"Therefore, I tell you, do not worry about your life . . . who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?"

                                                                                                Matthew 6:25, 27

In the pioneer days of aviation, there was a pilot who was attempting to make a flight around the world.  After he had been gone from his most recent landing place for almost two hours, he heard a noise in his plane, and finally recognized it as the gnawing of a rat.  He realized that while his plane had been on the ground a rat had gotten in the engine, and for all he knew the rat was now gnawing through an important cable that controlled the plane.  He became anxious over the situation and in his panic couldn't think of a solution.

He knew he could not return to the place he had just left, for it was over two hours away, and there was nowhere currently around him where he could land.  So, with great angst, he continued on.  But then a funny thing happened.  As the pilot continued his ascent to the height at which he could attain the most effective flight, he noticed that the gnawing finally ceased.  And it was then that he realized that a rat is made to live on the ground and under it, and as such it cannot survive in the atmosphere of the heights to which he had climbed.

Worry is the rodent of our lives.  It gnaws at us and concerns us until eventually it consumes us and our ability to think clearly.  But like a rodent, worry cannot live when we choose to climb above the world around us, when we rise above that in this world which seeks to control us.  Worry cannot breathe in the atmosphere of prayer.

Worry dies when through prayer we climb above the things of this world.  Take the plane of your life to that altitude today, and do not spend time worrying about what may be, for worry will not change it anyway.  God will supply our needs, and that is all that matters.

 "Father, Help us to focus on the things that matter, and gives us the courage to use our energy to address those things which need to be changed instead of using that energy to worry about them.  Guide us in the flight of our lives above the things of this world to the heights of your love and care.  In Jesus' name, AMEN."