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05.25.08
MURPHY’S LAW AND THE GOSPEL
PSALM 91; MATTHEW 6:25-34
- Facing Death
- Two Different Attitudes
- Are you curious to know when you might die?
- Probably not, since death isn’t something we like to think about or talk about
- Most of us are scared to death by death because we’re hope we’ve got a lot more living to do
- We know that death’s a part of life, but we’d like to hold it off as long as possible
- We want to enjoy life as long as we can
- Knowing when we’re going to die is something God doesn’t think we need to know
- It’s a piece of life that remains a mystery until it happens
- Imagine if, from the day of our birth, we knew exactly how long our life will be and when we’re going to die
- That knowledge would have a profound impact on the way we live
- For many of us, that knowledge would affect us very negatively
- We would go through life cowering in fear afraid to come in contact with others for fear that we might contract some sort of disease that would shorten our life
- We would never take any kind of risk for fear that the risky behavior might cause our death
- We’d be terrified to ever leave our homes
- In essence, knowing when we’re going to die would rob us of the joy of living
- When fear robs us of the joy of living, in certain ways we have already died
- Perhaps this is why God chooses to keep that information from us
- Yet, the opposite reaction is also possible
- Knowing when we’re going to die might change our life for the good
- There are countless stories about how the lives of people who have been diagnosed with a terminal illness have been radically changed by the knowledge that they have a limited amount of time left to live
- Relationships with those they love become deeper and more meaningful; a lot more effort is made to restore relationships that have been broken
- The beauty of the world becomes more exquisite as they take the time to notice little things that were so often taken for granted
- Every moment becomes precious, so it becomes very important to make the best use of each of them rather than to waste them on meaningless endeavors
- But isn’t it sad that this attitude is applied only to the final moments of life rather than to the whole of our living?
- Death Calculator
- If you’re interested in knowing how long your life will be and when it is that you might die, there is a way to find out with reasonable accuracy
- Dr. David Demko, a well-known gerontologist in Boca Raton, FL has been doing research for the past 30 years on lifestyle patterns that either enhance or diminish life expectancy
- While he was in graduate school in Michigan in 1974, he developed the Death Calculator, and shortly after, he received the support of the U. S. Administration on Aging
- Since then, the Death Calculator has been used around the world to predict life expectancy, based upon certain lifestyle behavior patterns
- The Death Calculator is really a simple quiz
- Based upon a median age of 79, you add or subtract years based upon your answers to the questions
- The questions include such things as:
- Do you have an annual physical exam? If yes, add three years; if no, subtract three years
- Do you volunteer on a weekly basis? If yes, add two years; if no subtract one
- Are you able to laugh at and learn from your mistakes” Yes = plus one year; no = minus three years
- Do you belong to a religious group and do you practice your faith? You gain two years for a yes answer, but you lose nothing for a no
- I was so curious when I read about this that I went online to take the death calculator survey
- Dying at a young age is a concern of mine since the males in my family tend to die in their early 60s
- There is longevity in my family, but it runs in the women
- My great-grandmother lived to be 102, and my great-great-grandmother lived to be 107
- I was nervous when I finished the 55 questions and began to tally my score
- But according to this calculator,, I stand a pretty good chance of living until I’m 101—that gives me another 48 years
- If you’re interested in taking this survey yourself, you can find it online at www.demko.com
- The point of Dr. Demko’s Death Calculator isn’t to predict when we’re going to die
- It’s purpose has to do with the way we live
- It’s intended to help us focus on making lifestyle choices that will help us live life in the healthiest way possible
- And it’s certainly better to make those choices now before we die because after we die, we have no choices at all
- Living Life
- The Way We Choose to Live
- And that brings us to our Scripture Lessons for today
- The 91st Psalm is an often read and much loved psalm
- In it, the psalmist declares his hope and confidence in the loving grace and gracious protection of God
- If we dwell in the shelter of the Most High God, we will find rest in God’s shadow
- God will be for us a mighty fortress, protecting us from harm
- God will gather us under God’s wings, just as a mother bird gathers her chicks, and God will even provide angels to lift us up and keep us from harm
- These are glorious promises, but we have to be careful how we understand them
- The key to understanding this passage lies in the opening words of this psalm, and the focal point of that first verse in the word “dwell”
- To “dwell in the shelter of the Most High” means to live our life in the presence of God
- And to live in the presence of God means to live life God’s way
- To live life God’s way is to structure our lifestyle and to make choices that will enhance the quality of life rather than harm it—for ourselves and for others
- It is to actively seek to do the will of God
- How often have we heard people complain, or we’ve complained ourselves, that God doesn’t care because God has allowed certain things to happen to us?
