A Worry Free Life?
“Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:6–7 NLT
Whenever this scripture comes to mind, especially the words in verse 6, I always wonder about the possibility of it all. Is it possible to live a life without worry? Can I get to a point where I can sense a foreboding of something to come and shrug my shoulders as though the threats were nothing but the promise of rain for which I already have shelter? Is it really possible?
On the one hand, I can imagine the freedom that comes with being worry-free and just living life without a care in the world and on the other hand I worry about being reckless, not having control and having a ready plan against tomorrow.
But taking a closer look at this scripture I realize that none of the reasons I have mentioned above has relevance. It is not about simply not caring, and it is not about losing control. It is about a shift in focus.
Anxiety often comes when we feel we are losing hold and the result could most definitely be catastrophic. Anxiety happens when a situation is looming, and we look at its capacity, consider our ability, and notice that we fall short in our capacity to take on the situation approaching. We fear the possibility of the inevitable, we fear the effect of what’s to come, we fear the consequence of going in blind and being unprepared for what’s to come.
What the scripture is drawing our attention to is to learn how to shift our focus from “our” ability to God’s ability. From “our” capacity to handle things to God’s capacity to handle things. If we believe that God is all knowing, all seeing, everywhere and possesses all power and might, you can then begin to see the possibility of a worry-free, anxiety-free life.
Since what mainly causes anxiety lies in the ability and capacity to handle, shifting our focus to God who has the ability and capacity, gives us rest because we know “He’s got this”.
So, we do not begin to apply this scripture to our lives by trying not to worry, we apply this scripture by spending time to know God and really believe that He is who He is and will do what He says. When we know this and our focus shifts from us to God, we would realize that we are worry-free.
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith.” Hebrews 12:1–2a
