Anxious

Sermon

I pray. I place my hands on the pulpit and feel the wood. I sense my feet firmly planted on the floor. I look up and see the stained-glass windows. I hear the soft sound of the blower behind me. I taste the peppermint I just finished. I breathe in the unique scent of this sanctuary. I place myself in this moment.

I do that every time I begin to preach, because for many years here, almost every time I made my way to the pulpit, I could feel a panic attack coming on that had nothing to do with stage fright. As the anthem would end and I would get up, I could feel my heart start to race and my breath quicken; I started to sweat, and I worried that I might faint or throw up or let out a stream of obscenities. And then? I would power through, and on the good days, about halfway through the sermon, I would be okay.

I tell you this for a couple of reasons. First, I know there are those of you out there who, like me, deal with anxiety and panic attacks, and I know you know how excruciating and debilitating and demoralizing they can be. I tell you this so you know that you are not alone.

And I tell you this because I think maybe if we were all a little more honest, issues of mental health would not carry the stigma that they do. I know I hid this from you, out of pride and shame. But if this time of coronavirus has taught me anything, it’s that we have to stop pretending that everything is okay and we’re swell. We need to strip ourselves of all the illusions and falsehoods and be who we truly are so that we can be in full relationship with each other.

And I tell you this, as someone for whom anxiety is an intermittent companion, because when Paul writes to his beloved friends at the congregation in Philippi not to be anxious, I want to scream. Right? You know when you’re having big feelings or a big response to something, and someone says to you, “Don’t be anxious; don’t be sad; don’t be angry,” – you know how unhelpful and oblivious that is.

Of course, the situation between Paul and the Jesus-followers in Philippi was a little different. He was writing them a letter, and it would arrive and be read aloud months after whatever had happened had happened. And what had happened? We can infer that the conflict between two leaders in the congregation, Euodia and Syntyche, had spread and was causing anxiety and worry and was impeding the good work there.

I was curious about this word merimnate, translated as “anxiety” or “worry,” and discovered that in the original Greek, it combines a verb that means to divide and a noun that means the mind. So to worry, to be anxious, is to have a divided mind. We cannot focus on the thing that is important because our mind is divided, distracted by something else.

We understand that. These last twelve months have been filled with anxieties we may never have anticipated.

People of all ages have worried that they will get COVID-19. They have worried that someone they love with get COVID-19. We have worried that our beloveds might die and we will not have had the opportunity to say goodbye or to be with them in their last days.

We have worried about our kids, so much, about their mental health after not being in the classroom, not being on the soccer field, not hanging out doing nothing with their friends. We have worried and then capitulated into more screen time than is good for us.

We have worried about keeping our jobs, losing our jobs, finding a job. We have worried about the long line of cars on the streets that surround the Northeast Emergency Food Pantry and our neighbors who need help to put food on the table. We have worried about getting the vaccine, about our parents getting the vaccine.

And now some of us worry about how we will come back from all of this, how to manage expectations because things will not be the same, ever.

If you’re feeling anxious right now, please allow yourself to take a deep breath.

The community at Philippi had worries of their own. As a fledgling community of Jesus-followers, they worried about bringing new people in to share the joy they had found. They worried about false accusations from those who did not understand this Jesus way. And they worried that conflict among them would bring the whole thing to ruin.

Paul’s answer to the anxiety in the community was this: the community. Paul deeply believed in the healing power of the community rooted in Jesus. He knew, and taught, and encouraged that the deep and abiding sense of community was what would allow this congregation to flourish and grow and carry out its mission of sharing the good news of Jesus Christ. He knew that ostracizing those in the conflict, dismissing Euodia and Syntyche, was not the answer. He knew the community needed to step into that conflict, and break it open, and infuse it with love and mercy and truth.

And so I wonder how that plays out for us in the anxiety we feel, in the conflicts we have known especially in this last year. Let me say that Westminster has not experienced that kind of conflict. There are some who are restless for us to get back to public worship and group activities, but that is to be expected and is not the source of any real conflict.

But how do we, in the communities we’re a part of, bring any healing to what we’ve been through this last year? Can our anxiety related to this virus, or related to racism, or related to the rise of far-right militants, or any number of things, be alleviated?

I think it can, but it takes honesty, and it takes work, and it takes love.

On Friday, I attended an online workshop that was part of the NEXT Church conference. Led by the Reverend Dr. Stephanie Crumpton and Dr. Barbara Wilson, the workshop, “Connecting COVID, Trauma, and Mental Health” explored the reality of what we have been through and offered ways for us to move forward. These women emphasized the power of recognition, admitting what we have been through, understanding deeply that every single life has been affected by COVID. They spoke about the need to be truthful and acknowledge the impact this virus has had on us and the world. We need honesty.

Living with and alleviating anxiety and worry takes work. Ignoring it and hoping it will go away is not going to be a successful game plan. After years of living with anxiety and panic attacks, something deep inside me knew I did not want to continue to live that way. My doctor retired, and when I met with my new doctor, I told her I struggled with anxiety. She mentioned that sometimes anxiety was a symptom of depression. I sat with that for about a year.

Then I happened to read a blog post by the actor Wil Wheaton, who spoke of his own history with anxiety disorder. I went back to my doctor, and she gave me the name of a therapist who specialized in anxiety disorders, and then she prescribed me an anti-depressant.

I work hard on living with anxiety and not letting it control me. And I must say that what has worked for me – therapy and medication – might not work for someone else. But if there is something in your life that is causing you a divided mind and prevents you from living fully, I invite you to be courageous and face it. Healing will take work.

And yes, maybe the most important thing to healing our worry and anxiety is the love that can be found in community. By love, I mean a deep and abiding and gracious commitment to each other – the people we adore and the people with like and the people we put up with. By love, I mean not giving up on each other, speaking the truth in love with each other, seeing and hearing each other.

A congregation grounded in healing love is honest about joys and concerns; a congregation grounded in healing love knows that it cannot keep that love within its own walls but must take that love into the streets, and let that love become justice, as Cornel West would say.

A community grounded in healing love pays attention to the most frail and the most hearty among them.

A community grounded in healing love reminds each other all the time of the love that Christ brought and still brings to the world.

A community grounded in healing love sees everyone as a sister, a brother, a sibling.

I recently read a powerful book by therapist Resmaa Menakem, My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies. He writes this about healing. “In today’s America, we tend to think of healing as something binary: either we’re broken or we’re healed from that brokenness. But that’s not how healing operates, and it’s almost never how human growth works. More often, healing and growth take place on a continuum, with innumerable points between utter brokenness and total health.”

I wonder about that church in Philippi, what happened, if Euodia and Syntyche ever worked through their conflict, and how the congregation helped them; I wonder how many people found joy in that community. All that’s left of that congregation is a view from a hill where they might have gathered. But the work they did, in their brokenness and their wholeness, helped to lay the foundation for the joy we know today in Christian community.

We have work ahead of us, the work of healing the anxiety and pain we have experienced in this last year. Do you know that tomorrow, March 8, marks the one-year anniversary of the last time we gathered in the sanctuary? A part of me still can’t believe that. We have work ahead of us, and there will be times when we take that deep breath and realize that we’re getting better, and there will be times that we’re utterly frustrated that things don’t yet feel right. It is a continuum, as Dr. Menakem notes.

But I will be here on the continuum with you, as you have been there with me, and as Christ has been with us all along.

Amen.