Serene engagement

He who finds his ulti­ma­te sup­port in the hea­ven­ly Father beco­mes ser­e­ne. Free of worry and fear, he can focus on the king­dom of God. This means com­mit­ting ones­elf to the values of peace, joy and jus­ti­ce in all are­as of life. Whoe­ver does this wit­hout reser­ve will expe­ri­ence God’s pro­vi­si­on by means of many coin­ci­den­ces. The meta­mor­phic cycle is: sere­ni­ty from pray­er – com­mit­ment to the king­dom of God – pro­vi­si­on by chan­ce. The ent­ry point is in pray­er – enjoy­ing child­li­ken­ess and nur­tu­ring com­mu­ni­on with Daddy.

The 828-met­re-high Burj Kha­li­fa in Dubai is the tal­lest sky­scra­per in the world. 192 thick steel gir­ders were dri­ven 50 met­res into the ground and shut­te­red with 45,000 cubic met­res of con­cre­te. The bridge with the lar­gest span is the Chao­tian­men Yangtze Bridge in Chi­na with an arch of 552 met­res. To with­stand the resul­ting loads, piers with good sup­port are nee­ded. Child­ren who are to exert a posi­ti­ve influence on socie­ty later on need good sup­port in the paren­tal home, whe­re they expe­ri­ence accep­tance and secu­ri­ty. The­re is an obvious con­nec­tion bet­ween a person’s inner roo­ted­ness and their atti­tu­des and vir­tu­es, right down to the impact on socie­ty.

From the Igna­ti­an tra­di­ti­on comes the fol­lo­wing play on words:

• What is my last HALT? What can and will I rely on, build on, hope for?
• Out of this grows HOLDINGS such as gene­ro­si­ty, kind­ness, trust, free­dom, recon­ci­lia­ti­on and hope.
• The­se direct my CONDUCT.
• And this in turn con­tri­bu­tes to sha­ping the RELATIONS whe­re I live.

Sup­port, atti­tu­des, beha­viour, con­di­ti­ons – this is the chain of effects that is also made clear in the Ser­mon on the Mount.

Serenity

Whe­re does the sup­port come from in our lives that allows us to remain calm even in the storms of ever­y­day life? It is the inti­ma­te com­mu­ni­on with our Father in hea­ven. That is why the Pray­er of the Unfa­ther is in the midd­le of the who­le Ser­mon on the Mount. The fol­lo­wing state­ments are made about this Father:

«Look at the birds. They do not need to sow or reap or gather pro­vi­si­ons, for your hea­ven­ly Father pro­vi­des for them. And you are much more important to him than they are»(Matthew 6:26 NLB). God crea­ted the world in a gre­at eco­lo­gi­cal balan­ce. Every ani­mal is part of an ela­bo­ra­te food chain. The catt­le egret, for exam­p­le, is often seen on the back of lar­ge ani­mals such as buf­fa­loes and ele­phants. They pick small pes­ky ani­mals off their bodies. It’s con­ve­ni­ent for both. Only fresh food is available for this heron spe­ci­es. Not­hing is packed and stored in tins. The hea­ven­ly dad­dy pro­vi­des anew every day.

«[…] Look at the lilies and how they grow. They do not work or sew clo­thes for them­sel­ves. Yet even King Solo­mon in all his sple­ndour was not so glo­rious­ly clo­thed as they. If God cares so won­derful­ly for the flowers that blos­som today and wither tomor­row, how much more does he care for you? […]» (Matthew 6:28–30 NLB). Our Father in hea­ven dres­ses the flowers so beau­tiful­ly that we can’t mana­ge it after any colour and style con­sul­ta­ti­on. The colours are inge­nious­ly coor­di­na­ted. It’s just right. At the moment, Sil­via and I are working on the colour con­cept for the kit­chen and living room when we reno­va­te our new house. It’s incre­di­bly dif­fi­cult and invol­ves a lot of uncer­tain­ty as to how it will final­ly look. Our Father gives every living being the per­fect outfit.

