I have a pop quiz for you. No, really.. a bible quiz. What was the final verse of last week’s gospel?

It was just last week, we heard Jesus not only tell us what is possible – but we were commanded to strive for that very possibility: “…be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Mt 5:48). Be perfect, telios, the Greek word which speaks of wholeness, a completeness, a certain end point, goal or destiny that is ours. “…be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Our destiny, our divine calling – a project for this lifetime. A project that with the grace of God is ours in the here and now – and forever. A project we have already encountered, however briefly, already.

In last week’s thoughts I pointed out that we have moments in our lives when we have peered into Perfect. It is in those moments forever seared in our memories. A first kiss, the first time we held our newborn child, and so many other of life’s moments. A moment so whole, complete, so fulfilled, that we might choose to forever live in the frozen tableau of that one moment, when we sense that Perfect is possible; that we can be whole, complete, no longer broken. We can be embraced and rest at journey’s end.

Since last Sunday many folks have chatted with me about that homily wondering about it all. One remarked that all one had to do was to look at our parishioners, look at the diversity and the eclectic gathering of folks – and then wonder if there just one Perfect. I think that grace of God comes to us individually and uniquely, we respond in the same way, and that each of us has a different nuance of the ways in which God calls us to wholeness and completeness as individuals and as a community. So, sure, it is all eclectic. It is all graced.

Yet, while the telios, our divine destiny remains, the moment slips away… so fleeting …. like gossamer wings … a dream lost in the morning light but still remembered.  Other folks commented that  we are not at journey’s end. We are here in a world far less than perfect, hardly complete, having too many broken parts. A world where rest sometimes comes only in fits and starts. A time where life is too often chilled with concern, apprehension, trepidation, foreboding, unease, distress, anxiety – a whole vocabulary of worry.

We all worry about something – something different – and for different reasons. …Me?  I worry about homilies.  I sat out where you sit for far too long and have heard too many homilies that made me wonder if the homilist had prepared. In the midst of a crowded, filled week, I know the temptation to be that guy. Even my better self knows that at best I could only conjure up a thin and pale offering compared to the Word of God truly alive in your hearts. Tuesday morning in our Friar meetings I worry we will just look at each other, clueless as to what we could possibly say come Sunday. And I will feel the ominous cloud of concern loom more darkly over my shoulder. If there is no hint by Friday evening, I might move into full fledged anxiety, my imperfections beginning to be writ large all over a blank page.

I should turn to God even more fervently, yes? Maybe I should truly lean upon the Holy Spirit. Weren’t we promised that the Spirit would come to us and give us the words we would say? Enable us to testify to the power, glory, and honor of God? If my faith was perfect, if I was perfect, could I just come up here and let the Spirit descend upon me. Give me the words to shine God’s light deep within your soul.

I could boldly come up here into the ambo (that’s “Catholic” for pulpit).  I would stand here silently, waiting, and anxious – as though a silent pillar of faith. But after a while you would shift uncomfortably in your pew, beginning to wonder, “What’s up with him?”  Eventually the sky would open, the Spirit descend, and the Word would come. The Word would speak to me: “Father George.”  I’d respond, “Yes, Lord!” And the voice of God would say:  “You should have prepared…”

We all worry about something – something different – and for different reasons. But you know…. “Worry is like a rocking chair–it gives you something to do but it doesn’t get you anywhere.”  We are sometimes all to practiced in worrying. For many of our worries, doing something about it is the antidote.  Getting prepared. And so I get prepared. I pray, read, think, chat with people and study Scripture – and slowly, with the grace of God, work my way to a homily.

Let’s be honest about worry – there are things for which worry is the appropriate response.  And sometimes you can prepare – sometimes you can’t.  Companies experience economic cycles and announce lay-offs. We can prepare for that. Our  grandparents and parents are getting older and we will need to take on the role of caregiver. We can prepare for that. Teachers schedule tests and we know to prepare. Monday morning when you are late for work, you start the car, and it begins making the most awful noise ever heard – well, as I said, something you can’t prepare for. It is all part of life in the 21^st century.  At least here in Tampa we no longer have to prepare for malaria and Yellow Fever season. And we never have to prepare for winter blizzards. Worry is part of life. But worry has to be appropriate and proportioned.

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life…Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them.”

But you have to keep it in perspective. Martin Luther famously commented that God does not drop food into the beaks.  The birds do not sow or reap, but they have to spend a lot of energy in hunting or searching for their food. They prepare and God provides. It is worth repeating: God provides. Our role is to prepare. I think that is the long view of things.

Worry that is disproportionate or burdens in a way that approaches debilitating is a kind of spiritual short sightedness.  And yet it happens. We reach a point if we wonder if we are forgotten, if anyone notices – and the burden of our worry leave us so myopic that we can’t see past ourselves. And then comes that whisper at the edge of our thoughts: “The LORD has forsaken me; my LORD has forgotten me.”  But we need to be reminded of the prophet Isaiah’s response to such forlorn cries: Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you.

It is in these moments of our short-sightedness that your heavenly Father knows all your needs. Even needs you have no idea you have. I have found that it is these moments that God sends grace into your life. And grace comes, not as pixie dust that magically smooths out the rough places, but comes imperfectly in the person of someone, with their own worries and anxieties, but someone who has prepared, practiced, prayed, and chosen to do something. Someone who, despite their own concerns and shortcoming, chooses to practice  “[Putting] on heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another…and above all, put on love.”  (Col 3:12-13)  That prepared and practiced moment of grace can be as simple as “Are you OK?” Or as powerful as “Would you like to pray with me, now?”

Prayer can begin as worrying out loud. But the practice of prayer reminds us that we are not forgotten. Reminds us to do our part, to prepare. Reminds us of who God is. Helps us to keep our worry in perspective. Helps us take the long view.

Practice makes perfect? Maybe.  I am more inclined to think the 3Ps make perfect. Prepare – Practice – Pray.  They are the pathway to being perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect.