"What if I I can't get have children?" "What if my husband can't find a job?" "What if my Sunday School lesson doesn't go well tomorrow?"
These are some of the questions that are going through my mind right now. I spend a great deal of my day and night worrying about the "what ifs" in life. My worry has seemed to take over a lot of my free time. I wasn't always like this; I didn't worry so much about everything. All I really want is peace, contentment, and joy, but with worry, fear, and anxiety on my mind it's difficult to get to that place.
Linda Dillow defines anxiety as, "that which divides and distracts the soul, that which diverts us from present duty to weary calculations of how to meet the conditions that may never arrive. It's the habit of crossing bridges before we reach them." She goes on to say that, "worry is derived from an old Anglo-Saxon word meaning 'to strangle or choke'."
Wow! Worry and anxiety can have much control over how I live my everyday life. Living with anxiety can keep me from living a life filled with peace, contentment and joy. That is NOT how I want to live, but yet I allow it to happen to me every day.
How can I change this pattern?! How can I become a woman that is filled with joy, peace, and contentment? How can I live knowing that God will take care of my daily "what ifs"?
The answer came to me from my husband. As I was sharing my latest worries with him tonight, he said, "How big is your God?" He threw a stuffed animal at me and asked, "Is He only this big?" At first, the question offended me, "How could you ask me that? My God is the same as your God!" But was I acting like it? Was I giving Him all of my anxiety and know that He would take care of it, or was I treating him like the size of my stuffed animal and limiting His power?
Some of my favorite chapters in the bible are Job 38 and 39. These chapters talk about the "bigness" of God. My God can call lighting down from heaven! He can raise the sun in the morning! My God calls out the stars each night, by name.
I serve a BIG God that created the universe and yet takes care of the birds in the sky and the flowers in the valley. He cares for me (and you) so much more. Matthew 6:33-34 says, "But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you. Therefore do not be anxious for tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." I think that God put that verse in His word just for me.
I don't need to worry about the what ifs in life... ever... because I serve a BIG God that can handle it for me.
