Worry Goo

I have friends who are organizational whizzes. I am nothing at all like them. I love them, often wish I was them, but sadly, there are hardly any similarities. I have a few pockets of organization in my life. Well, probably just enough to keep my family from going completely insane and to keep my editors from losing their spirituality. But much of my life is spent hunting through large piles of junk I should’ve thrown away, searching for the life-or-death kind of important items I’ve misplaced.

I do have one friend, however, who is much more like me than I’m sure she would ever want to be. Organization? Not exactly her watchword either. Her pickup, for instance, looks like it belongs to a homeless person. You would almost swear all her worldly goods are in there.

I took a ride in her truck recently, and I actually had to sit on a two-foot pile of junk mail, candy wrappers, books, file folders, and takeout bags from at least a couple of month’s worth of fastfood. There had to have been six pairs of shoes in the floorboard. They were sitting on top a pile of clothes. I think she could’ve been locked out of her house for a solid week without experiencing any real wardrobe shortages. I started to sit down on her taxes and noticed there was enough Bible study material under there to cause significant face-glowage. But all fashion, government and spiritual stuff aside, I had to draw the line at sitting on the can of biscuits I saw poking out from under some Styrofoam containers.

“Hey, I’m not sitting on a can of biscuits. What if it popped open and exploded biscuit goo and can shrapnel all over my rear end?”

“No way,” she laughed. “It’s been in here since last Christmas. Even if it popped open, the insides are probably too shriveled to do any damage.” She still humored me and tossed the thing on the dashboard.

I wasn’t convinced that goo shrivels instead of burgeoning. Hadn’t she seen the movie, “The Blob”?

I stared at the Blob-wanna-be as it rolled back and forth on the dash. “You have to know that could put an eye out.” Even as I said it, I pictured an entire office of health insurance personnel puzzled over where to file a claim reading, “cause of injury: accidentally assailed by canned bread product.” You really have to be careful what you sit on.

Funny that I should worry about what I was sitting on when worry itself can be such a dangerous thing to sit on. Jesus knew we would have worrying tendencies. He addressed it point blank in Matthew 6:27 when he asked the question, “Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?”

Every now and then, we need to do a little self-exam. We need to ask ourselves if there’s anything we’re sitting on that we shouldn’t be. Are there any worries threatening to explode worry-goo all over our lives? Not only is it not adding a single hour to life, it can actually suck some of the goodness out of life.

Philippians 4:6-7 tells us what to do instead of worrying. “Don't fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God's wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It's wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life.” Philippians 4:6-7, MSG

Living a fretful life is no way to live. It’s the way to get ulcers. When we’re worried, we’re consumed by whatever it is we’re fretting over—even if it’s something that hasn’t happened. The focus of our worry becomes all we can think about. That means we’re not able to focus where we really need to. How can our focus be on worry and on Christ at the same time?

Let’s trade worry for prayer. It’s a trade that brings the peace of God.

Incidentally, it might be one less thing for you to worry about if I go ahead and tell you that there were no bread-related injuries reported after the truck ride. No dough-covered booty even. And there were fewer worries for me, too, since I knew that if I did need a change of clothes, there were several outfit choices in the floorboard.