Anxiety vs. Trust
Anxiety is taking over way too many of your lives. We're going to fight it.
“I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he is killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him!” - Luke 12:4-6
When God says do not fear anything in this world, it is because he has us. He’s got our back. Nothing can come against you, not even the enemy, without God’s permission. People wrestle with this truth a lot, but this theology has changed my parenting and marriage so much, because I know who to fear. God has power over the devil. That makes people really uncomfortable because if God has power, then why does he allow suffering? But the alternative is that he isn’t powerful over suffering and evil, and that isn’t comforting either. That’s not helpful.
So let’s start with what’s true: God has you. He has every circumstance you face. He understands your fears, your feelings, your doubts. He knows about all of it and he’s powerful over it. One of my good friends recently confessed that right before her wedding, she went through paralyzing fear that she was going to lose her future husband. And even after they had gotten married, she cried as she sat across from me and told me that her fear hasn’t gone away. The weeks leading up and following her wedding had been marked with an absolute demonic attack. A fear was over this precious couple and it had stripped her of the joy that’s supposed to mark those first weeks of marriage. She was saying it had made her grateful and all these positive things about it. I got mad. I hit the table and said, “don’t put words from God on something that’s evil! This fear is not from God. This is evil. Fear is from the enemy and he is seeking to kill, steal and destroy.” They are a power house couple and it makes sense that the enemy would come for them in this way. God’s glory is all over their marriage. The enemy was stealing that joy.
We barely even notice fear anymore because it has invaded our culture and our minds so much. We are so afraid. It’s just part of our thought process every single day. We have to fight it. We've got to start noticing it. We’ve got to call it out and we got to fight it. Let's talk about how we fight this, because I want to get really practical.
We fight anxiety with trust. We can’t avoid all the things we fear. We can’t guard our lives from all the bad things that could happen. That’s not the goal in this world. We will have trouble. This fears are real, but they are mitigated by a hope that is eternal. Paul calls them “light and momentary trials.” He’s talking about being shipwrecked and nearly killed in prison. Those are some of the worse things that can happen to you. And he’s speaking of those things as light and momentary afflictions. Why? Because he has a view of eternity that is so real and palpable to him. He knows he's in the first little opening scene of eternity. He is not going to be derailed by the only power the enemy has to bring him trials. Paul knows the enemy doesn’t win in the end. He doesn’t get victory. Revelation promises that there will be a time where he is cast away and kept from the people of God. A time when suffering and death and darkness will no longer be present. We are aching to be with God one day, bur right now we have work to do. Paul knew he had work to do, and he wasn’t going to get distracted by difficulties. He wasn’t going to live paralyzed by fear. In Philippians he says, “to live is Christ and to die is gain.” There is a hope in Heaven and eternity that is bigger for Paul than any other thing. Paul is so single-minded. He was so fixed on Jesus. He had clarity to his life, to his decisions, to who he loved, how he loved, and what he spent his time doing.
So what does it look like to lay down our fear? How do we live single-minded? We don’t have to be afraid of death, sickness, or suffering. But Luke is saying here that if we’re going to be scared of one thing, it’s where we’re going to end up in eternity. All the suffering here on earth can be redeemed and used for God. But we want to make sure our eternity is right.
If you’re afraid of everything on this earth, but you’ve never thought about death and eternity, I want you to do that right now. If you've never trusted Jesus Christ, this is what you do. You say, “God, I need a savior and I believe your son, Jesus Christ is it. I believe that he died for me. I believe that my sins are forgiven because of him and I want to follow him with my life. I believe he was raised from the dead and I want to be raised from the dead too and I want to give my life to you while I'm here.” That's how simple it is. That's what you pray. That is all that we have to do to be right with God.
Now I want to speak to those of you that know Jesus. You may have known him for a long time and are paralyzed by fear. Do you believe this book that tells us that he has gone before us and is building a home for us? Do you believe that this is a story you're a part of? Do you believe that he is more powerful than every single thing you fear? I told my friend who was paralyzed with fear that I can’t promise her husband won’t die tomorrow. I don’t have power over that. But I did tell her, because I’ve been through enough suffering and have watched friends go through enough suffering to know, that when that day comes, God will give her grace for it. He will give you everything you need to go through that on that day.
It’s not easy, but it’s possible to walk through the darkest nights when we have a hope that lasts forever. Not only that, but our God says he will walk through it with us. He will be in it with us. He will provide us with grace we can’t even imagine. I don’t understand why bad things happen to good people. I don't have the answer for that. I can just tell you that I know there is a good God that's more powerful than all of it and that one day we will all understand.
So how do we lay down this anxiety and fear? First, we start by making sure our view of God is right. That happens by knowing him intimately and walking with him regularly. That happens by knowing his word and knowing who he is. It starts also by feeding ourselves truths instead of lies. We have to start by fighting the lies we’re telling ourselves on a given day. That's why in Philippians Paul writes, “think on things that are true.” He tells us what to think about. He talks about all these beautiful attributes. Even just thinking about what is true changes so much about our thoughts. How often do we “what if” ourselves to death? So much of what we’re fearful of isn’t even real or true.
We have to fight for our faith. When we see him come through again and again, we learn to trust him more. As I’ve gotten older, my trust has grown. I don’t stand here trembling about what might happen to my kids, my husband, or my job. I do if I think about it for too long, but that’s what fighting for my faith and for trust looks like. I don’t give energy or space to those thoughts. God is not asking me to deal with losing my husband or children today. One day he might, and that day I will have to face that fear. But today I will not feed that fear.
So are you feeding fear? What fear are you feeding and how can you interrupt it? How can you use the weapons God's given you in his word? This thing is worth fighting. It is keeping us from joy, from peace, and from our mission.
One practical way to work through this is the anxious thoughts guide. It has a mind map on it, and you work through what’s giving you the most anxiety or fear right now. You’ll ask yourself a few questions like is this true? What does God’s word say? When I worked through this grid, at the time, my son had just left for college. I was worried sick about him. Would he make good decisions? Would he date girls I don’t like? Then somehow all those fears ended up he ended up in prison because of his decisions. That became my fear. My son loves God and he’s making good choices for the most part. He’s a great kid. But I was terrified he was going to derail his life, and nothing I was worried about was even true. Even if he did end up in prison, we still have hope! We can start a prison ministry together. There’s redemption in all things. God likes to take the broken and turn it into something beautiful.
There’s nothing we don’t have hope in. Because of that, we can trust God in our anxiety. We’ve got to choose better. We have to put our foot down and say no more. No more dwelling on this. No more feeding this. No more energy toward this. Bring in your community, fast, pray, interrupt your thoughts. Because God has given you tools to fight this.