«[…] Your hea­ven­ly Father knows your needs»(Matthew 6:32 NLB). This is the core state­ment and basis for sere­ni­ty. Your hea­ven­ly Father knows your needs. That is true! In the com­pa­ri­sons with fee­ding the birds and clot­hing the lilies, the con­clu­si­on is: «And you are much more important to him than them» and «How much more does he care for you then?» You are incom­pa­ra­b­ly more important to the hea­ven­ly Father than a bird or a flower. He cares for you – as a father does for his child. This Father is not one who just talks big and has not­hing to offer. No, He draws from unli­mi­t­ed resour­ces, He owns all sil­ver and gold (Hag­gai 2:8). And this wealt­hy father says to the elder son in the para­ble: «Look, my dear son, you and I are very clo­se, and all I have is yours»(Luke 15:31 NLB). If you have acqui­red the right to be a child of the hea­ven­ly Father through faith in Jesus Christ, this also appli­es to you. You recei­ve a share in all the riches of the Father.

This know­ledge bursts all worries like soap bubbles. In com­mu­ni­on with this God you expe­ri­ence deep­ly and exis­ten­ti­al­ly that you can ans­wer the rele­vant ques­ti­ons like: Am I enough? Am I valuable and beau­tiful? Do I belong? Does God mean well with me? Does He care for me? you will hear an unre­ser­ved YES. This is the basis of sere­ni­ty, tran­quil­li­ty and stress-free living.

Goal orientation

Whoe­ver has set this pil­lar, this sup­port, in life, can build into the height and width. His atti­tu­des, shaped by the hea­ven­ly Father, lead to beha­viour and con­di­ti­ons that are in accordance with the King­dom of God. The­r­e­fo­re Jesus demands: «Seek ye first the king­dom of God and his righ­teous­ness […].»(Matthew 6:33 LUT). The­re are the ele­ments of goal ori­en­ta­ti­on and deter­mi­na­ti­on in it. It’s about deter­mi­na­ti­on and commitment.

What are we sup­po­sed to work for? I used to equa­te the King­dom of God with the Church. Con­se­quent­ly, one spo­ke of a voca­ti­on when someone set out pro­fes­sio­nal­ly in the direc­tion of a spi­ri­tu­al office. The­re is a big misun­derstan­ding behind this, about as big as this, that the Gos­pel is exclu­si­ve­ly about per­so­nal, indi­vi­du­al sal­va­ti­on. No, the gos­pel is the good news that Jesus Christ not only saves souls, but rede­ems all crea­ti­on. The King­dom of God is just as holi­stic. It descri­bes the cul­tu­re of the city on the moun­tain descri­bed in Matthew 5.

But the King­dom of God is to grow in all are­as of life: in per­so­nal spi­ri­tua­li­ty, in the fami­ly, in the church, in work and in poli­tics. From a holy sere­ni­ty and self-for­getful­ness, I beco­me free from oppor­tu­nism and can focus with full com­mit­ment on what is good and right. Paul cha­rac­te­ri­ses the king­dom of God in three terms: «For the king­dom of God is not about ques­ti­ons of eating and drin­king, but about what the Holy Spi­rit brings about: Jus­ti­ce, peace and joy»(Romans 14:17 NGÜ). We are to com­mit our­sel­ves to the­se values out of the filia­ti­on of God. When­ever God’s word hap­pens, gets hands and feet, the king­dom of God beco­mes visible.

If I sup­port the pre­ser­va­ti­on of an end­an­ge­red spe­ci­es, if I redu­ce CO₂-When I redu­ce my car­bon foot­print, when I work to impro­ve living con­di­ti­ons in a govern­ment agen­cy or asso­cia­ti­on, when I seek dia­lo­gue in my fami­ly ins­tead of with­dra­wing, when I am righ­teous in my work­place, when I nur­tu­re my rela­ti­onship with Hea­ven­ly Father, when I share the good news of the King­dom of God with others, when I honest­ly record my hours and expen­ses, when I address things direct­ly ins­tead of tal­king about them behind the sce­nes, I am see­king the King­dom of God.

