Tell Him About It
“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:6-7
There are so many things that we can get anxious about. There are small things and big things. There are things other people don’t worry about and things that some people worry about way too much. There are long-term worries and surprise worries and all kinds of things to be worried about. Some people are better at handling worry and others are not.
But the fact is that everyone is going to have something to worry about, whether it’s big or small, important or not. Honestly, the only people who don’t worry about anything are babies and that’s because they haven’t learned how to yet. There’s not really anything we can do to avoid worries, and sometimes they’re good because they help us stay on top of things and know what’s going on around us. The important thing is what we do with those worries.
Do you think about them all the time? Do they get in the way of other things that you need to do? Do they affect every decision you make? Unfortunately, some worries can be like that. Philippians tells us to not be anxious about anything. The verse tells us to give everything to God. Everything.
I think we get in the habit of only giving God the medium-sized things. We ask Him to keep us safe when we go on a trip but don’t think He’ll bother with the pimple we got on picture day. We ask Him to help us pass a test but don’t think He can do anything about our aunt who got really sick.
The thing is He can handle anything and he cares about everything. He can handle the big things, the things that affect a large part of our lives and is always on our minds. Nothing is too big for God to take care of. And nothing is too small for Him to worry about. If building a doghouse is important to you, it’s important to Him too. He wants to hear about the little things in our lives and can definitely take on the big things. God wants us to give them up to Him, He wants us to ask for help and to ask for His peace and tell Him about the things that make us anxious.
He also wants us to be thankful while we’re doing it. That seems counterintuitive because it’s hard to be thankful when we’re anxious about something. That’s just it though, because it’s hard to be anxious when we’re thankful. If we get into the habit of giving things over to God and adopting an attitude of thankfulness, we’ll stop worrying about things.
That’s the first step in having peace about a situation and then God does the rest. We’re not just told to not be anxious but we’re given the promise that we’ll get God’s peace when we give our worries over to Him. Which is great because God’s peace is so much better than any peace we can work up for ourselves.