Worry

This is me. I'm not different than you. I struggle. I fall. I succeed. I doubt. I laugh, a lot. I cry more than I want to admit in public. I'm a softy. I'm a pastor, father of four that aren't mine, grandfather of the same type, husband, brother, son, and friend. I've worked the big outfits and the little ones. I'm a storyteller at heart and I suffer from severe anxiety. I've been a people-pleaser much of my life and that made me not like myself very much. I'm learning how to like me again. I'm not hiding anymore.

So for the next five days, you're not hearing about worry from a man in a clean shirt who read about it in a book. You're hearing it from a man who has laid awake with it. And the first thing I want to hand you is what worry actually is, because it took me years to see it.

We are really bad about invading God's personal space. Like a horse that crowds up on you and won't respect where you end and he begins, we crowd up on God. And the way we invade God's personal space, all the time, is worry.

Now hear me on this part, because it matters. The Bible is full of things God said we don't have to do, and most of them come down to these two: you don't have to worry, and you don't have to be afraid. He didn't say you would never be worried or never be afraid. He said you don't have to be. There's a big difference, and the rest of this ride lives in that difference.

Yesterday I named worry for what it is: trying to be God. Today I want you to hear what Jesus himself said about it, because a lot of anxious folks think God is disappointed in them for worrying. Jesus didn't scold. He pointed at the field.

Doesn't God feed the birds of the air and clothe the flowers in the field? God said we don't have to worry, but yet we worry a lot more than we have faith.

And here's the part I don't want you to ride past. Jesus used the birds and the flowers to show you how the Father provides. But Jesus didn't come to die for flowers. He came to die for you. If God dresses up a prickly pear finer than Solomon ever dressed, what do you think he'll do for the one he sent his son to buy back?

Guilt is a futile attempt to travel back in time and change something. Worry is a futile attempt to travel forward in time and make something happen. We ruin every day by worrying about the future. Learn to be present in the present. That's where God is. You can't change the past, and tomorrow will bring its own worries. Give up on the illusion of control.

I promised you the how, so here it is, from a man who wore the title. Advice from a professional worrier: how I trained myself to stop, in one simple step. It is one simple step, but that doesn't mean I mastered it in one day. Every single time I started to worry, I told myself, "It's going to be ok." Sometimes I had to repeat it out loud for an hour. But why is it going to be ok? Because God said he'd never leave me or forsake me, and that means it's going to be ok.

Now let me be honest with you about a churchy phrase you've probably already had handed to you. Maybe stress can be defined as trying to control the uncontrollable. To be honest, I don't like the term, "Give it to God." I understand what it means, but I think it's misunderstood for a very important reason. Most of the time, giving it to God is a journey, not a one-time event. People pray and "give it to God" and when they are not immediately released from the burden, it seems like God doesn't care. Well, he does. He does more than just care, he loves you. Start the journey today. Every time you feel that stress, say, "God, this is yours." You might have to say it 100 times a day. If so, then do it. Do it until you don't have to say it anymore.

Two more things I do, and they're simple enough to start tonight. The Bible's most often repeated command is "do not be afraid." Write down what you're afraid of and give it to God. Walk boldly in life. And then work at it the way you'd work at anything worth having: find that muscle inside you that stops you from worrying and exercise that thing until it is strong. It's the faith muscle.

Worry's got a big brother, and his name is fear. I'm not going to talk down to you about it, because I know it from the inside.

Have you ever sat numb, yet feeling every single thing, and prayed, "God, thank you for not allowing me to know that such a beautiful start to the day would end up so terrible"? I've prayed one of those prayers. When everything was falling apart, I had to be the one that was strong. I had to be there for my wife. I couldn't afford to let the fear inside find a way out. And that's hard. There are still moments that the fear seems about ready to overwhelm the faith, but I've got fear in a headlock and refuse to let it win. That's really what it feels like inside. This massive snake of fear trying to destroy my joy. I spent many years being swallowed by that snake. I don't run from it now. I'm tired of running. Faith and fear both demand that you believe in something you cannot see. I've decided.

A long time back, Ralph Hager put me on his good bridle horse, and I rode him braced-up and stiff. Ralph saw it and warned me, in that dry way an old cowboy has: "That horse ain't bucked anybody off in 22 years, but he's fixing to buck you off if you don't relax." Then he told me something I've never forgotten. Your fears will get you in wrecks far more often than they'll keep you out of them.

You can't help how you feel sometimes, but you can choose how you act. You can feel fear without acting afraid. That is courage. I didn't say you couldn't do it afraid. I said you can't do it giving in to fear. The Bible's most repeated command is "do not be afraid," and here's why: fear takes more effort than faith, with a lot worse consequences.

Last day, pard. You know what worry is: trying to be God. You've heard what Jesus said about it, you've got the how, and you know what to do when fear shows up. One thing left, and it's the thing you actually came looking for: the peace.

My favorite picture of peace in the whole Bible is Jesus asleep in the back of a boat in the middle of a storm. Imagine Jesus asleep against a bale of hay while we freak out because it hasn't rained. Jesus never freaked out. If I'm asleep, does it look like I'm worried? And when he stood up and said, "Quiet, be still," the wind died. He was showing off God's peace. Like the old saying goes, sometimes God doesn't quiet the storm. He quiets the person in the storm.

I'll leave you with the night I got my own sermon preached back to me. I'd been stressed out for a good while, helping ranchers through hard times, and all the while a family had blessed our house with new siding, new doors, and new windows. My wife wanted the back door moved, so we moved it. But the concrete porch stayed put. That night, pitch dark, I stepped out with my right foot, my left foot never found the porch, and down I went. My wife hollered, "Are you okay?" I said, "I don't know if I'm okay or not. Somebody moved the porch. It's not there anymore." And I found myself getting so stressed out that I forgot to be joyful. People love us. They blessed our house to where it doesn't snow inside anymore. I get to live the life of a cowboy. What did I have to be stressed out about? What do you have to be stressed out about?

I preached a whole message on Jesus' own words about worry. Seven warnings he gave, and the cure for all seven. It's called 7 Warnings About Worry. Watch it here.