Consider the lilies . . .

Worry as a lament

One of my grandmother’s favorite Bible stories comes from Luke 12:22-34, sometimes referred to in shorthand as “The Lilies of the Field.” I first heard her recite it from memory when we were on the strike line in front of the factory where she was ladling out soup and I was handing out pieces of bread.

My family was very involved in the Labor Union Organizing Movement, mostly at the textile mills in Fall River, MA, where I grew up. They were part of the founding of the International Lady Garment Worker’s Union (ILGWU), on Third Street. My grandmother would make certain that, as the weeks and months of the strike continued, “the men” had something to eat.

She would make a huge vat of soup and many loaves of bread, load it up on my shiny red Radio Flyer wagon, and we would make the several-mile walk from her house down to the factories to meet the men at the strike line.

The memory that is keenest in my mind is the time we arrived and, not only were the men in line, but there, off to the side, were their wives and children who were also hungry and had come, hoping for something to eat.

There was no mistaking the tension in the air but it became very real when I heard my grandmother suck her breath between her teeth. I also heard her whisper a prayer to Jesus and one to Mary, to make sure her son got the message:

Hey there! We need a little help, here, sir. Remember what you did near Bethsaida near the Sea of Galilee, when you fed four or five thousand from five loaves of bread and two fish? Well, here we are, in Fall River, near the Taunton River. We’re going to need that kind of miracle now. Mary? Please make sure your son hears this. Okay? Amen.

The tension grew thick enough to cut with a knife. Anxiety was written over everyone’s faces, but you could almost hear the pleas from the eyes of the women and see the fear on the faces of the children.

My grandmother’s brow was furrowed. That’s when I started to feel scared.

I don’t know what happened, exactly. There was no bolt of lightning. No thunder. No chorus of angels, singing.

I remember feeling a gnawing in the pit of my stomach. It hurt. And then, it didn’t.

I looked up and saw my grandmother’s face. It was relaxed. She was smiling. I heard her say, “Okay, everybody! Get in line. We’ve got some good Portuguese Kale Soup here, and bread that I made this morning. Lots of people here today, but you know, it’s okay. Don’t worry. We’ll just add some water to the soup and everyone will eat hearty.”

The soft sound of human laughter seemed to reach the men who had been moving determinedly toward us. They suddenly stopped and, like the Red Sea, they parted. One of the men motioned to the women to come first, with the children. They were hesitant at first, but the hunger in their bellies animated and moved their feet and they came forward with a cup they had pulled from a place deep in their pockets.

I stood next to my grandmother, tearing off pieces of bread and handing them to the children and their mothers until they were fed. The men came next for their soup and bread. As she served, my grandmother recited the story from Luke 12:

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothes.”

It was as quiet as a communion line in church. The soup ladle occasionally clanged against the pot like a sanctus bell. “Consider the lilies, how they grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.”

People were quiet but smiling, now, as they came forward in the line. As I struggled to tear off a piece of bread from the loaf, you could hear the “rip” in the silence of the crowds. “If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will he clothe you—you of little faith!”

I heard my grandmother’s voice over the scraping of the last ladle of soup was given out. ”And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. ^{. . . . . .} But seek God’s kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well”.

Without logic or reason and despite this being the largest crowd ever, we realized that the last person had been fed.

We took a moment to let that reality sink in. Everyone had been fed.

Not much, to be sure. Just a half a cup or so of soup and a small piece of bread. Just enough to stop the rumbling in their stomachs. Just enough to fuel their body’s energy to keep on. Just enough to restore the hope in their hearts that God, at least, if not the owners of the textile mills, was hearing their prayers.

I realized then, two things. The first was that worry is a form of prayer. It is part of an ancient lament that has been part of the human enterprise for eons. My child’s mind wondered that if we did not lament, if we did not raise our minds and hearts and voices to God in a passionate expression of grief or sorrow or anxiety, how would God know that we need help?

St. Paul assures us that “The Spirit intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words.” The Psalmist wrote that even as “a deer longs for a water brook,” so do our deepest longings find their way to the ears of God.

I have come to know that the expression of raw emotion - the most piteous plea, the loudest, wailing cry - is heard in the deepest chambers of the heart of God. I believe that is what happened that day. God heard our worry. God heard our anxiety.

God can say, “Be not afraid.” And, “Do not worry about your life,” and “Consider the lilies,” because God knows that Jesus taught - and some of us listened - that when we feed the hungry and cloth the naked, we are feeding him.

Some of us have come to know the truth of what Teresa of Avila wrote in her poem, "Christ has no body but yours, / No hands, no feet on earth but yours".

So, no, I am not ashamed to worry. I am not ashamed to wring my hands and pace the floor. I am not ashamed of the occasional rising tide of anxiety in my soul. I know that these are forms of lament. I know these to be ancient prayers I share with my ancestors.

I know that God is listening. God’s time is not my time, but God hears.

I also learned something else that day. I learned that, sometimes, communion is not just bread delivered on a silver paten and wine administered from a silver chalice.

Sometimes, the holiest communion is provided from a large vat, administered in a tin cup, and delivered from one small hand to another in a jagged piece of bread.

As the government, which is once again presided over by little men of enormous incompetence and cruelty, runs perilously close to the brink of destruction, the tariff wars rage, and the dark clouds of a recession begin to gather, please consider the lilies of the field, yes, but know that our worries and anxieties are laments that are precious to the very heart of God.

Oh, ye of little faith! Know that God’s time is not our time but God knows the sound of the human cry because God has made it in the suffering and hunger, the cries and laments of Jesus.