Tuesday, January 07, 2014

Don't worry!

Phil. 4:6-7 Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.  Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.

It's confession time.  I'll start.  I'm a worrier.  I worry.  It's what I do better than anything else.  If there were a PHD in worry I would have earned it years ago.  I've mastered all the nuances of worry.  I am better at it than anyone I know and I hate it!

But I'm also a pastor and those two things, being a pastor and a worrier, do NOT go together.  I have to constantly make a decision- will I trust God or not???

For me this is my constant battle.  We all battle something, this is mine.  When I worry I'm basically saying, "There is no God! I'm on my own! What will I do? How will I survive? How will I work all of this out? If I don't do something no one will!!!"

When I worry I'm telling God he doesn't care and I can't trust Him.  That's a big thing to say to the creator of the universe!  But worry is subtle like that, it's not so blatant as to get in God's face and deny he's able to care for me, but that's really what I'm saying to him.

When Paul tells us "Do not worry" he's giving us a response to something we all struggle with...that sense that our lives are out of control and unless we worry all is lost!  But Paul rubs salt in our worry by saying it this way, "Don't worry about anything!"  He is telling us that worry....about ANYTHING....is sin. Then, as Paul does so well, he gives us an option..."don't do this, but do this instead."


The right response to worry is to take those worries to God and dump them at his feet, thank him for taking care of it and leave it all there.  Then, walk away and let his peace take care of me.  These are powerful verses because they address the fears of every heart and give us a solution.....but the solution is a God big enough to take care of my problems.

When I worry I'm really saying God isn't big enough, able enough, strong enough, caring enough, loving enough to take care of me, my worries and my problems.  Shame on me for thinking that way!

Worry is always a sign of a man or woman living with a small god.  How big is your God? 



1 comment:

Mike Messerli said...

One of the sad realities of life is that as I age I learn more about things I never worried about before, I get a bigger list of things to worry about! When I was young I didn't know enough to worry, now I "know more" and it's proven to be my undoing in the battle against worry.