Don’t obsess over the future

The story’s told of a clock that spent a great deal of time worrying about its future, reasoning that it had to tick twice each second. ‘How much ticking might that be?’ the clock thought. So it began to calculate that it would tick 120 times each minute, which is 7,200 times each hour. That meant in a twenty-four-hour day it would have to tick 172,800 times, and 63,072,000 times every year. By this time the clock began to get overwhelmed and sweat profusely. Finally, it calculated that in a ten-year period it would have to tick 630,720,000 times – and at that point the clock collapsed with a nervous breakdown. Psychologists reckon that about 95 per cent of all we worry about never happens. What about the other 5 per cent? Four out of five times things turn out better than we anticipated, including a lot of outright blessings! In the end, only 1 per cent of all the bad we think might happen actually does, and of this it’s rarely as bad as we feared. That’s why Jesus said, ‘Don’t be anxious about tomorrow. God will take care of your tomorrow too. Live one day at a time’ (Matthew 6:34 TLB). The apostle Peter gives us the right perspective to live by in these words: ‘Casting the whole of your care [all your anxieties, all your worries, all your concerns, once and for all] on Him, for He cares for you affectionately and cares about you watchfully’ (1 Peter 5:7 AMPC). So the word for today is – don’t obsess over the future.

Prayer Point

Help me, Father, to live in today rather than jumping ahead to meet tomorrow’s worries. Remind me that just as You’re meeting my needs today, You’ll also be there for me in the days ahead. Help me to cling to the only certainty of the future – that You’ll be with me.

God’s Little Devotional Book for Moms (Colorado Springs, CO: Honor Books, 1995), 193.