Do you worry?

• By candidasullivan
• June 5, 2024
• No Comments

Throughout my life, I’ve had a continuous cycle of worry. Even when things were going great, I convinced myself it was only going great because everything was about to fall apart. I watched the news and the weather and allowed other people, events, and forecasts to dictate how I felt. 

I couldn’t be happy on Monday if the weatherperson predicted severe weather for Thursday. Looking back on that period of my life makes me sad. Oh, how I wish I could have helped my younger self because I stressed myself out continuously. I was a bundle of nerves and fears. 

While I’m not entirely immune to the temptation to worry, I have gotten so much better about working through my worry cycles. 

So, I want to share what I’ve learned, experienced, and overcome. I’ve prayed a lot about worry. It honestly upsets me when the enemy uses my fears to hurt me. 

WHAT DO I DO WHEN WORRY HITS?

The first thing I do is try to figure out why I am worrying. Therefore, I start with my relationship with God. How close are we right now? While my instinct is to assure you and myself that we are really close, examining it is worthwhile. 

Have I been praying about the things bothering me or just worrying about them? Do I talk to God about them or everyone else? Has God answered me, or have I been talking all the time? That is a BIG indication of where I am. 

If God is silent and not offering me any comfort, I have a problem. I’ve probably not talked to Him about it nor listened for His voice, or I’m so far away from Him that I can’t hear Him. We are God’s children; He wants to help and comfort us. 

I like to think of it this way: When I was a little girl, I thought my Daddy could protect me from anything. If a storm raged, as long as I could see him and hear his voice tell me everything would be okay, I felt confident it would be. 

It’s the same way with my Lord. If I can see Him working in my life and hear His words of comfort, I’m okay. But if things feel scary and I can’t feel my Lord or hear His voice, I really start to worry. 

The voice of my Lord is peace. 

I remember one time I was in bad shape. I couldn’t sleep or even take a really deep breath. Every muscle in my body felt tense, and I was sure something terrible was about to happen at any moment. As the surges of fear overwhelmed me, God whispered: It’s not the storm outside of you that scares you, but the one inside you. 

It wasn’t my circumstances causing my pain but how I thought and felt about them. I had created a storm inside of me with my catastrophic thinking. I was in flight or fight mode when there wasn’t any danger. 

Sometimes, worry is me trying to figure out something other than God’s will. When I resist His plan, I feel fearful, overwhelmed, stressed, etc. But when I can lean into Him and accept His will as the best possible outcome, I have peace even in the storms. 

Worry is a bigger deal than I initially thought it was. It means something is unaligned with our relationship. It means I am not trusting my Lord as I should, following Him, or obeying him.  

Worrisome thoughts will enter all of our minds from time to time. But what I do with the idea makes all the difference. If I allow it to loop over and over in my mind while I imagine the worst-case scenario, then I am listening to the enemy. The real power is when I can tell the Lord what the enemy is saying to me and ask Him to help me overcome it all. 

When I feel worried, I try pray and praise my Lord. My God is good. He cares for me greatly. I am highly favored and deeply loved. Therefore, the enemy must go through my Lord to get to me. And if God allows certain things to happen, it is for a purpose greater than what I can see or understand. 

Instead of worrying, I want to pray, learn, grow, and praise my Lord. I believe in the Lord and His precious word.

Isaiah 41:10 KJV

¹⁰ Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.

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