Sights and Insights
If you decide for God, living a life of God-worship, it follows that you don’t fuss about what’s on the table at mealtimes or whether the clothes in your closet are in fashion. There is far more to your life than the food you put in your stomach, more to your outer appearance than the clothes you hang on your body. Look at the birds, free and unfettered, not tied down to a job description, careless in the care of God. And you count far more to him than birds. – Matthew 6:25-26 (The Message)
I ate my lunch in the Fellowship Hall today. I do that every so often to keep a sense that that part of the building is being used. Today I brought some lettuce and a new bottle of salad dressing and made myself a salad. Afterwards, I put the bottle of dressing into the refrigerator. When I opened the door, a vast expanse of whiteness greeted me. Other than a few creamer cups in the door, there was nothing else in the fridge. It makes sense, as there has not been much reason to have anything in it for some time now. Still, the sense of a barren fridge was powerful. It was a sense of having no tools or resources for any kind of meal. There are no leftovers from previous events, or anything stored in anticipation of upcoming activities. It was simply bare, lifeless, and a bit hopeless.
I think that sense of opening the door to an empty fridge fit what many of us have been experiencing this week. As many activities are having to return to being fully virtual if not cancelled altogether, it is not so much a sense of being back where we were before. It is more a sense, it seems to me, of being out of resources. We don’t have the energy or patience to deal with all of this yet again. We don’t have leftovers from previous feasts as momentum to carry us, or hope for festive future meals to propel us forward. What do you do when your refrigerator is empty?
As I looked out the windows from the Fellowship Hall, I saw that the ground in the grove was covered with birds. There were at least thirty robins, plus more other types than I could identify and count from my vantage point. Immediately I was reminded of Jesus’ words about the birds in Matthew 6. We get so concerned about what resources we have, what energy we can commit, how much time to allot to which task, and our need to be prepared. Yet Jesus redirects us to focus not on our limited resources, but to the infinite care of God. God will be with us, will guide us, and will give us strength enough for today. Tomorrow God will do the same. We can content ourselves in God, even when our fridge is bare. For that gracious love, thanks be to God!