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Living One Day at a Time, Enjoying One Moment at a Time

Matthew 6:33-44; James 4:13-17

13 Look here, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we are going to a certain town and will stay there a year. We will do business there and make a profit.” 14 How do you know what your life will be like tomorrow? Your life is like the morning fog—it’s here a little while, then it’s gone. 15 What you ought to say is, “If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that.” 16 Otherwise you are boasting about your own pretentious plans, and all such boasting is evil.
17 Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it.
(James 4:13-17, NLT)

            It’s good to be with you again this week to spend time looking at the Serenity Prayer. After talking about God, serenity, courage, and wisdom, we are ready to look at the less-familiar section of the prayer, and we will spend this week focusing on “Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time.”         

            This line of the Serenity Prayer is calling us to live in the present – to be aware of the current moment and live in that moment. This is really important, because the present moment is the place where God can engage with us. For God, who lives outside of time, all time is now – the present. And when He speaks to us or shows us something, He shows it to us now – even if what we see helps us understand the past or gives us a glimpse of the future, He is showing it to us in this moment. If we want to encounter the living God and His work in our lives, we have to do it in real time, as it is happening.

            Does that mean God doesn’t want us to think about the past? Absolutely not. In fact, He often calls His people to remember – but why is that? At the end of his life, Moses sings a song to all Israel, where he calls Israel to remember the mighty deeds of God in the Exodus.

“Remember the days of old; consider the generations long past. Ask your father and he will tell you, your elders, and they will explain to you.” (Deuteronomy 32:7) 

Moses goes on to remind Israel of God’s past actions of deliverance and salvation – but his purpose is to point them to God in the present. After singing the song, Moses says to Israel, “Take to heart all the words I have solemnly declared to you this day, so that you may command your children to obey carefully all the words of this law. They are not just idle words for you – they are your life.” Remembering the past was not something to do for its own sake; it was a way to understand the importance of present obedience to God and trust in Him. The history of Israel – indeed, for us, the history of God’s people from Adam through the present – is a history of a good God who is active in delivering His people and working through us to reveal His glory to the world around us. So, we remember the past in order to know how to live in the present.

            For example, if I am facing a financial crunch, and am worrying about providing for my family, it can be important for me to remember times in the past when God has provided support that I didn’t have any way to see coming: an unexpected gift, a bonus, someone who fixed my car for free. When I remember His actions in the past, it helps me trust Him enough to live in trust in the present.

            Remembering the past is not the same as living in it. Do you know anyone – maybe at times you have been someone – who lives in the past? “Oh, remember when everything was easy…all our children were well-behaved, my job was easy, and our marriage was perfect.” Or maybe it’s a simpler vision. “Remember when I made the winning play in my high school football game…when I was the homecoming queen…when I starred in the school play.” Not bad things to remember, but what happens to us when we live there?

            Well, first of all, to some extent we are engaging in a fantasy world. Life may have been easier in some ways at some point than it is right now – but it’s never been perfect. It’s easy to glorify the past, to minimize the problems we had then, to forget how incredibly awkward it was to be 14 (or 34 or 54) and imagine that we had a golden era. That’s not the way it really was. And God lives in Reality. Not my imagined super-simple fuzzy memory of days gone by.

            Or my bleak memories of how terrible it’s been, either. While some live in an unreal fairy tale, others of us struggle to escape the pain of the wrong done to us, or the wrong we have done to others. But this is just as unreal a place to live. No matter what I have done in the past, no matter how dark some of my sin has been – and in my case, it certainly has – there are two important things I need to remember. One, I can’t do anything to change my past sin. Two, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ have atoned for all my past sin. In Philippians 3, Paul talks about all the really good and deeply terrible things that are part of his past and says that being in Christ trumps and transforms all of that. He finishes by saying in verses 13-14, “One thing I do: forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.” Did Paul literally forget the things that had happened in his past? Of course not! But he is refusing to be defined by his past, good or bad, so that he can live now as one who has been united with Jesus.

