Friday, 26 December, 2003

This series of devotions are focused around Soren Kierkegaard’s “Christian Discourses etc.” The biblical text to consider during these devotions is: Matthew 6:24-34.



The measure which God employs in meting out food to the bird is the same measure, if I may say so, which the bird has in its mouth: (God) gives the bird ‘enough’, then the bird measures it and says, ‘It is enough.’ If the little bird quenches its thirst on a dew-drop, which is exactly enough, or if it drinks from the largest lake, it takes just as little, it does not require to have all that it sees, not to have the whole lake because it drinks from it, not to take the lake with it so that it may be secured for its whole life;… When the bird has eaten and drunken it never occurs to it to ask, Where am I to get something the next time? Therefore the poor bird is not poor after all, but it never occurs to it to ask what it shall do with the remainder, with the whole lake, with the immense provision of corn which remains over when the bird has take the three grains which were ‘enough’ – it has not, it does not possess, abundance, and has no the anxiety of it.



“It does not require to have all that it sees.” The anxiety of abundance, to which Kierkegaard directs himself here, is an amazing phenomenon among us. He writes in the middle of the 19th century and yet he could be writing for us today. In our abundance we look for more and more. Imagine what life would be if we would let ourselves push away from the lake and be content with a few drops that will indeed satisfy us?!? But then, there are always reasons to have more. Imagine, in the 19th century he was not having to deal with the parade of television commercials that make it appear as though we are always left with less than what we need. Today so many of us live with the anxiety that attempts to push us into stretching ourselves more and more…to have more and more…or produce more and more…or consume more and more. If we have less than more, then, we cannot be good enough…our children will be less than the best…our houses will not be as good as others…our cars will not be as fast or as safe. The anxiety of abundance becomes a never ending parade in which we lose touch with what it is to have enough…the enough promised by our God.



Connection: I know, it’s the day after Christmas…there are sales out there!! In our abundance, we would do well to consider the lilies of the field and the birds of the air. Who knows what such contemplation might bring to this day.



Benevolent God and Gracious Giver of life, you provide for us and you call us out of our self-centered ways so that more and more of your beloved people will have enough. When we long to stretch out for more, bless us with the eyes to see how we can be a gift to others by letting go of some of our great abundance. Amen