Maalox Moments
Sermon
Life Injections
Connecting Scripture to the Human Experience
... do not let your hearts be troubled...
Unfortunately, Maalox moments seem to outnumber peaceful moments. I offer a few reasons why.
__________
The makers of Maalox have come up with a series of commercials that have highlighted situations which, in their estimation, are tailor-made for the use of their product. In one of those commercials, one is taken into a home with kids running about screaming, the dog knocking over a vase, the bathtub spilling water onto the floor. The toast is smoking in the toaster. The doorbell is ringing and the telephone is clanging. The camera then zeroes in on the haggard look of the mother who, at this point, could easily qualify for a nerve transplant. It's then that one hears the announcement: "It's another one of those Maalox moments."
Maalox, of course, is for upset stomachs and there are few among us who have not had their stomachs upset by the stress and the worry and the anxiety common to life. Maalox moments occur all too frequently. Rare is the life that hasn't had a large share of those moments.
We live in an age when anxiety is at an all-time high, when tensions are mounting to increasingly steep levels, when stress and worry are often the order of the day. A glance at pharmaceutical statistics proves the point. Valium is the most prescribed drug in America today. Close behind is Tagamet, and that's used to treat ulcers which are often the result of worry carried too far. Of the top-selling over-the-counter drugs, Maalox and Excedrin and Rolaids are near the top of the list. Their distinct role is to treat the physical effects that have come to us compliments of stress, worry, and anxiety.
It seems apparent that the words of Jesus in our Gospel today haven't been taken very seriously by very many people. Jesus tells his disciples, and, in essence, tells us, "I leave behind with you peace. I give you my own peace. You must not be distressed or fearful." You have to understand that Jesus' use of the word peace in this passage is very unique. It was common in the days in which he lived for people to greet each other with the word peace. But Jesus isn't using the word peace as a greeting, he's using it in terms of a bequest. Jesus says, "I'm giving you peace," and he fully expects that the peace will reign supreme in the hearts and minds of all his followers.
That being so, why is it that so few of us realize that peace? Why is it that our lives are filled much more with Maalox moments than they are with peaceful moments? Maybe one of the reasons lies in the fact that all too often we get worked up over things which we can't do anything about.
There is a legend about a burdened old man who, along his tiresome way, met an angel. The old man was bent under the enormous weight of a great burlap sack across his shoulders and on his back. It was so heavy it was a wonder he could walk. The angel said, "What is it you have in the sack?" The man replied, "In there are my worries!" The angel said, "Empty them out, let me see them." With great effort, the old man lowered the huge sack from his back and turned out the contents. Out first came yesterday, and then tomorrow. And the angel picked up yesterday and threw it aside and said, "You don't need that because yesterday is in the hands of God and no amount of worrying will change it." Then the angel picked up tomorrow and said "You don't need this because tomorrow is in the hands of God and no amount of worrying will change it." In the end, the old man had no worries to put in the sack.
It's so often the case that much of what we worry about lies beyond our control. Maalox moments are often the result of things we can do nothing about.
Members of Alcoholics Anonymous pray a great prayer that all of us should think about adopting. It's called the serenity prayer. It reads: "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference." Of all the phrases by which people live their lives, I can think of none that contains more good sense than that. Within it is the notion that there are things that happen to us in life that despite how much we would wish them different, they will not be different. We, if we are to survive, must accept those things as they are, doing so with grace and with dignity.
Walter Underwood, in his book Being Hopeful, Being Human,1 talks of a man who developed a worry table. He wrote down all the things he was worried about and then classified them. He quickly discovered that forty percent of the time he was worried about things that would probably never happen; thirty percent of the time he stewed about decisions he had already made; twelve percent of the time he fretted about becoming ill; ten percent of the time he was troubled about his friends and their children; and eight percent of the time he was worried about immediate problems that he needed to solve. After reviewing his worry table, it became obvious that he could discard 92 percent of his worries.
That's not a bad exercise for us to adopt. Perhaps in constructing our own worry table, we'd find that one of the reasons why we have more Maalox moments than peaceful moments might be that we worry too much about things which will either never happen or which we can do nothing about.
Then there is the matter of getting all nerved up because of things we lack, failing to realize and appreciate all the things we have.
When a colleague came by yesterday, he asked me what I'd be preaching on this Sunday. I told him that I'd be talking about worries. He then proceeded to present to me the following syllogism: There are only two things to worry about in life, and that's being healthy or being sick. If you're healthy, you have nothing to worry about. If you're sick, you have two things to worry about, getting better or getting worse. If you're getting better, you have nothing to worry about. If you're getting worse, you have two things to worry about, surviving or dying. If you survive, you have nothing to worry about. If you die, you have two things to worry about, going to heaven or going to hell. If you're going to heaven, you have nothing to worry about. If you go to hell, you'll be so busy shaking hands with your friends that you won't have any time to worry.
