Luke 12:27 "Consider the lilies, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin..."

"Consider the lilies, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." (Luke 12:27 RSV).

Comment:

The more familiar version of this statement ("Consider the lilies of the field ...") is found in the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew (6:28-29). The fact that both Matthew and Luke record it in such similar words, while Mark doesn't include it at all, suggests that it was part of the missing document, the collection of sayings of Jesus known as the Q Document, that both Matthew and Luke drew upon, along with the earlier Gospel of Mark, in compiling their versions.   As with so much of the Sermon on the Mount, the words themselves have become so familiar that they have lost much of their original power. It would have been a radical and outrageous statement for Jesus to tell his listeners, living in lack and limitation, that there was no need to worry. Even today, it takes an effort to affirm that Jesus was not speaking in hyperbole; he meant what he said. The same energy of infinite Divinity that provides for all of life will provide for us as well, once we release our insistence on doing it ourselves. This doesn't mean we don't have to work; lilies, like all of life, have important spiritual functions to perform. It does mean that if we are relaxed and focused on obeying and expressing the divine guidance within us, doing the spiritual work that is ours to do, our needs will be met. And nothing we might make—robes, crowns, jewels etc.—could ever be as beautiful as the radiant beauty of our innate Oneness with the divine.   Blessings!

Rev. Ed