Unfort­u­na­te­ly, not ever­y­thing that hap­pens under the roof of a church is the king­dom of God. An essen­ti­al dimen­si­on of God’s king­dom is loving rela­ti­onships or rela­ti­ons. King­dom of God hap­pens when I lea­ve my inner cir­cle and turn to someone who does not (yet) belong. Jacob Thies­sen, rec­tor of STH, once said: «Moreo­ver, one does not come only to con­su­me or to cri­ti­cise. Every mem­ber of the con­gre­ga­ti­on per­forms a ser­vice through his or her pre­sence. Tho­se who have this atti­tu­de come to wor­ship in a com­ple­te­ly dif­fe­rent way.«Do you come to the ser­vice rea­dy to ser­ve. With eyes open for peo­p­le who feel lonely and don’t belong (yet)? Who could you ser­ve today?

Jesus said: Seek the king­dom of God and I will form the Church. When we have found our foo­ting with the hea­ven­ly Father, we are set free to seek the king­dom of God. The spoils of this are satis­fac­tion and contentment.

Coincidence

«Seek first the king­dom of God and his righ­teous­ness, so all this will fall to you»(Matthew 6:33 LUT). With this state­ment the cir­cle clo­ses: sere­ni­ty from pray­er – com­mit­ment to the king­dom of God – pro­vi­si­on by chan­ce. This in turn leads to com­mu­ni­on with the dad­dy out of gra­ti­tu­de, from which fol­lows sere­ni­ty, com­mit­ment and fur­ther coin­ci­den­ces with sen­der. The ent­ry into this wond­rous cycle of meta­mor­pho­sis is in pray­er – enjoy­ing child­hood and nur­tu­ring com­mu­ni­on with Daddy.

Bes­i­des the dai­ly coin­ci­den­ces (see ward­ro­be and food table) of God’s pro­vi­si­on, the expe­ri­ence of buy­ing the house in Seon was such a coin­ci­dence for us. We never had to focus on that, but could seek the king­dom of God. The sen­tence «so all this will fall to you» is in the pas­si­ve voice. Our action is for the King­dom of God, the pro­vi­si­on of the neces­si­ties of life is the Father’s thing. It is just like in natu­ral life too. Just as the 3‑year-old daugh­ter does not worry about food and clot­hing, a child of God does not have to worry about mate­ri­al things. Our Father in hea­ven lets ever­y­thing fall to us that we so often worry about. By chan­ce, things fly towards us. It’s easy to live with this all-round care­free packa­ge! A gre­at gra­ti­tu­de ari­ses, which in turn leads us into pray­er to the hea­ven­ly Father.

Our voca­ti­on is to beco­me, figu­ra­tively spea­king, a Burj Kha­li­fa or a Chao­tian­men-Yang­tse Bridge in socie­ty. With the assu­rance that our ulti­ma­te hold is secu­red with the hea­ven­ly Father, we can exert high and wide influence on this world by see­king the king­dom of God. Through meta­mor­pho­sis, our atti­tu­des, our beha­viour and our cir­cum­s­tances change.

Possible questions for the small groups

Read the Bible text: Matthew 6:25–34

1. Accor­ding to the Ser­mon on the Mount, what is a pre­re­qui­si­te for sere­ni­ty? How do I reco­g­ni­se whe­re I have the last hold?
2. What are the pre­re­qui­si­tes for a care­free or anxie­ty-free life?
3. What is the King­dom of God? How is it cha­rac­te­ri­sed? In which are­as of life should it appear?
4. What does the strong verb «to seek» express in the con­text of the king­dom of God?
5. Does the Father in hea­ven real­ly allow all this to hap­pen? What are your expe­ri­en­ces with this promise?