worry...

Here are some thoughts that I shared at our joint evening service this evening (joint with our two local Methodist Churches). For a while now I've been thinking about worry, about the future - all that kind of stuff....

Ecclesiastes 3: 1-8
"There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven:
A time to be born and a time to die,
A time to plant and a time to uproot,
A time to kill and a time to heal,
A time to tear down and a time to build,
A time to weep and a time to laugh,
A time to mourn and a time to dance,
A time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
A time to embrace and a time to refrain,
A time to search and a time to give up,
A time to keep and a time to throw away,
A time to tear and a time to mend,
A time to be silent and a time to speak,
A time to love and a time to hate,
A time for war and a time for peace."

Time, change, its always going on around us. There’s nothing we can do to stop time, theres nothing we can do to speed it up.

Leaves are beginning to fall from the trees, it's autumn. The leaves falling are yet another reminder of the seasons, the passage of time etc.

Why I like Autumn…
I think of Autumn as a warm cosy time, theres a feeling of expectancy, maybe even of looking forward to Christmas already.

But that's not all. Often, by the time we get into October, November, I can look back and realise that all those new things that were happening in September, that I'd given so much time to worrying about, I have survived. The world hasn’t ended, the new school isn’t all that bad, the new job is going well etc.

Time and again in my life people have told me not to worry. I know I worry a lot. It's one of my worst traits. I know. I’ve had Matthew 6:25-34 quoted at me soooo many times. But it’s true. Worrying will achieve nothing. It’s not that it won’t help, but it can actually make things worse.

A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine was talking about the idea of ‘God having the whole world in his hands’.

Now I sometimes thing of God struggling to hold the world aloft. But maybe, God’s there with the world cupped in his hands… It’s almost effortless….

Ecclesiastes 3: 9-15
"What does the worker gain from his toil? I have seen the burden God has laid on men. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live. That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil – this is the gift of God. I know that everything God does will endure for ever; nothing can be added to it or taken from it. God does it so men will revere him. Whatever is has already been, and what will be has been before; and God will call the past to account."

God has designed the world in a way which we will never understand it all. It pains me to say it, but I can't know everything.

We are to revere God, to marvel at his greatness, His great faithfulness, the way the planets keep turning, the seasons will follow one after the other, the way He continues to provide for us, day after day…

Great is Thy Faithfulness
"Great is thy faithfulness, O God my Father,
there is no shadow of turning with thee;
thou changest not, they compassions they fail not;
as thou hast been thou for ever wilt be.

Great is thy faithfulness! Great is thy faithfulness!
Morning by moring new mercies I see;
all I have needed thy hand hath provided,
great is they faithfulness,
Lord, unto me!

Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest,
sun, moon and stars in their courses above,
join with all nature in manifold witness
to thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

Great is thy faithfulness! Great is thy faithfulness!
Morning by moring new mercies I see;
all I have needed thy hand hath provided,
great is they faithfulness,
Lord, unto me!

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth,
thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!

Great is thy faithfulness! Great is thy faithfulness!
Morning by moring new mercies I see;
all I have needed thy hand hath provided,
great is they faithfulness,
Lord, unto me!