Sometimes what it takes to go from a Maalox moment to a peaceful moment comes down to a matter of keeping things in perspective.
There is an interesting story about J.C. Penney,2 the tycoon who founded the large chain of stores that bear his name. He suffered tremendous financial losses during the Depression. He worried about them to such an extent that he had a nervous breakdown and was confined to a sanitarium for months. The doctors worked with him but to no avail. He became increasingly worse until one night he decided he was near death and so he wrote farewell notes to each of his loved ones. The next morning, to his great surprise, he was still breathing. He hadn't died. As he contemplated his fate, he heard a number of voices singing a tune that sounded vaguely familiar to him. Struggling out of bed, he walked down the corridor to the chapel, the source of the voices. As he opened the door, he heard the words that were being sung:
Be not dismayed what'er betide,
God will take care of you.
Beneath his wings of love abide,
God will take care of you.
Mr. Penney remembered that song from his childhood. It evoked within him an overwhelming sense of the care, the kindness, and the love of Almighty God. He suddenly began to image his blessings instead of his worries. He began to take note of the fact that there were a lot of things right in his life, that he had a lot of things going for him which many people didn't have. He was blessed by family, friends, and business associates who never left his side. God had indeed taken care of him and blessed him but he was too filled with worry to take notice. J.C. Penney began to get well quickly and he went on to live to the ripe old age of 92. He never forgot the old song that enabled him to image his blessings instead of his worries, to image all he had instead of all he lost.
So it goes with many of us. We worry about getting ahead. We worry about accomplishing something. We worry about paying off a debt. We worry about meeting a deadline. They are legitimate and important worries. But we fail, in the meantime, to appreciate and relish the immense amount of blessings we still have and which will still be there regardless of how successful or unsuccessful we are with our ventures.
Another reason why our Maalox moments might outnumber our peaceful moments could stem from the fact that we have unrealistic expectations about life.
S.I. Hayakawa, the former Senator from California, once wrote a very telling piece3 about bus drivers from Chicago. When he was young, he used to ride the bus down Indiana Avenue, a street that was often blocked by badly parked cars and tractor trailers backing into warehouses and maneuvering in every which way. While he rode the bus, he observed two types of bus drivers. One type seemed to expect to be able to ride down Indiana Avenue without interruption. Every time things got blocked, they would get steamed up with rage. They would blow their horns, and they would lean out of the bus to yell at the drivers of the tractor trailers. At the end of the day one can reasonably assume that they were nervous wrecks. When they went home, they were probably jittery and hypersensitive, menaces to their wives and children.
The other type of bus driver, Hayakawa observed, drove their buses fully expecting Indiana Avenue to be blocked, a realistic expectation because it usually was. They would sit and wait for minutes at a time without fretting. They would be whistling a tune or they would be writing their reports or they would be glancing at a magazine that they brought along for just such stoppages. Hayakawa concluded his essay by remarking how in confronting the same objective situation some bus drivers lived a hellish life of nervous tension while other bus drivers had a nice relaxing job with plenty of time to rest.
Many of our Maalox moments stem from the fact that we expect life to be perfect, free from flaws, interruptions, mistakes, and turmoil. Let's face it! It never is! The better we learn to cope with life's inevitable shortcomings, the better will be our nerves, the less stressful will be our lives.
Another reason why we may not be realizing Christ's bequest of peace could stem from the fact that we've centered too much of our lives upon ourselves. We end up having nothing else to think about except our aches, our pains, our worries.
The Healing Power of Doing Good4 is a book packed with testimony about the immense benefits which come our way when we give of ourselves for the sake of another. One statistic noted that sixty percent of the people who volunteered themselves for something realized as a result a decrease in feelings of helplessness, despair, and anxiety. One senior citizen started doing volunteer work at both her winter residence in Florida and her summer home in Minnesota. She volunteered her services tutoring young children in math. According to her, volunteering was the best thing she could have done for herself. Working with children not only made her feel good, but it also got her to forget the aches, the pains, and the bits of arthritis that worried and troubled her. When our life centers around ourselves, we have a lot of time on our hands and when that is so, our minds have nothing else to do but manufacture worries.
There are many reasons why our Maalox moments outnumber our peaceful moments. These are indeed stressful times. Anxiety and tension are indeed on the rise. That's all the more reason to take Jesus up on his Gospel offer. Jesus has left behind a bequest of peace. It's time we collected our inheritance.
____________
1. Walter L. Underwood, Being Human, Being Hopeful (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1987), p. 12.
2. Ibid., p. 16.
3. S.I. Hayakawa, Symbols, Status, and Personality (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1963), p. 81.
4. Allen Luks with Peggy Payne, The Healing Power of Doing Good (New York: Ballantine Books, 1991).
Unfortunately, Maalox moments seem to outnumber peaceful moments. I offer a few reasons why.
