9th August Trinity
Matthew
6; 19-24, 25-34
“Do not save up your
treasures on the earth, where moths and rust eat away at them and thieves
tunnel in and steal. Save up your treasures in heaven, where no moth and no
rust consumes and thieves do not tunnel in and steal. Because where you have gathered a treasure, there your heart will bear you.
“The lamp of the body is the
eye. So if your eye is wholesome, your whole body is lighted; whereas if your
eye is bad, your whole body is in darkness. So if the light inside you is
dark…what great darkness!
“No one can serve two masters: either he will hate
one and love the other, or he will put
up with one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and greed’s
demon of riches [mammon].
“That is why I tell you, do
not trouble your heart about what you will eat and drink or with what you will
clothe your body. Is not life more important than food, and the body more
important than clothing? Look at the birds in the sky: they do not plant, do
not harvest, and do not fill barns, and your heavenly Father still feeds them.
Are you not of more value than they? Can any of you, by being vastly concerned,
add one moment to the span of your life?
And why do you worry about
clothing? Study how the lilies of the field grow: they do not work, and they do
not spin cloth. But I am telling you that not even Solomon in all his glory was
ever arrayed as one of these. If that is how God clothes the wild grass of the
field, here today and thrown into the furnace tomorrow, will He not do much
more for you, o small in faith?
“So do not worry, saying, ‘What will we drink? What
will we wear?’ It is the nations who ask for all these things, and indeed, your
heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. Ask first for God’s
kingdom and its harmonious order, and these other things will be delivered to
you as well.
So do not worry about tomorrow, because tomorrow
can worry about itself. Today’s trouble is enough for today.
9th August/September Trinity
September 22, 2013
Matthew 6: 19 – 34
Greed’s demon of riches makes slaves of us. It drives us
like cattle with lashes of fear, of doubt, of envy. It drives us to be anxious
and over-concerned, to worry. Christ encourages us to free ourselves from this
demon, whose only real gifts to us are troubled hearts.
Christ is not saying that we should neglect to plan, or that
we should not be willing to work for basic necessities. Rather He is saying
that we should do what is necessary without anxiety, without fear or worry or
over-concern. Worry is praying for what you don’t want.
God provides us with what we need. What we truly need may
not be the same thing as what we want! Perhaps our soul needs a period of loss
so that we learn how truly rich we are; perhaps we need to see and be grateful
for all that we do have; much of it is non-material: the love of family and
friends, a God who always knows our inmost heart.
Christ wants to strengthen our trust, our confidence. He brings us confidence in the wisdom of
divine order and harmony. He brings us trust in the superabundance of Cosmic
Life.
The poet says: Look at the birds. Even flying
is
born
out
of nothing. The first sky
is
inside you, friend, open
at
either end of day.
The
work of wings
was
always freedom, fastening
one
heart to every falling thing. [1]
As Christ says,
‘Where you have gathered a treasure, there your heart will bear you.’ [2]
[2] Matthew 6:21
