In Matthew 6:28-34 we are reminded to seek God first and to not worry because God loves and cares for his children. Listen to part of this familiar passage – the words of our Lord in The Message paraphrase.

If God gives such attention to the appearance of wildflowers—most of which are never even seen—don’t you think he’ll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you? What I’m trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met. Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.

These words spoke to me this week. Maybe this happens with getting older, maybe it’s the busyness of our culture, but I confess that too often I feel “FOMO” or fear of missing out. I wonder if I am really appreciating or celebrating the moments or if I am letting them just fly by. Sometimes I have that conversation in my head and then scold myself because I just missed paying attention to the very moment I was in. I know – I’m a work in progress here people!

I think that’s why these verses popped up in my Bible app this week. God wanted me to hear them, just that way. “Relax. Don’t be preoccupied with getting things. Don’t fuss over things. Trust Me.” And I feel the latter part of these verses tell us how to do that. “Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions.” The definition of the word steep as a verb includes words like soak, drench, saturate, immerse, absorb. To steep something properly takes time, it doesn’t happen instantly.

That’s probably why it’s calming – it slows us down. I encourage you to read over these words this week and join me as I work at steeping myself more in God-reality. Let’s relax more, worry less and trust in God’s provision and love.

Walking Humbly,
~ Pastor Cindy