Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; their neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O men of little faith? Matthew 6:28-30
I’m a planner. I like making plans. When I make plans, I have a hard time sometimes when those plans don’t go just as I planned them.
One summer afternoon, I was mowing the lawn, when dark clouds started to gather overhead as they are prone to do on summer afternoons in Florida. So, I picked up the pace on my lawn mowing, anticipating that a thunderstorm was going to happen in the not too distant future. It started to rain lightly, but I was undeterred. I was determined to finish what I had started. Then it started to rain harder. And my resolve was even greater, even as my shoes started to get soaked. It began to thunder nearby and then it began to thunder even more loudly. My ego took over. No way am I going to stop mowing, I must finish what I started. I can stand the thought of looking at a half-mowed lawn for any amount of time. Then lightning struck very close to where I was working.
I started thinking as I frantically ran around the soaked yard “is finishing this job worth dying for? Will it really matter a week from now if I didn’t finish this job?” I started thinking that if I got struck by lightning, that would have permanent catastrophic consequences for my family. I could die and leave my wife without a husband and my child without a father. I thought better of it, put the lawn mower away and went into the house.
Two days later, I decided to mow the entire lawn again—yes, I’m obsessed with my lawn.
The lesson I learned that day is that we often get anxious about stuff that truly doesn’t matter. It wasn’t going to change the course of my life if the lawn didn’t get mowed during a rainstorm. However, if I got struck by lightning, my life would change. And as I thought about it, I wondered how many things in life that we stress out about won’t matter next year, next month, next week or even the next day. The truth is, a lot of things we stress out about and get angry about really don’t matter. In the big span of life, it doesn’t matter if the fries at McDonald’s were cold, or that I bought a pair of shoes I ended up not liking.
There are some things that truly do matter—a job promotion, our children getting into college. A lot of things really do not. So when you are deciding whether to stress out about something today, ask yourself, “will this matter next year, next month, next week or tomorrow?” If it’s going to matter next year, then fight for it. If it’s not going to matter tomorrow, don’t stress out about it.
I remember my high school English teacher my senior year, Mr. P. Mr. P. made our class do a timed write for ten minutes each day. If you didn’t turn in anything, you got an “F.” I remember at the beginning of the school year, students would complain that they couldn’t think of anything to write. And occasionally throughout the year, even I couldn’t think of things to write. Mr. P. said “We have 185 days of school. Having writer’s block on a few of them and getting an “F” won’t be a big deal. Over the course of the semester, you have to be consistent. But on a particular day, if you can’t get it done, don’t stress.” Yes, I had a few failing days but still got an “A” in the class and Mr. P. is the one I credit with my ability to write quickly. He also taught me a valuable lesson about stress. Sometimes the failure of today matters tomorrow. But many times it doesn’t.
So whether you are failing at writing today, or failing to get your lawn cut before the rain starts, ask yourself, will this matter next week or next month or tomorrow, and that will tell you whether it is worth stressing about today.
Lord, help me to discern the needs of today. Help me to manage the responsibilities that I must complete today. Help me to not stress about things I cannot control. Help me to be efficient in my tasks, to give my best effort in all things and to make good decisions about which things I should stress about and which things I shouldn’t. Walk with me in my decisions and in my work today. Amen.
Ask yourself when confronted with stress today—will this matter tomorrow? Or next week? Next month? Next year? And then act accordingly.
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The Revised Standard Version of the Bible is copyrighted 1946, 1952, 1971, and 1973 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. and used by permission. From the Online Chapel of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America.