            What about wrongs done to us? Do you ever find yourself reliving the memory of being mistreated, done wrong, abused? When I am rehashing those situations and scenarios, I can remain stuck in those places of pain. I am absolutely not suggesting we try to forget those or push them aside. The serenity to accept the things I cannot change includes the ability to accept that I have been hurt by people in ways that were wrong. And then we begin the journey – sometimes the long journey – toward forgiveness and healing. Sometimes that healing work requires us to remember and engage the past – but we are doing that so that we can make changes in the present. We don’t want to let the sins committed against us define us any more than we do the sins we have committed against others. Now, I’m mentioning this very quickly. It’s a much longer and more complicated discussion than I can fully explore in this sermon. But as someone who has had to do a lot of work in this area myself, I can tell you that coming to terms with my past has helped me experience life differently and live it more fully in the present. I don’t want to get stuck there, and I don’t want you to get stuck there either.

            What about the future? Does living one day at a time mean I don’t make plans? That seems foolish! Well, I agree with you. I believe sometimes the work of today is to make plans for days to come. As I am writing the first draft of this talk, it will be weeks before you hear it, so obviously I believe in some degree of planning for the future. What’s the difference between planning for the future and living in it? If it is healthy to remember the past, but not live there, what does it look like to relate healthily to the future but not live there?

            Matthew 6:33-34 come to mind for me quickly:

 “33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” 

If I am engaged in worry, I am not living one day at a time. Jesus says that our preoccupation with what might happen, and all the myriad ways we can try to prepare for it, is not healthy for us, and will not bring us closer to God. Each day has enough trouble of its own. In other words, do what’s in front of you to do. Sometimes what is in front of you to do may impact the future, absolutely. If I pay my electric bill today, I will have working electricity next month as well. But if I am sitting on my couch, worrying about next month’s electric bill, it may actually take over my mind so much that I never actually make this month’s payment. Worrying about something, at least in my experience, often produces the very thing that it was theoretically trying to prevent. Worry does not do us a lick of good. It accomplishes nothing. Most of the things I worry about never happen anyway. And it often keeps us from seeing what God is doing right in front of us.

            Living in the future can go the opposite direction as well. We can idealize what life will look like a year or a decade or more down the road, and put off things that God wants for us until that Ideal state is reached. Well, I’ll be generous when I get the next promotion. I’ll make church involvement a priority once this work deadline has passed…or the kids are potty-trained…or the kids can drive…or the kids are grown and gone…the list can go on forever. Jayme looked at me a number of years ago and said, “We have to stop waiting until life gets easier to do the things that are important to us. If we wait until then, it will never happen. We have to begin now.” (You will notice in these lessons that often God’s wisdom enters my life through the words and actions of my wife.)

            And if it isn’t worry or idealization, living in the future may also be a product of our pride. James 4:13-16 talks about this.

 “13 Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” 14 Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. 15 Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” 16 As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. All such boasting is evil.” 

Honestly, this passage stings a little bit for me. I’m a planner by nature, and sometimes my ego gets the better of me and I begin to think that my plans are actually going to cause things to happen the way I want. When I do that, I am forgetting who is actually in charge of the universe, and it ain’t me. How often when I am setting aside dates for a vacation or determining when the weather will be right for yard work do I forget that all of this – everything in my life, in fact – is dependent on the will of God? I don’t think James wants us to just say this as if it is a magic phrase or a way to demonstrate our religiosity. While it may be important at times to use words like that to help us remember who’s in charge, what is really important is maintaining in our hearts and minds the reality that the future isn’t here yet, and God, not we, decides what it will be like. We don’t get to make our plans and then ask God to bless them. We get to seek His plans and ask what He wants our part in them to be.

            Okay, remember the past and learn from it, but don’t live there. Let it be a tool to help us make good decisions in the present. Acknowledge the future and take action in the present to prepare for it but don’t live there either. Instead, maintain the humility to know that I can’t do anything that God does not permit me to do, and I shouldn’t do anything that He isn’t working in me to do. So, what does it look like to live in this present day and enjoy this present moment?