__________
The makers of Maalox have come up with a series of commercials that have highlighted situations which, in their estimation, are tailor-made for the use of their product. In one of those commercials, one is taken into a home with kids running about screaming, the dog knocking over a vase, the bathtub spilling water onto the floor. The toast is smoking in the toaster. The doorbell is ringing and the telephone is clanging. The camera then zeroes in on the haggard look of the mother who, at this point, could easily qualify for a nerve transplant. It's then that one hears the announcement: "It's another one of those Maalox moments."
Maalox, of course, is for upset stomachs and there are few among us who have not had their stomachs upset by the stress and the worry and the anxiety common to life. Maalox moments occur all too frequently. Rare is the life that hasn't had a large share of those moments.
We live in an age when anxiety is at an all-time high, when tensions are mounting to increasingly steep levels, when stress and worry are often the order of the day. A glance at pharmaceutical statistics proves the point. Valium is the most prescribed drug in America today. Close behind is Tagamet, and that's used to treat ulcers which are often the result of worry carried too far. Of the top-selling over-the-counter drugs, Maalox and Excedrin and Rolaids are near the top of the list. Their distinct role is to treat the physical effects that have come to us compliments of stress, worry, and anxiety.
It seems apparent that the words of Jesus in our Gospel today haven't been taken very seriously by very many people. Jesus tells his disciples, and, in essence, tells us, "I leave behind with you peace. I give you my own peace. You must not be distressed or fearful." You have to understand that Jesus' use of the word peace in this passage is very unique. It was common in the days in which he lived for people to greet each other with the word peace. But Jesus isn't using the word peace as a greeting, he's using it in terms of a bequest. Jesus says, "I'm giving you peace," and he fully expects that the peace will reign supreme in the hearts and minds of all his followers.
That being so, why is it that so few of us realize that peace? Why is it that our lives are filled much more with Maalox moments than they are with peaceful moments? Maybe one of the reasons lies in the fact that all too often we get worked up over things which we can't do anything about.
There is a legend about a burdened old man who, along his tiresome way, met an angel. The old man was bent under the enormous weight of a great burlap sack across his shoulders and on his back. It was so heavy it was a wonder he could walk. The angel said, "What is it you have in the sack?" The man replied, "In there are my worries!" The angel said, "Empty them out, let me see them." With great effort, the old man lowered the huge sack from his back and turned out the contents. Out first came yesterday, and then tomorrow. And the angel picked up yesterday and threw it aside and said, "You don't need that because yesterday is in the hands of God and no amount of worrying will change it." Then the angel picked up tomorrow and said "You don't need this because tomorrow is in the hands of God and no amount of worrying will change it." In the end, the old man had no worries to put in the sack.
It's so often the case that much of what we worry about lies beyond our control. Maalox moments are often the result of things we can do nothing about.
Members of Alcoholics Anonymous pray a great prayer that all of us should think about adopting. It's called the serenity prayer. It reads: "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference." Of all the phrases by which people live their lives, I can think of none that contains more good sense than that. Within it is the notion that there are things that happen to us in life that despite how much we would wish them different, they will not be different. We, if we are to survive, must accept those things as they are, doing so with grace and with dignity.
Walter Underwood, in his book Being Hopeful, Being Human,1 talks of a man who developed a worry table. He wrote down all the things he was worried about and then classified them. He quickly discovered that forty percent of the time he was worried about things that would probably never happen; thirty percent of the time he stewed about decisions he had already made; twelve percent of the time he fretted about becoming ill; ten percent of the time he was troubled about his friends and their children; and eight percent of the time he was worried about immediate problems that he needed to solve. After reviewing his worry table, it became obvious that he could discard 92 percent of his worries.
That's not a bad exercise for us to adopt. Perhaps in constructing our own worry table, we'd find that one of the reasons why we have more Maalox moments than peaceful moments might be that we worry too much about things which will either never happen or which we can do nothing about.
Then there is the matter of getting all nerved up because of things we lack, failing to realize and appreciate all the things we have.
When a colleague came by yesterday, he asked me what I'd be preaching on this Sunday. I told him that I'd be talking about worries. He then proceeded to present to me the following syllogism: There are only two things to worry about in life, and that's being healthy or being sick. If you're healthy, you have nothing to worry about. If you're sick, you have two things to worry about, getting better or getting worse. If you're getting better, you have nothing to worry about. If you're getting worse, you have two things to worry about, surviving or dying. If you survive, you have nothing to worry about. If you die, you have two things to worry about, going to heaven or going to hell. If you're going to heaven, you have nothing to worry about. If you go to hell, you'll be so busy shaking hands with your friends that you won't have any time to worry.
Sometimes what it takes to go from a Maalox moment to a peaceful moment comes down to a matter of keeping things in perspective.
There is an interesting story about J.C. Penney,2 the tycoon who founded the large chain of stores that bear his name. He suffered tremendous financial losses during the Depression. He worried about them to such an extent that he had a nervous breakdown and was confined to a sanitarium for months. The doctors worked with him but to no avail. He became increasingly worse until one night he decided he was near death and so he wrote farewell notes to each of his loved ones. The next morning, to his great surprise, he was still breathing. He hadn't died. As he contemplated his fate, he heard a number of voices singing a tune that sounded vaguely familiar to him. Struggling out of bed, he walked down the corridor to the chapel, the source of the voices. As he opened the door, he heard the words that were being sung:
Be not dismayed what'er betide,
God will take care of you.
Beneath his wings of love abide,
God will take care of you.
Mr. Penney remembered that song from his childhood. It evoked within him an overwhelming sense of the care, the kindness, and the love of Almighty God. He suddenly began to image his blessings instead of his worries. He began to take note of the fact that there were a lot of things right in his life, that he had a lot of things going for him which many people didn't have. He was blessed by family, friends, and business associates who never left his side. God had indeed taken care of him and blessed him but he was too filled with worry to take notice. J.C. Penney began to get well quickly and he went on to live to the ripe old age of 92. He never forgot the old song that enabled him to image his blessings instead of his worries, to image all he had instead of all he lost.
So it goes with many of us. We worry about getting ahead. We worry about accomplishing something. We worry about paying off a debt. We worry about meeting a deadline. They are legitimate and important worries. But we fail, in the meantime, to appreciate and relish the immense amount of blessings we still have and which will still be there regardless of how successful or unsuccessful we are with our ventures.
Another reason why our Maalox moments might outnumber our peaceful moments could stem from the fact that we have unrealistic expectations about life.
S.I. Hayakawa, the former Senator from California, once wrote a very telling piece3 about bus drivers from Chicago. When he was young, he used to ride the bus down Indiana Avenue, a street that was often blocked by badly parked cars and tractor trailers backing into warehouses and maneuvering in every which way. While he rode the bus, he observed two types of bus drivers. One type seemed to expect to be able to ride down Indiana Avenue without interruption. Every time things got blocked, they would get steamed up with rage. They would blow their horns, and they would lean out of the bus to yell at the drivers of the tractor trailers. At the end of the day one can reasonably assume that they were nervous wrecks. When they went home, they were probably jittery and hypersensitive, menaces to their wives and children.
The other type of bus driver, Hayakawa observed, drove their buses fully expecting Indiana Avenue to be blocked, a realistic expectation because it usually was. They would sit and wait for minutes at a time without fretting. They would be whistling a tune or they would be writing their reports or they would be glancing at a magazine that they brought along for just such stoppages. Hayakawa concluded his essay by remarking how in confronting the same objective situation some bus drivers lived a hellish life of nervous tension while other bus drivers had a nice relaxing job with plenty of time to rest.
Many of our Maalox moments stem from the fact that we expect life to be perfect, free from flaws, interruptions, mistakes, and turmoil. Let's face it! It never is! The better we learn to cope with life's inevitable shortcomings, the better will be our nerves, the less stressful will be our lives.
Another reason why we may not be realizing Christ's bequest of peace could stem from the fact that we've centered too much of our lives upon ourselves. We end up having nothing else to think about except our aches, our pains, our worries.
The Healing Power of Doing Good4 is a book packed with testimony about the immense benefits which come our way when we give of ourselves for the sake of another. One statistic noted that sixty percent of the people who volunteered themselves for something realized as a result a decrease in feelings of helplessness, despair, and anxiety. One senior citizen started doing volunteer work at both her winter residence in Florida and her summer home in Minnesota. She volunteered her services tutoring young children in math. According to her, volunteering was the best thing she could have done for herself. Working with children not only made her feel good, but it also got her to forget the aches, the pains, and the bits of arthritis that worried and troubled her. When our life centers around ourselves, we have a lot of time on our hands and when that is so, our minds have nothing else to do but manufacture worries.
There are many reasons why our Maalox moments outnumber our peaceful moments. These are indeed stressful times. Anxiety and tension are indeed on the rise. That's all the more reason to take Jesus up on his Gospel offer. Jesus has left behind a bequest of peace. It's time we collected our inheritance.
____________
1. Walter L. Underwood, Being Human, Being Hopeful (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1987), p. 12.
2. Ibid., p. 16.
3. S.I. Hayakawa, Symbols, Status, and Personality (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1963), p. 81.
4. Allen Luks with Peggy Payne, The Healing Power of Doing Good (New York: Ballantine Books, 1991).
