Weather Report From Heaven: Sunny and bright, with an abundance of light and lots of singing and rejoicing.
Bible verse of the day: Philippians 4:6-7 “ Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Insight: We are going to begin a new blog method of using questions to fuel our eagerness and curiosity to dive deeper into God’s word to find answers for big life issues. I will try to present penetrating questions that we all grapple with in life, and then it will be up to the reader to do with them what they will. I think for me, and if I am guessing correctly for a lot of others as well, is how do we find the root cause of all the anxiety we feel on a day to day basis? I know the Bible tells us more than any other command to “fear not,” yet it seems many people do live in a constant battle with fear, which produces anxiety. Here are two thoughts the Lord put on my heart this morning during some reading I was doing: 1. Fear, which produces anxiety, is triggered by a mindset of lack. Psalm 23:1 says, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I lack nothing.” But we live as though we do lack a lot. Why is that? I believe it is because we are bombarded 24/7 and 365 days a year with subliminal messaging that tells us we don’t measure up. We are told we don’t have enough, don’t make enough $, aren’t fit enough, don’t look good enough, don’t have enough stuff, need a better car, a bigger house, a prettier wife or husband, boyfriend or girl, we are too fat, we are too thin. The assault on our senses is unrelenting. What is the cure: Learn to truly believe what Psalm 23:1 says, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I lack nothing.” Pray this until you believe it! He is the provider or all we need, we just need to accept that “more” isn’t always better.
2. We create anxiety when we try to manipulate God. What does this look like? We try to tell God we will do His will, but our way. This seems far fetched, but in reality we do this all the time. We don;t freely abd fully submit all things to God in an effort to maintain a feeling of being in control. But external circumstances continually tell us we are not in control: We don’t have control over the airplane we are flying with, the car next to us on the freeway, our boss’s mental state, the weather the day of our big game, etc. So, when we try to pretend we are in control, we create anxiety because deep in our soul we know we are not. So what’s the solution? I believe it is total surrender to God’s will through studying the scripture, and getting away from all the “noise” in our lives so we can clearly hear from God. We can’t hear from God when we are too consumed with all the noise associated with our myriad of devices, or when we are trying to dictate to God what our lives should look like. We need alone time. We need quiet time. We need time to hear and to listen better. Try to eliminate some of the noise in your life and see if your anxiety decreases. I know every time I take moments, hopefully hours or days, to unplug from the grid, and get away from the bombardment of noise, I create more space for prayer and for reading scriptures and hearing God’s voice. This leads me to feel calmer and closer to God. The result: Less anxiety. Let’s try it. It won’t be easy, it requires desire and discipline, but it is necessary, and we will find the world can still continue on, even without us being connected to the web.
Prayer: God, Help us to learn to fear not by trusting that You alone are enough, we lack nothing in You, and by getting away alone to hear your voice, so we can follow You instead of trying to dictate to You. Help us to learn to relieve our anxiousness through these actions and shifts in our mindset. We know we need this, so give us the strength in Christ Jesus to accomplish our goals. Amen!
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