            One. Ask God for decisions that you can make for today. Remember, this is all a prayer anyway. So don’t decide, “I will always live only in the present and never get caught in the past again.” Instead, start practicing this moment. How long does it take most New Year’s resolutions to die? But make a resolution for today. Addicts know this. We decide, today, I won’t drink (or do drugs, or gamble, or whatever else our addictions may be). And then we hope to wake up tomorrow and make the same decision again. But you don’t have to be an addict. Want to lose twenty pounds? You can’t do that today. But you can say “No” to dessert today. Want to become a person who is always patient? You probably can’t do that today either. But you can make a decision today to respond with patience when someone in front of you in line takes forever to count out exact change. There is so much God is working on in my life. Most of it happens slowly. But I can cooperate with His agenda for me today – and when I do that one day after another, change really does happen.

Two. Be present. Pay attention to the people you are with and the circumstances you are in. When one of your kids is telling a long story about her day, don’t wander off in your head about the game coming on later tonight, or go back to yesterday’s highlights. Focus on her and listen to what she has to say. This is the only chance you have to hear her say those words at this time. So, engage it. And if that’s a challenge with your child (and it can be for me), it’s really a challenge when you are sitting through a pointless boring meeting. But be present. Pay attention to God and what He is doing. He cares about you and all the other people in the pointless boring meeting. So, what is He up to, and how can you notice that and participate in it with Him?

Three. Practice gratitude. So much of the day and its many moments slip by us without our even noticing. But when I take time to say thank you to someone, I’m living in what is happening in this moment. I am appreciating the gift I’ve just been given, even if it is as simple as helping me open a door or passing me the stapler. I am paying attention to what is right in front of me. And that can really impact my relationship with God. How often do I miss the small blessings that He pours out regularly? I know this: I miss them less as I thank Him for them more. One of my journaling practices is to list 3-5 things in my day that I am thankful for. It’s a way to remember the work of God in the past as I connect with Him in the present.

Four. Slow down. That’s hard, because our life is so fast paced. It’s easy to feel like we are missing out if we aren’t always on the go, catching the latest and greatest thing, which by next month will be totally forgotten. Pause. Take a breath. This came up last week in our conversation on wisdom. Slowing down and taking a breath is a critical spiritual discipline for many of us. Pastor John Ortberg once asked the theologian Dallas Willard what he needed to do to be spiritually healthy. Willard’s response: “You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life.” The young pastor replied, “What else do you have for me?” Willard said, “There is nothing else.” Ortberg goes on to say, “Hurry is the great enemy of spiritual life in our day. There’s a difference between being busy and being hurried. Busy is a condition of the body having many things to do. Hurry is a condition of the soul in which I am so preoccupied that I cannot be fully present to God or a person. Jesus was often busy, but he was never hurried.” (Living in Christ’s Presence, p. 143-144) Think about that last line again. “Jesus was often busy, but he was never hurried.” In John 5:19, Jesus says, “The Son can do nothing by Himself; He can only do what He sees His Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.” If we want to live like Jesus (and we do), we have to slow down in the middle of our hectic surroundings enough to lift our heads up and see what the Father is doing so that we know what we are to do. That means we have to be living in the present.

Remember God’s work in the past to help you take action today. Plan for the future but hold it loosely and humbly. Live in the present. Live right now. Make decisions for today (including the decision to live in the present moment today). Pay attention to what is happening right in front of you. Look for opportunities to be grateful. And slow down. When all else fails, slow down.

I’ll close again this week by praying the Serenity Prayer, and if God leads you, please feel free to join me in learning and praying this prayer.

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.

Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time, accepting hardships as a pathway to peace.

Taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it to be.

Trusting that He will make all things right if I surrender to His will – that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with Him forever.

May God bless you this week with the ability to live in the present moment and find His Presence with you there.