Yesterday was a rainy day on campus, and so water puddled in low spots. Walking home, I came to a puddle in the street and found a robin busy bathing. Putting its head down, flapping its wings… the robin seemed quite happy with its newly found place to splash.
I enjoyed that moment; still do. Our souls can be more at peace. Tech devices amp up anxiety. We keep checking them to see what we’re missing, what we need to attend to, what dares to be happening without my most significant and indispensable input! A 2015 study found that 64% of people surveyed would give up dining out, 51% would give up a pet, 50% would give up vacation, 51% would give up a day off every week, and 38% would give up sex for a year…rather than give up their cell phone (in Thomas Friedman, “Thank You for Being Late,” 121). That powerful little computer in my hand is wonderful in many ways, no doubt about it, but let yourself become beholden to it and you rob yourself of a large measure of marvel in creation and the peace God offers.
“I know all the birds of the hills” (Psalm 50:11). He saw the splashing robin, and me with all the worries I lug around. Are you, “casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you”? (1 Peter 5:7). Says your Savior, “Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?” (Matthew 6:26).
“Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble” (34)
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