Aug. 16, 2015
It never fails to surprise me how in this congregation, when we begin to talk about big, vulnerable things, the confession most folks want to make is not a confession of sin, it’s not a revelation of pride, sloth, gluttony, wrath, envy, greed or lust—rather, what comes out, is a confession of the terrible hold that anxiety has over their lives, your lives. The anxiety might be specific: about a decision, a job, a relationship, a new initiative, but more commonly it’s a generalized anxiety, a giant miasmic anxiety that holds you hostage to fears of death, either the Big One or the little deaths of your particular hopes and plans. It squeezes your life like a great and terrible sea monster, careening up from the depths without warning to seize your little ship and splinter it into pieces.
