Dealing with WORRY and hearing from God

(Foto by Jermaine Ulinwa from Pexels)

Worry will not add anything to your day. Except a heavy weight. Crushing your joy, it will stir your peace into a cocktail of confusion and fear. It will keep on pounding you with thoughts of what might be but will usually never happen. It will disrupt, diminish and bash at the things that are; until you learn to box back and attack, deciding deception has no hold on you anymore.

“Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to your life? Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest? “Consider how the wild flowers grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will he clothe you—you of little faith! And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.”
Luke 12:25‭-‬31 NIV
https://bible.com/bible/111/luk.12.25-31.NIV

Give it all to Jesus.

Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous be shaken.
Psalms 55:22 NIV
https://psalm.bible/psalm-55-22

The other evening I was worrying about something way beyond me, I can’t even remember what it was, but it was stealing my peace, disrupting my otherwise constructive thought processes and distracting my concentration on things that were actually necessary and more relevant. Get this: the things going on around you are ALWAYS more relevant than what you are worrying about, since that is only a fear induced possibility which tries to influence your decisions and kill your peace. How often does it succeed?

At some point I realized and, since this is my way of dealing with such things, I envisioned giving the entire load of worry over to Jesus, it was a huge heap, like a pile of dirty washing. I locked it into a cage and gave Jesus the key. Sometimes it shouts through the bars and I have to remind myself where it is. It will not be let out unless he lets it out and that will be to transform that particular worry from a distructive fighter for inner turmoil into a stepping stone towards prayer and trusting God to do what’s best.

Jesus took the key and kissed me on the cheek, which was lovely. It made me smile. And no it wasn’t part of my imagination, I purposefully put the worry into the cage and gave Jesus the key but his reaction was not something I expected or would have conjured up myself. It is the connection we have to each other in our relationship. If you know Jesus personally, like so many who do, you will know what I mean. If you have not experienced this yet and find it weird, you can ask God to speak to you and he will. Not necessarily in the same way though.

“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
Matthew 7:7‭-‬8 NIV
https://bible.com/bible/111/mat.7.7-8.NIV

Some people feel physical pain and understand exactly what they should pray for healing in someone else.

Others are reminded of scripture or focus more on nature and what God tells them through the things they see. For most I think it is a mixture of all of those things. Only very rarely does God speak with an audible voice. For some once in a lifetime, for most never. But we know and understand what he is telling us, he shows us through things we read and understand in the bible, in sermons, worship music, conversations, even every day experiences can lead us to understand what he is trying to help us with. It is always in love, patient, kind and never mean, forceful or fear inducing. That is how you can know if it is from him or not.

Most of the time his voice is a notion, a knowing that we know, a nudge in our inner being or our conscience to do something specific. We just know when we need to admit something and apologize, we feel the unease of warning when we are about to do something that would cause damage.

All these things and so much more, God uses to communicate with us. The real question is: DO WE HEAR HIM? or do we ignore these nudges and do what we want despite our conscience gently nudging at us to stop?

I love praying and worshipping God, it frees me from all the other stuff which sometimes threatens to drown out the things that could make me laugh and be at peace. Prayer and worship turns my focus away from everything else. I turn to him and then I can get whatever is bothering me and tell him about it, like the good and kind father that he is, he listens and in my case often helps me understand and deal with things using my imagination.

I put my bundle of worry in the cage, locked it and gave Jesus the key. He kissed my cheek in response and through that I am reassured of his affection for me. I haven’t worried about the issue again. The following day I was actually happy, I even felt like dressing up a bit just to go into town, to the delight of my daughter who often finds me embarrassing because I usually just wear what is easiest, quickest and most comfortable.

It made me realize that I actually felt good and in that had fun making a bit of an effort where more often than not I just have too much going on to bother much about appearances. Now I realize though that the stuff going on is only the tip of the ice berg, the weight of worry and pressure it causes is the huge rest of it. Once I gave Jesus the worry I wasn’t carrying that weight around anymore. I could focus on other, more fun things. That is why it is best to cast our cares upon Jesus.