Anxious Much?

 What is anxiety? This past Wednesday we took a closer look at what anxiety is, what it does to us, and what causes it. Then we dove into the Word of God to find out how we, as believers in Jesus Christ, should handle anxiety. Spiritual leaders often tell us to look at the Bible for answers to life's questions, and yet usually that's not our gut reaction. Why look to some old book when my friends are right here? But, when it comes to the difficulties of life, who should we trust more - the God who created this world or our friends who have about as much life experience as we do? The obvious answer to that question is that we should trust God more. But do we? Do we trust that God knows our problems and how to deal with them the right way?

Hopefully, if you are reading this, you are at least curious to know what the Bible has to say about handling anxiety in life. So, let's take a look at what we discussed at the Summit last Wednesday.

Anxiety defined: "Anxiety is a feeling of fear, dread, and uneasiness." Notice that it doesn't say "or" there. Anxiety is all of these things mixed together.

What does it do?

Some of the effects of anxiety: sweating, feeling restless and tense, rapid heartbeat, trembling, breathing rapidly (hyperventilation), weakness or feeling tired, difficulty concentrating, trouble sleeping, a tendency to avoid the triggers (avoiding thinking about what you're anxious about), etc. Feel free to add in some of your own experiences of when you get anxious. Usually, anxiety causes different effects for different people. When I get anxious, for example, I get sweaty, tense, I feel weak and I have trouble sleeping. In an attempt to "avoid the triggers" I will try to distract myself by watching a show or playing an immersive game. What does anxiety do to you?

Now, sometimes anxiety can be a good thing - it can force us to prepare for things to come (like when we are anxious about a big test so we go overboard on the studying) or it can light a fire under our butts to start working on a paper before the deadline. Unfortunately, anxiety is usually a bad thing. It paralyzes us from doing anything other than worrying. We call this crippling anxiety. The feelings of fear, dread, and uneasiness are so strong that we get physically sick or just feel trapped and unable to do anything.

Does anxiety ever solve our problems, though? No. Worrying, by itself, doesn't solve anything. Like, I can worry about my test all I want, but unless I actually study for it, that worrying isn't going to help me get a better grade. Or, I can worry all I want about the church van breaking down on its way to HCBC, but worrying isn't going to stop it from happening. <= I proved this on our second attempt last year as I worried about the van breaking down, and it still broke down...

What causes anxiety?

The short answer: stress. Anxiety (and worry) is a natural response to stressful situations like a problem at work, a test at school, relationship drama in your friend group, or an upcoming important decision. Sometimes anxiety can be caused by a medical issue (although this is rare). As I said earlier, anxiety is a form of fear. It shows up when we are worried about something, something that we feel like we can't control. Its that feeling we get when we don't know what's going to happen.

How do we deal with it?

Here is where we start looking to God's Word. Before we do, though, I want you to do something. I want you to think about a situation that gives you anxiety. What are you dealing with right now that is making you anxious? Is your friend group going through a fight? Are you having trust issues with a boyfriend/girlfriend? Is it something at home, either with your parents or siblings? Maybe you're just worried about what your future is going to look like. Whatever it is, I want you to have a specific situation in mind as we look at what God has to say about dealing with our anxiety. Do you have it? Good.

The passage we are about to read together is a familiar one to many Christians, and honestly, I think it gets taken out of context too much in the church. The book of Philippians is a letter written by the apostle Paul to a church in the city of Philippi. He talks about a lot of good stuff like the mindset of a Christian, how Christians should interact with each other and with the world, and what our priorities should be. And here, as he is getting to the conclusion of his letter, he gives this advice to Christians as they experience trouble in this world.

Philippians 4:4-7 - "Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. 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."

Let's walk through this advice together, step by step. First, he says to rejoice. This is so important that he feels the needs to repeat himself! REJOICE! What do we have to rejoice about? Well, think about your life right now: what are some good things you have to be thankful for? Some things that bring you joy? We have life, that is cause for celebration in and of itself (why else do we celebrate birthdays, after all?). We continue to have breath in our lungs. Through Jesus Christ we have a restored relationship with God, life everlasting, and the promise of an unending future with God. We have a family (who may be troubling at times, but they are usually there for us in one way or another). We have friends (some better than others). We have access to education, food, clean water, a roof over our heads. As we get more specific, we find many more things to rejoice over than we probably thought at first. Paul says that the first step to dealing with anxiety is to rejoice - to think about the joy in our lives.