- We have a habit of running to God for shelter only after we’ve done something stupid or wrong or hurtful
- Far too often, we come running to God to “fix things” after we’ve made a complete mess out of life, then we accuse God of not caring when our troubles don’t instantly disappear
- God’s gracious protection is ours only insofar as we are willing to “dwell” in God’s presence
- As we live according to the pattern that God has designed for us to live, God will be our protection and will satisfy us with long life
- But when we choose to live a lifestyle that is different from what God has designed, God’s protection is not guaranteed
- While God loves us and will forgive us, God will not instantly remove the consequences that result from the choices we have made while living a lifestyle contrary to the will of God
- Murphy’s Law or Jesus’ Law
- It amazes me how much of life is governed by Murphy’s Law rather than the Law of God
- I don’t know who this guy Murphy is, but the law he formulated significantly influences the way many of us live our lives
- Murphy’s Law states “Anything that can go wrong will go wrong at the worst possible moment.”
- Buying into this law colors the way we look at life and influences everything we do
- Murphy focuses us on the negative side of life rather than the positive, and draws our attention to what’s wrong with the world rather than to what’s right with it
- He convinces us that we are subject to fate rather than grace, and we have no control over what happens to us
- Worst of all, his law develops an attitude of pessimism within us, and that pessimism becomes the breeding ground for worry
- If we’re really interested in not only living longer but living better, one of the best things we can do is to eliminate most of the stress we’re under, and the key cause of stress is worry
- Worry is a mental and emotional response of concern or fear to vague or unspecified threats
- And there’s scientific evidence that proves the effects that worry has on our health and well-being
- So many of the diseases that afflict so many of us—like high blood pressure, heart attack, stroke, and even cancer—are directly related to the amount of stress we’re under and the amount of time we spend worrying about things that will probably never happen to us
- So Jesus’ words are very true—we can’t add a single hour to our life by worrying
- In fact, worry will effectively shorten our life rather than lengthen it
- But the reverse is also true
- Evidence has shown that not being a chronic worrier can add not only an hour, but perhaps even years to your lifespan
- Worry is related to a shortage of hope and trust, and that’s the point Jesus is making in these words from the Sermon on the Mount
- How we deal with issues that stress us is directly related to faith
- While Jesus’ words about worry are stated in the imperative (as a command), that’s one law he gave that we have difficulty following today because we have a lot more to worry about
- A certain amount of anxiety is normal because it spurs us to action, but we often allow our worries to cripple us so that we can’t act, and that’s when worry becomes counterproductive and jeopardizes our health and wholeness
- It’s this kind of worry that Jesus is talking about
- A Prescription for Faith
- To help counteract the devastating effects that chronic worry has upon us, Jesus prescribes a two-part remedy
- Part one of the remedy is “Seek first the kingdom of God”
- An alternate translation of this verse is “Strive for the kingdom of God first.”
- “Strive” means to exert a lot of energy and effort toward a goal, and “kingdom of God” simply means to do God’s will in our living
- These words are Jesus’ summary of the teachings of the 91st Psalm
- What Jesus is saying, in other words, is that rather than waiting for that far off day for God’s kingdom to arrive so that all our worries will disappear, we ought to actively work to build God’s kingdom here and now
- And as we do, some of the things we fret about are going to become non-issues because we’ve got more important things to be busy with
- Rather than worrying about things such as war and terrorism, we ought to busy ourselves with making peace because peace is a reflection of the kingdom of God
- Rather than worrying about things that might go wrong in our life, we ought to invest ourselves in righting those things in our culture that cause injury and harm to others
- There are a lot more creative uses for the energy we waste in worry, and as we learn to channel that energy in more creative ways helping others and seeking to do God’s will in the world, what we’ll discover is that we’ll have a lot less to worry about
- The second part of Jesus’ prescription is to live one day at a time
- It sounds simplistic, but it works
- All we have is today; yesterday is gone and we can never get it back, and tomorrow hasn’t arrived yet
- “This is the day the Lord has made,” declares the Psalmist, “let us rejoice and be glad in it.” (Psalm 118:23)
- When we make it a practice to rejoice in the gift of each new day and to use that day to serve God, we will find that we have less to worry about—no matter what that day happens to bring
- We’ll feel better and we’ll live longer because we’re letting God do our worrying for us
- Putting our hope and trust in God doesn’t mean that we’ll never experience worry again because some worry is unavoidable
- What it does mean is that we’ll have a source of strength to help us deal with those things that cause our worry that’s greater than our own
- Rather than expecting everything to go wrong and be caught in the trap of Murphy’s self-fulfilling prophecy, we can learn to focus on the good side of life and enjoy our days with greater health and happiness for however many days God gives us to live