Is Not Life More?
Is not life more than what you think it is?
Frederick Buechner
I ran across these words of Buechner in his small yet profound book Telling the Truth. He is, of course, paraphrasing Jesus' words in his mountaintop sermon on anxiety recorded by Matthew (ch 6). But the way Buechner captures Jesus' words hit me like a crosscurrent. It hit me like a crosscurrent for I was sitting at a coffeeshop, looking out on Greenwood Ave., and thinking this all looks nice. This life is nice. Is not life more than what you think it is? More than what it appears or seems to be? Apparently, Jesus in asking this question, assumes an answer. We might even say he is wrapping a statement in the garb of a question. There is more to life than what we often think there is. And if that is true, what is that "more"?
In his sermon, Jesus preaches on the angular, sharp, dread-inducing "life" of anxiety. We have too many things we might worry about: clothing and food for start. Yet, Jesus asks rhetorically, is not life more than what you think it is, even these basic necessities? That "more" of which we seek, is another world. A kingdom if you like. A kingdom with a King who serves his subjects, even to the point that his scrubbing away of their grime leaves his hands raw and bleeding, bloody sweat dripping from his face because of the exertion, and the evidence of it seen on his feet. This kingdom has a King who calls a spade, a spade. And with everything else that he names, he is not simply stating what it is; his very words state that it is. Brother. Sister. Child of God. Forgiven. This kingdom and its King brings with it that elusive thing we name "justice" though it cannot be found in our world. We only see fragments of it, hear whispers of it echoing from our halls of legislation and the courtroom. Yet this King executes justice, not according to an ever-lengthening law code written by the legislature, but he executes justice for he is Truth.
And it is this kingdom with her King that is the "more." For this King says to dry bones, Live. And to the thirsty who have no money to purchase water to slake their thirst, Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. And to the dying, Today you will be with me...in paradise.
Is not life more than what you think it is?
– Matthew