Philippians 4:6 CEV
Don’t worry about anything, but pray about everything. With thankful hearts offer up your prayers and requests to God.
People deal with anxiety every day. Think about the different stages in our life. Whether you are a student, single, married, parent, retired, each age brings some sort of stress. Perhaps when you were a student you stressed about getting good grades to get to the university of your choice. Once you got into the uni., you worried about graduating and getting the job. After landing the job, you had enough of the single life, so you stressed about finding “the one.” You found Mr. or Mrs. Right, and now you feel it’s time to tie the knot. You get married, trying to make it work, and realize doing life with your soulmate isn’t easy at all; all that brings on is anxiety. And for those who are married, they think of having kids, and thinking that will smooth everything out, only to find out it doesn’t because now they feel they are stressed about their kids and parenting. Finally, they get closer to retirement, and start worrying if they will have enough money, or if the money will outlive them
Every category of life has something to be anxious about. We think that if we only get to the next category, it will alleviate the stress, but that is rarely the case. Yes, there are some moments in our lives that are smoother than others, but anxiety is actually part of the human experience. God uses it as a tool to show us that we were made for Heaven, and that we need Him.
The Word of God is full of verses that speak about anxiety and fears. The apostle Paul tells us in the book of Philippians to not be anxious about anything. All we have to do, is present our worries and fears to God; He is our counselor who gives us peace and consoles our hearts. He is our anchor of hope. A God who carries our burdens and gives us rest.
God wants to teach us to grow in our faith through anxiety; to learn to trust and walk in strength with Him.
