“Hakuna matata! What a wonderful phrase!
Hakuna matata! Ain’t no passing craze!
It means no worries, for the rest of your days…
It’s our problem-free philosophy…
Hakuna matata!” (Walt Disney Records)
Is the song stuck in your head now? Disney’s The Lion King (1994) is packed with catchy tunes, including the nostalgic favorite “Hakuna Matata,” sung by Timon the meerkat, Pumbaa the warthog, and Simba the lion cub. Having left home after experiencing tragedy, young Simba is alone and near death in the desert. When Timon and Pumbaa find him, they adopt him into their little group, teaching him their guiding philosophy: hakuna matata. “Hakuna matata” is a Swahili phrase meaning “no worries.” In The Lion King, this is framed as ignoring anything that might take away from pleasure in the moment.
In Luke 12: 22-25, Jesus also instructs His disciples not to worry:
“Then Jesus said to his disciples: ‘Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to your life?'” (NIV)
Are these two messages the same? Is Jesus saying we should just ignore all our problems and live in the moment? Not exactly, and by the way, neither is The Lion King. Simba eventually realizes that he needs to go home and help the rest of the pride. His childhood friend Nala catches up with him and confronts him about how the pride is suffering in his absence. He responds, “Sometimes bad things happen, and there’s nothing you can do about it. So why worry?” And she retorts, “Because it’s your responsibility.” His attitude of not caring was not only preventing him from healing but also harming those he cared about. He learns that sometimes you’ve got to deal with your problems. He would be wrong to continue in his “hakuna matata” attitude while his people suffered, since he could do something about it.
Rejecting personal responsibility to focus on being happy in the moment is the wrong attitude. But the other extreme is also wrong: assuming that we can control everything if we just work hard enough—leading to crippling anxiety that distracts us from what’s really important.
What Worry is Not
A limitation of language is that we often use the same word to refer to very different things. For example, I might say, “I’m worried that bookcase is going to fall onto that child because it looks unstable.” The wrong thing to do at that moment would be to do nothing, “repent” from worrying, and walk away into another room. I should move the child or fix the bookcase so the very real problem is no longer something to worry about. We can substitute different words here (concern, prudence, etc.), but we’re talking about the same thing: acknowledging that something is wrong and something needs to be done to correct it. That kind of “worry” or “concern” is productive and necessary.
However, I’ve often found myself prone to the bad kind of worry. I’ve caught myself lying in bed at night, agonizing over nightmare scenarios: “What if my family member dies in a car crash tomorrow?” That’s the time to step away from worry and trust in God’s care. That kind of worry is fruitless because there’s absolutely nothing I can do to change whatever’s going to happen, especially at that moment. I’m merely borrowing imaginary trouble from the next day.
I think one way to determine what’s worth being “concerned” about is whether or not we can do something about it. For example, “I’m worried that so-and-so might have misunderstood what I said and been offended.” I would need to ask myself, “Can I do something about it?” I could plan to go back to that person and clarify what I said and apologize for offending them if need be. Beyond that, punishing myself for my mistake by dwelling on it to the point of anxiety is not what God wants. There’s no need to pile trouble from the past or future onto ourselves past the point where it’s useful.
Be Prepared
On some level, we have to care about temporal things and daily life. But we should make sure that our overall focus is on what’s most worthwhile: eternity. In Luke 12, the passage where Jesus instructs His disciples not to worry is sandwiched between the parable of the rich fool (Luke 12:13-21) and analogy comparing the disciples to servants preparing for their master’s return (Luke 12:35-48). The rich fool stores up treasures that will ultimately prove worthless in the light of eternity, suggesting that maybe we too often prepare for the wrong things. The future we should prepare for is one with God, not so much one on earth. Taken all together, the overall point of the passage in Luke seems to be this: worry about (read “prepare for”) things of eternal importance, not temporal comfort. By all means, be diligent in daily duties and care for yourself and those in your care. But don’t focus on what’s going to happen tomorrow to the extent that you rob yourself of today’s joy and steal your attention away from God’s ultimate plan for you. The focus of our fear, in the sense of awe and wonder, should be on God, not on circumstances that are ultimately temporary.
Remember Who You Are
Not only does needless worry distract our focus from what’s important, but it also harms us by robbing us of trust. When anxiety overcomes us, we think that God doesn’t care about us and that we’re left to fend for ourselves. But Jesus makes it clear that God values us—more than birds or flowers, which He cares for too. We are precious to Him, and He really does want the best for us, even if we don’t always understand it. Part of that care includes not wanting us to burden ourselves with things we can’t change. We too often take on the anxiety of today AND all the days to come.
You’ve probably seen the famous Serenity Prayer printed, framed, and shared in many places. Credited to Reinhold Niebuhr, the prayer is commonly quoted like this:
“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can,
and wisdom to know the difference.”
The truth is, we can’t control everything, but we don’t have to because God is already doing that. We should strive to take each day at a time, trusting God to help us make the right decisions daily and care for us in the future. Once we’ve done what we can, we leave the rest to God, knowing that He cares for us. We’re not promised that life will be pleasant, but we are promised that God won’t ignore or forsake us at any point. Our life on earth will never be “problem-free,” but one day, if we trust in Jesus, we really will have “no worries for the rest of our days.”
Works Cited
Walt Disney Records. Lyrics to “Hakuna Matata.” Genius, 2022, https://genius.com/Walt-disney-records-hakuna-matata-lyrics
The Lion King. Directed by Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff, Walt Disney Pictures, 1994. Disney+, www.disneyplus.com/movies/the-lion-king-the-walt-disney-signature-collection/1HqwiEcje6Nj
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