Hakuna Matata - Matthew 6:25-34

              It was the summer of 1994, the year before our high school seniors were born. That summer, through the animation of Walt Disney productions, a little meerkat named Timon and a warthog named Pumba taught most of us, whether we knew it or not, a little Swahili.  As they sang to a depressed Simba, offering their life philosophy, they taught us this little phrase:

“Hakuna Matata!”

How many of you remember this phrase?  How many of you remember what it means?  That’s right, “No worries.”  Some other folks would translate it “no problem.”  Timon and Pumba offered up a worry free and care free attitude where you just ignore everything except that which makes you feel good.

However, just in the course of our high school graduates' lifetimes (not to mention the lifetime of those of us just a little older) there has been much to cause worry.

v  In 1995, the year most of our graduates were born, the Oklahoma City Bombing took place.

v  In 1999, as they turned four, the Columbine High School Massacre took place—and the world waited with anticipated worry over Y2K.

v  In 2001, their first grade year, the tragedy of September 11^th took place.

v  While in elementary school, the world also experienced a sniper reigning terror upon our nation’s capital, the space shuttle disintegrating on reentry, a massive tsunami hitting the South Pacific leaving up to 280,000 dead, and Hurricane Katrina devastating Louisiana and Mississippi.

v  While our graduates were in middle school our nation watched in shock as a gunman ravaged the campus of Virginia Tech and we struggled with both physical and financial sickness of the swine flu, and the beginning of our ongoing recession.

v  During high school our graduates and the world have witnessed the devastation of earthquakes in one of the poorest nations, Haiti, and one of the richest, Japan. The natural disasters of Super-storm Sandy and the twister of Moore, Oklahoma also compounded many folks worries.  The violence of the Aurora Colorado, Sandy Hook Elementary School, and the Boston Marathon Bombings also brought fear into the lives of many folks.

These are just a few of the things that we and the world were given to worry about over the course of our graduates' lives.  Now our graduates get to join the adult world with a whole new set of everyday worries, the worries of life.  Where will you live?  When will you get married?  Where will your food come from?  Where will your clothes come from? Will you be successful in whatever career you attempt?  The list of things to worry about could just continue on indefinitely.  Timon and Pumba and their Hakuna Matata mantra, are just way off base in the real world, aren’t they?  We have plenty to worry about.

That is why, my brothers and sisters, that our graduates need, that we all need, to hear the words that Jesus spoke as he began bringing his sermon on the Galilean hillside to a close.  Jesus had been teaching to all those who had gathered to hear him the keys to living a faithful life—addressing what it means to truly live as the people of God.  He taught them regarding anger, adultery, divorce, and swearing oaths.  He addressed retaliation and loving your enemy.  Jesus explained how to give, how to pray, and how to fast.  We find Jesus calling us to focus hearts and treasures in upon God, not the things of this world.  Then Jesus addressed what is probably a huge struggle for most of the population…worries about the necessities of life.  Jesus tells those gathered, not to worry about what we’re going to eat and not to worry about what we are going to wear.  He says look at the birds of the air and notice how God feeds them, they’re not malnourished, they aren’t starving to death, and if God loves those birds enough to do that, just think what God will do for you as he values you above the birds.  Then Jesus says, look at the lilies in the field.  Look at them, look how beautiful they are; look at how beautifully God has clothed them.  Jesus says, if God clothes the flowers out there that are here today and gone tomorrow so beautifully, how much more beautifully will he clothe you. 

Jesus says don’t worry about the basics of life, God’s going to take care of you, he’ll provide what you need. 

Does that mean that we can sit back and relax, without a care in the world and just say “God, Hey, I’d like a pepperoni pizza today; or “God, a plate of Honey-Chipotle Chicken Crispers from Chili’s sure would be good.”?  Can we expect to lay back on our couches and say, “Hey God, my Nike’s are a month old, I need some new ones;” or “Lord, these jeans are no longer in style, I need a new pair.”?  No, my brothers and sisters, God doesn’t work like that.  When Jesus tells us not to worry about these things like the world worries about them, Jesus isn’t suggesting that God is going to become our Genie in a lamp that we can rub like Aladdin.

Jesus isn’t saying that God is going to grant us everything on our wish list.  He is saying that God knows what we need, what we truly need, the provisions of life—food, clothing, shelter—and we don’t need to worry about those things, God will provide them. 

Jesus tells us where our concern needs to be.  He says, “seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness…”  According to Jesus, the thing that should concern us most is not whether we have what we think are the basic necessities of life, but whether or not we are seeking to live out our lives as citizens of the Kingdom of God and whether or not we are living lives that are filled with the righteousness of God.  In other words, God’s Will, God’s desire for us and the world around us should be first and foremost on our minds, and whether we are living in accordance with our wills or God’s will. 

Jesus tells us if we seek out the Kingdom of God, if we strive with all our might to live according to God’s will with the grace that God gives us, then we’re going to find ourselves blessed.  If we are seeking out with our lives to use whatever gifts God has given us to build up His Kingdom, if we are seeking to live righteous lives, then God is going to meet every true need we have.  It may not mean that we’ll have Papa John’s, Harbor Inn, or Chili’s every night.  It may not mean that we’ll have the newest and hottest brand of tennis shoes and jeans.  But it does mean that if we are seeking to live our lives in accordance with the will of God, that won’t matter, because God is going to provide everything we need, and really, everything we want—because if what we want is in accordance with God’s will, then it will shift what our hearts truly desire and the things of this world that we think we want will not be as important any more.  It also means that in the midst of those trauma’s that strike our world, we understand and realize that while we are living in this world, we are citizens of God’s Kingdom and that those events, whether we physically survive them or not, cannot and will not have the final say in our lives—God will—and we can move from fear to confidence.

Jesus’ “Hakuna matata” philosophy is not to ignore all except for what makes you feel good…but that we should live lives of “no worry” because we have learned to rely completely upon God.  Jesus was years ahead of Disney.  Jesus was even years ahead of medical science, which has concluded that worrying isn’t good for our bodies.  Jesus said, which of you, by worrying, can add a single year to their lives?  We can’t and now doctors have even linked worry and stress to early death. 

My brothers and sisters, each morning we wake up we are faced with a choice.  Whether to let ourselves get caught up in all that the world tells us we need to worry about, or to face the day with, not a “care-free” but with a “God-freed” philosophy.  The world is going to tell us to worry about everything from whether or not we have what will make us popular to whether the air we breathe is safe for us—from concerns over the weather to unemployment to gun-wielding individuals on the brink of losing it.  However, we need to begin each day by seeking out God’s Kingdom and his righteousness—whether we are heading off to college, heading off to school, head off to work, or enjoying retirement, then, as we seek where God is leading us, and trust in his care, we will truly be able to say, “Hakuna Matata, No Worries!”

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.