Why Worry When You Can Pray?

Philippians 4:6-9

Why Worry When You Can Pray?

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.

Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies.

Food for thought!

Our meditation for today is based on today's second reading from the Letter to the Philippians.  St. Paul reminds us that our faith in Christ affects how we face the problems of life. Whereas people who have no faith usually respond to life's problems with worry, people of faith respond to life's problems with prayer. As Jo Ann Carlson  said, “The minds of people are so cluttered up with everyday living these days that they don’t, or won’t, take time out for a little prayer—for mental cleansing, just as they take a bath for physical, outer cleansing. Both are necessary.” 

And so Paul enjoins us: "Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns." (Philippians 4:6). First Paul reminds us that prayer is not simply reading a shopping list of our needs before God. It also includes praises to God for the blessing of life and faith that we enjoy already.

In prayer, we can take everything to God. Yes, every thing in your life; not  just some things. As it has been beautifully put: "There is nothing too great for God's power; and nothing too small for his fatherly care." A child may take anything, great or small, to a parent, sure that whatever happens to him is of interest there, his little triumphs and disappointments, his passing cuts and bruises; we may in exactly the same way take anything to God, sure of his interest and concern.

We can pray for forgiveness for the past, for the things we need in the present, and for help and guidance for the future. We can take our own past and present and future into the presence of God.When we pray, we must always remember three things. We must remember the love of God, which ever desires only what is best for us. We must remember the wisdom of God, which alone knows what is best for us. We must remember the power of God, which alone can bring to pass that which is best for us. He who prays with a perfect trust in the love, wisdom and power of God will find God's peace.

This is what happens when we learn to take all our problems to the Lord in prayer. We trade our stress and worry for peace of mind. And talking of the mind, the human mind will always set itself on something. This is something of the utmost importance, because it is a law of life that, if a man thinks of something often enough, he will come to the stage when he cannot stop thinking about it. His thoughts will be quite literally in a groove out of which he cannot jerk them. It is, therefore, of the first importance that we should set our thoughts upon the right things and here Paul makes a list of them: "you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse." These are the things that must be our daily food for thought.

Prayer has another dimension. In prayer, we giveback to God his due. We recognize him as our creator and sustainer.  In today's Gospel reading (Matthew 21:33-43), we find people who refuse to give to God what belongs to God.  A set of rebellious farm managers enjoy the benefits that accrue to them as managers but withhold the benefits that should go to the landowner. Oar landlord is the Lord. We all have at least received life from God. Life is given to us in trust. We are expected to cultivate and manage this life in such a way that it bears good fruit - fruit that we can present to God the owner of our lives on the day of reckoning.

If and when the management of our life become difficult, worry is not the solution. We are  expected to go back to God in prayer. As our lives become more complex and our concerns more encompassing, prayer becomes the last resort. Let us not forget the Scripture guideline to “pray without ceasing.” I attribute a large part of my own formula for success to the power of prayer in my daily life.

Whatever you do in life, whether you get married, bring a case to a court of law, perform surgery on a child, or buy a stock, it is wise to begin with prayer. That prayer should be that God may use you as a clear channel for his wisdom and love. Perhaps some of us stopped praying, either because we didn’t feel our prayers were being answered, or we didn’t like the answers we received from God.

In his book My Favorite Quotations, Dr. Norman Vincent Peale wrote the following about prayer: “If you want to utilize the matchless power of prayer, begin praying immediately and continue at every opportunity. I have observed from a number of enquiries that the average person probably spends about five minutes a day in prayer. That is one-half of 1 percent of one’s waking hours. [...] If you want to experience the heady energy of prayer, practice it more often. The physician, Alexis Carrel, a spiritual pioneer, advised praying everywhere: in the street, the office, the shop, the school. You can transform spare moments by praying for your need, for everyone and everything you can think of. Then believe that your prayers will be answered. They will be. And prayer is always answered in one of three ways: no, yes, or wait awhile.”