Philippians 4:6 – ” Do not be anxious about anything.”
Anxiety consumes pretty much everyone. We can’t help but feel nervous and worry about stuff. Why are we anxious? It can fall into three different categories: (1) About things we all face: Like aging, disability, retirement, loneliness, financial uncertainty, accidents, illness, losing a loved one, and death. (2) About things we all must do: like making decisions, starting and ending relationships, losing weight, changing careers, making a mistake. (3) Reflecting our inner state of mind: These anxieties reveal how we feel about our ability to handle things. For example, fear of rejection can affect every relationship in your life. In order to avoid being hurt you shut others out, your world grows smaller and your opportunities for personal growth are more limited. That was taken straight out of the devotional, and I couldn’t have categorized it any better. So what do your anxieties fall under?
If we really get down to it, the bottom line is that we have anxiety because we don’t feel we CAN do it. Once we have that thought, floods of negativity enters and feeds our anxiety. So if you knew that you CAN handle anything, would you still be anxious? NO. And that might sound too easy, but the fact is that once you bring God into the picture, you’ll have joy in knowing that you’ll overcome anything that comes your way and be anxiety-free… Philippians 4:13 says: “I can do everything through him who gives me strength,” and Philippians 4:6-7 says: “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Let those verses be of encouragement to you as they have to me.
I guess I want to challenge those who read this…not sure who you are, but someone told me of a new type of fast (giving up something to see our dependance on God) that is MUCH harder than fasting on food. Try and fast from ANY negative thoughts, actions, or sayings… The actions and sayings might be doable, but not thinking anything negative is actually a big challenge… And negative thoughts feed into anxiety, so why should we be thinking negative thoughts anyways… I already tried this a couple times, and failed within like 10 minutes, but today’s devotional encouraged me to try it again today, but this time, know that I can do it with God’s help! Alright, so starting now….no negative thoughts….you can do it! 😆