Worry Not

“If God so clothes the grass of the field,
which grows today and is thrown into the oven tomorrow,

will he not much more provide for you, O you of little faith?
So do not worry and say, ‘What are we to eat?’
or ‘What are we to drink?’or ‘What are we to wear?’
All these things the pagans seek.
Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.
But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness,
and all these things will be given you besides.
Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself.
Sufficient for a day is its own evil.”  –Matthew 6: 30-34

I was enriched by the Gospel reading yesterday, harkening to worry not and trust more.  It was a profound for my worry-wart heart to hear; a passage that I’ve heard often but never so vividly as yesterday.  You see, worry is a part of my life, an old crutch I fall back on easily.  In order to feel like I’m caring for something deeply, I worry about it.  The anxiety from the worry only hampers the existing situation and provides little action to prevent the cause of the worry.  Take, as random example, the future worry that my almost-crawling daughter is going to one day crawl up the stairs and fall.  Worriers like me will often get stuck there and continue to worry about the future potential of danger, rather than getting off our worrying tushes to the store to buy a baby gate!!  Worrying is an easy fix for the moment, an anxiety-producing emotion that I often use as an excuse rather than a motivator.

But what if I offered up worry in its entirety?  This would be monumental.  How much more pleasant and relaxed I would be as a mother.  How much more brain time would be freed to devote to the action of raising my children.  In the end, wouldn’t He have so much more of me?