Breaking Through Anxiety with "Joy and Wonder in All God's Works": 20th Sunday after Pentecost- Proper 22, Year B
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In Inside Out 2, we get to see a slightly older Riley as she attends a summer hockey camp to get ready for high school training. On the way up, Riley learns her friends Bree and Grace won’t be in the same high school with her next year.
This knowledge comes soon after the arrival of Anxiety into the emotional space in her head. With this knowledge, Anxiety banishes the older emotions like Joy, literally bottling them in a jar, and calculating plans to ensure that Riley has friends with the top players of the team and thus has people to be with as Bree and Grace head to different schools. This means she pushes her old friends out of the way in favor of newer ones.
But Anxiety can’t control everything, and the emotion causes Riley to get placed in the penalty box. Anxiety goes into a full on panic, creating a whirlwind around the console of Riley’s brain, shutting every other emotion out.
What makes Riley open to reconciling with her friends and making things right is going back to what got her into hockey in the first place: the joy of playing. It allows her anxiety to subside and for her to be herself again.
Now Riley’s Anxiety acts much like the Disciples today, playing the role of a gatekeeper and keeping all others out. This unfortunately is the role that Anxiety often plays in our lives. It can be scary to let others in because that means change. It means a factor that is different and we often can’t control. That’s definitely true for us as individuals. It can also be true for groups like the Disciples.
God is calling us to something different though. Jesus tells the Disciples to let the children in. In fact, they must go a step further and accept the Kingdom of God like one of these little children, if they are to enter it.
How do children receive the Kingdom of God? With laughter and running. There are many times when I hear our pre-school during the week that I hear shouts and screams. These aren’t sounds made out of fear. They are sounds made out of joy. They are almost uncontrollable even.
So many times out in the world, these spontaneous responses of wonder get squelched. They are seen as a nuisance. They are seen as something to be gotten rid of. Over time, we hear less shouts on the playground. We see more controlled reactions. Then we reach the point of adulthood where we have lost the joy in our step and with it the sense of wonder in all God’s works, as we pray for at the end of each Baptism in the church.
To receive the Kingdom of God, we have to be ready to take it in with as much joy as possible. That can only be done with a child-like spirit. That can only be done when we let go of our control. That can only be done when we tear down the walls that are keeping us from God.
That can only be done when we let go of Anxiety and realize why we started doing the things we love in the first place.
That’s what Riley learns as she starts to skate with Joy once again. That is what we can learn too if we allow ourselves to be open to God’s power being at work in us.
We are called in our Gospel today to have the joy that marvels in all of God’s work. This is what we need in order to make it to the Kingdom of our Lord. This is what need to be made whole.
We are also called to let others in who wish to have this “joy and wonder in all God’s works.” We can’t do that if we erect walls for them. We can only do it if we tear those walls down that divide us from each other and our Lord. We can only do it if we work together to marvel at the Lord’s work and be made whole by God’s love and forgiveness.