Valerie Schultz: Taking nothing with us? God always comes along
| Monday, Oct 12 2009 11:26 AM
Last Updated Monday, Oct 12 2009 11:26 AM
"Jesus summoned the Twelve and ... sent them to proclaim the Kingdom of God and to heal the sick. He said to them, "Take nothing for the journey, neither walking stick, nor sack, nor food, nor money, and let no one take a second tunic."
(Luke 9:1-3)
Take nothing for the journey. It's not exactly the way most of us travel these days.
Or the way we live. We are such creatures of comfort. We count on our things to make us happy, to give us a sense of security, to pamper us when we've had a bad day. At least, I do. I know in my heart that love and and faith and truth and justice matter more than material things, but I still want a belly-warming cup of tea and a soft bed when night falls. And maybe a small amount of cash tucked away in a drawer, just in case.
What a leap of faith, to take nothing for the journey! What trust, what clarity! And the amazing thing is that the apostles did as Jesus directed, without question or argument. I would have made a poor apostle. I am such a worrier that I would have wanted to pack several lunches, a second, third, and fourth tunic, and a first-aid kit in my oversized sack.
There is a long mystic tradition of those who have taken nothing for the journey: monks and missionaries, prophets and visionaries, who took voluntary vows of poverty and relied on the kindness of strangers. Throughout the ages, wiser souls than I have trusted God to take care of them as they went about God's work. I have much to learn from them.
And I have every reason to trust and believe: every time we have one of those months when our family budget is off track, when income falls way short of expenses, when I lose sleep worrying about the future, something always rescues us. Something comes in the mail or costs less or otherwise barely averts disaster, and I wonder anew why I don't ever trust that God will take care of us.
Maybe we aren't all called to get down to one tunic or to hit the road to proclaim God's Kingdom. Yet we are called, especially in the midst of global recession, to simplify our perhaps overly materialistic lifestyles, to be mindful of the less fortunate, to trust God as we undertake whatever our life's journey may be, and to help those we meet along the way who truly have no food or money or sack or walking stick. The language of the Gospels may be dated. The message surely is not.
