about healthy focus on God’s reign, offering creation as our teacher. He urges us to learn from birds and flowers: “they neither sow nor reap nor gather,” “they neither toil nor spin,” yet God takes good care of them. For Jesus, birds and flowers have an un-anxiousness that models a better way of life—one freed from worry over adiaphora (indifferent things) to focus on what matters: the reign and righteousness of God.
This is hardly the only time Jesus uses creation to instruct disciples about life, ministry, and the ways of God. Christian Scripture reveres creation as good, instructive, sacred, and intimately connected to us.
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Given this, we need a renewed vision of what George “Tink” Tinker calls “an acute and cultivated sense of [our] intimate participation in the natural world as part of an intricate whole.”[1]
Being with, connecting with, and honoring creation is a spiritual practice. Unfortunately, it has historically been undervalued by much of Western Christianity (one result of which is our environmental crisis). In fact, most of us are “creation starved” on a daily basis, due to our schedules, technology, and work. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that the average US citizen spends just 7% of their life outdoors—about half a day each week. The same citizen spends 87% of their life indoors and 6% in automobiles.
Reconnecting with creation isn’t rocket science. It just takes time. …Take a walk. Sit outside. Go for a hike. Open your window. Smell the flowers. Visit a pond. Watch the wind in the trees. …Chances are high you’ll come away with a much stronger sense of the reign of God.
I’m not a huge poetry fan. But Wendell Berry’s poems capture well some of the sacred significance of encountering creation. I conclude with one here:
I go among the trees and sit still. All my stirring becomes quiet Around me like circles on water. My tasks lie in their places Where I left them, asleep like cattle.
Then what is afraid of me comes And lives a while in my sight What it fears in me leaves me, And the fear of me leaves it. It sings, and I hear its song.
Then what I am afraid of comes. I live for a while in its sight. What I fear in it leaves it, And the fear of it leaves me. It sings, and I hear its song.
After days of labor, Mute in my consternations, I hear my song at last, And I sing it. As we sing, The day turns, the trees move.
~ Sabbath Poems, 1979 I[2]
Rev. Dr. Troy Troftgruben Associate Professor of New Testament Wartburg Theological Seminary
[1] George E. Tinker,” “An American Indian Theological Response to Eco-Justice,” Defending Mother Earth: Native American Perspectives on Environmental Justice, ed. Jace Weaver (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1996), p. 172.
[2] Wendell Berry, A Timbered Choir: The Sabbath Poems 1979-1997 (Berkeley: Counterpoint, 1998), p. 5.
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