You will come again tomorrow, won't you?

In Kierkegaard's discourse To Be Contented with Being a Human Being, he has a lovely little illustration of the difference between an attitude colored by anxiety and an attitude of contentment and trust:

"If a girl in love said to her beloved when he came to visit her, 'You will come again tomorrow, won't you?' - there would still be some anxiety in her love. But if, without mentioning tomorrow, she threw her arms around his neck and said, 'Oh, thank you for coming today' - then she would indeed be altogether assured about tomorrow. Or if there were two girls, and the one said to her beloved, 'You will come again tomorrow, won't you?' and the other said, 'Oh, thank you for coming today' - which of the two would be more convinced that the beloved would come again tomorrow?"

Kierkegaard's point is that if we are worrying about something in the future, it shows that we do not have full trust and assurance in the person responsible for that something. If we are fully and completely trusting in that person, we need not even think about the future, much less worry and question about it. We can instead delight with gratitude in the present moment. So if someone trusts God to provide for him, then even when he has no money for the next day's needs he can thank God for supplying his needs for this day, and let the future rest in God's hands. This kind of genuine unshakeable faith can be seen in the life of George Mueller, a Prussian pastor in England during the mid 1800s, who opened orphanages in Bristol in response to the great need he saw there, eventually becoming able to care for 2000 children at a time in these homes. Because he carried out this work without asking anyone for money (and because he didn't even accept a salary for himself from his pastoral position!), choosing instead to rely completely on God, he was able to see God provide countless times, in countless ways. People would donate money just as it was needed, or in the exact amount required; once, when they had no food at all, he still gathered all the children together to give thanks for breakfast - and donated food arrived just as they finished their prayers.

For most of us today, Mueller's situation is far from the actual experience of our lives. But we still have needs, and we still have worries - in fact, it seems that worries do not decrease even when needs do! For my husband and I, right now, those worries tend to be about planning and decision-making as we're both at the beginning of career paths with a multitude of options in front of us for both those careers and the family we want to have someday. It would be easy to worry, for instance, that Paul won't be accepted to a PT school and our lives will remain in limbo, or that he will be accepted and I won't be able to get a job after the move, or that we would find ourselves unexpectedly pregnant. And I have worried about all those things, and I've poured out my anxiety and questions to God many times - but while it is good to take my anxieties to Him, I need to do so with an attitude of trust. Only when I truly trust Him can He actually calm the worries and fears in my heart. When my heart is content in Him, responding with joy and gratitude for the guidance and provision He has given me today, convinced that He will continue to lead and provide in the future - then, and only then, will I be able to find peace from my worries.