We can also rejoice because of what Paul says next: "the Lord is near". We can rejoice because God is near us. And we can choose not to be anxious about anything because the Lord is near. Even as you are reading this, God is there with you. He is on your side. And if God is for us, then who can be against us?

This next part is the "famous" part, and gets quoted a lot: "Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation..." pray. Paul's advice here is not to just "stop worrying". That's not exactly what he means when he says "do not be anxious about anything". Instead, its more of a "rather than be anxious about this or that situation, pray about it". Remember, anxiety is a form of fear. Being anxious about something means that we are afraid of what is going to happen. So, instead of being afraid, pray about it, ask God to step in, and trust that God is in control.

Then what happens? "And the peace of God...will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." When we follow this process, we will find peace. The situation may or may not be resolved, yet we can have peace of mind because we know and trust that God is in control, so we don't need to be afraid anymore. We don't need to worry anymore (especially since worrying won't actually change anything).

So, in dealing with anxiety, we need to move along this path:

1. Rejoice - find what's good in your life and rejoice in it.

2. Remember (remind yourself) that the Lord is near. God has not abandoned you. He is right there with you, even now. He is there even when you can't feel Him there. Let that comfort you.

3. Identify what you are anxious about and pray to God that He would handle the situation. Entrust it to Him. Stop worrying about the situation and trust that it is in God's hands.

4. Embrace God's peace. Peace is like the opposite of worry. I often picture it as the calmness of the sea after Jesus calmed the storm in Matthew 8:23-27 (go read it if you want).

Now, let's read the next few verses in Philippians 4: "Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me - put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you."

You ever notice how when someone tells you not to think about something, it becomes the only thing you can think about? Anxiety is just like that. If I said, "Just don't worry about it", or as the New Yorkers say "Forget about it", would you just stop worrying about it? Would you forget about it? NO! Of course not! Paul doesn't just say, "Hey, forget about it." He says to stop thinking about this, and start thinking about that, instead! He says to stop thinking about the situation you're anxious about, and instead start thinking about the things of God. Whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent and praiseworthy - think about those things.

All of this comes down to a mentality shift. When we are suffering from anxiety, it means we are solely focused on what could happen - usually what we are afraid is going to happen. Then, we become paralyzed because we feel like we can't do anything about it! The Bible tells us to stop. Stop focusing on what might happen, and what you cannot control, and start thinking about what God promises will happen, and what He can control. As Christians, we have already trusted God with our souls and our eternal future. We know that God wins in the end, and we are on the winning side. So, why can't we trust Him with everything else?

Do you still have that specific situation in mind? You know, the one I asked you to think about before we looked at Philippians? Okay, what I want you to do is to walk through these steps with that situation.

1. Rejoice - make a list of things in your life that you are thankful for (and don't settle for just what I listed above, try to be more specific to what you have).

2. Remind yourself that God is near. We are forgetful, and often forget that God is always with us. As anxiety creeps in, remember that God is next to you and you can talk to Him about it.

3. Identify what you are anxious about (name it and be specific about the situation). What are you worried is going to happen? Once you have named it (this works best by either writing it out, or speaking it out loud), talk to God about your fears. Talk to Him about the situation, what you fear might happen, and your feeling powerless to do anything. Turn it over to Him as you talk, saying something like "God, I can't do anything about this, but I know You can. I know You know what is going to happen. I trust that You are in control and that no matter what happens, You have my back."

4. Embrace the peace of God. As you are talking to God about your situation, you are allowed to ask for peace. But, even if you don't specifically ask for it, when you entrust your situation to God, His peace will come to you. For me, it usually feels like a huge weight has been taken off my shoulders. What's weird is that most of the time, nothing about the situation has actually changed. The situation is still the same, its my mindset that is different. I am no longer looking at it from a "what if" perspective, but rather from a "God's got this" perspective. 

5. "Think about such things" and "put it into practice". Move on. Don't linger in the worry and anxiety. Look to what God is doing in the world, or perhaps even in the situation you were anxious about, and go join Him.

I hope this has been helpful to you. I hope that you are able to let go of your anxiety and turn it over to God. And I hope you are able to move on with your life, to move forward. In the comment below I have shared some additional verses from the Bible that touch on this topic of anxiety. I hope they are helpful to you as well. I have found that talking about our anxieties with other believers can also help, so if you need to talk, just reach out.