Does this passage resonate with you?

Blessed be the Lord!
    For he has heard the voice of my pleas for mercy.
 The Lord is my strength and my shield;
    in him my heart trusts, and I am helped;
my heart exults,
    and with my song I give thanks to him.” -Psalm 28:6-7

Me too!

I can say that no matter how you answered that question, it resonates with me too.

You see, many times I cry out to Him and I sense His help.

And many other times, too many to count, I don’t cry out to Him. I respond to life with worry and only my own actions. Therefore, I don’t sense His strength and shield; I sense stress.  My heart doesn’t exult. My song is one of self-pity instead of praises to the Lord.

For most of us, we do both! Isn’t it sad that the Lord misses out on (and we do too) our hearts exulting in and praising Him?

Worry is a word that gets tossed around a lot without much thought of what it truly means. Let’s look at the word very closely:

Worry – refers to the thoughts, images, and emotions of a negative nature in a repetitive, uncontrollable manner that results from a proactive cognitive risk analysis made to avoid or solve anticipated potential threats and their potential consequences. Worry is described as a response to a moderate challenge for when the subject has inadequate skills. (From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

And from dictionary.com…

Worry – to torment oneself with or suffer from disturbing thoughts; fret.

It’s good to remember what worry means.
Worry is done intentionally to avoid threats. It’s OUR response to a challenge when we have inadequate skills.
It’s OUR response, not the Lord’s. Worry torments, disturbs, and causes suffering and it’s done by no one else but ourselves! If someone else caused these things in us, we’d call it abuse!
Worry is trusting in our own thinking and actions. It’s the opposite of trust and faith in God. 
The remedy?

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.”  – 1 Peter 5:6-11

Another definition may be in order:

Humble: having or showing a modest or low estimate of one’s own importance.

Worry seems to be an indirect way we attempt to, in some way, control our circumstances. If that’s true, then it makes sense why we’re encouraged to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God.

Let’s lower our estimate of our own importance in chewing on our circumstances and remember that we are under God’s mighty hand. Let’s cast these anxieties on Him.

Why give up our feeble attempts at having control?

Because He cares for us!

Let’s elevate His importance and acknowledge His help in our lives so that He is glorified.

If you, like me, have found yourself to be in a season of being a worry wart, no worries!  It’s a bad mental habit and bad habits can be broken. It may be a sin to rely on ourselves instead of God, but Jesus’ perfect life has covered our many sins.

We are free to live in new ways!

I’ll admit to you that my biggest challenge in this area is going down the “what if” road. Once I take that road, my mind can easily catastrophize the future. One “what if” thought can lead to an entire scenario played out like a movie in m y mind. That movie gets my heart rate going and from there I might go to Google to find out all I can about a subject. After investigating, I worry more or make my own plans. Before I know it, I’ve left Jesus totally out of the picture.

Just like you, I go through seasons of feeling full of faith and trust. These seasons gradually give way to other seasons that feel dark and scary. The pattern I see that is the catalyst for the dark seasons is a lack of intentionally pursuing God and His Word and being lazy in my thinking.

Will you join me, once again, in turning the mind from wasteland thinking to graceland thinking? Let’s turn away from all that easily entangles us and turn once again toward Jesus, His Kingdom, and His grace.

He has covered our sins and He enables us to move toward Him.

Get a free mini course on transforming the mind with God’s Word here:

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Linking up this week wtih these awesome bloggers!

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