Yet some men do worry, and by so doing effectually destroy their peace
of mind without doing any one any good. What is worse, it is often the
religious man who worries. I have even heard those whose care was for
the soldier's soul, deplore the fact that he did not worry! I have
heard it said that the soldier is so careless, realizes his position
so little, is so hard to touch! And, on the other hand, I have heard
the soldier say that he did not want religion, because it would make
him worry. Strange, isn't it, if Christianity means worry and anxiety,
and if it is only the heathen who is cheerful and free from care? Yet
the feeling that this is so undoubtedly exists, and it must have some
foundation. Perhaps it is one of the subjects which ought to engage
the attention of Churchmen in these days of "repentance and hope."
Of course, worrying is about as un-Christian as anything can
be. [Greek: "mê merimnate tê psychê umôn"]--"Don't worry about your
life"--is the Master's express command. In fact, the call of Christ is
a call to something very like the cheerfulness of the soldier in the
trenches. It is a call to a life of external turmoil and internal
peace. "I came not to bring peace, but a sword"; "take up your
cross and follow Me"; "ye shall be hated"; "he that would save his
life shall lose it." It is a call to take risks, to risk poverty,
unpopularity, humiliation, death. It is a call to follow the way of
the Cross. But the way of the Cross is also the way of peace, the
peace of God that passeth understanding. It is a way of freedom from
all cares, and anxieties, and fears; but not a way of escape from them.
Yet worrying is often a feature of the actual Churchman. The actual
Churchman is often a man whose conscience is an incubus. He can do
nothing without weighing motives and calculating results. It makes
him introspective to an extent that is positively morbid. He is
continually probing himself to discover whether his motives are really
pure and disinterested, continually trying to decide whether he is
"worthy" or "fit" to undertake this or that responsibility, or to
face this or that eventuality. He is full of suspicion of himself,
of self-distrust. In the trenches he is always wondering whether he
is fit to die, whether he will acquit himself worthily in a crisis,
whether he has done anything that he ought not to have done, or left
undone anything that he ought to have done. Especially if he is an
officer, his responsibility weighs on him terribly, and I have known
more than one good fellow and conscientious Churchman worry himself
into thinking that he was unfit for his responsibilities as an
officer, and ask to be relieved of them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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