The Cure for Anxiety

…no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly…Psalm 84:11

I see so many people with anxiety over various things they think they desperately need….a car, a house, a different job, a smart phone, a game system, a drink, a romantic partner.  That desperation is a pathology.  It is not wrong to have goals in life and work toward them.  Some of those goals might very well be acquiring material things or a relationship with someone, but anything that is more important to us than our relationship with God is an idol, and it is wrong…W-R-O-N-G!  That sick attitude causes people to lie, cheat and attempt to manipulate outcomes to gain their purposes.  It causes poor decisions.  We humans never know all the factors with which we are dealing.  We don’t know what will happen tomorrow.  Our decision-making process is crippled by these limitations.

If we love God with all our heart, soul and mind, and we are developing our relationship with him, we don’t need a single thing, and we can rely on Him to plan our future.  He has promised us that if our focus is right, He will see to it that we have every GOOD thing.  That does not mean everything we desire, but it truly does mean everything that is actually good for us.

Those of us who have attempted to live this way can testify that we have wanted some things, NOT gotten them, and then later discovered that we ended up with something far better than what we thought was so important.  Sometimes putting God’s will first has saved us the trouble and sorrow our desire would have caused had we obtained it.

How does one go about convincing someone else of that?

I can share that God has done this in my life, but I know I can’t talk anyone else into it.  This is where faith comes in.  By some miraculous combination of our faith and God’s grace, we step out into life believing that because He made us, He knows what we need and will provide it.  He is God and will keep His promises.  I have been relying on His promises for 65 years, 5 months and 18 days of my 73 years minus 4 days. 

If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! 

Matthew 7:11