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Sep 22, 2022 08:00am

When Anxiety Comes, part 2

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Yesterday I shared a story with you about a time when I had needless anxiety. Like I told you then, sometimes anxiety is appropriate, and sometimes it is needless. In the situation with my wife’s surgery, my anxiety was simply due to a lack of communication regarding the surgery.
I believe Jesus shows us what to do when faced with anxiety.

1. He leaned into his relationship with the Father.
2. He communicated with the Father in prayer.
3. He aligned his will with the will of the Father.

In a moment of anxiety in Jesus’ life, we find that he considered communication with the Father as necessary and critical. So should we.
So let’s take a moment to apply these three steps modeled by Jesus to our own lives.
1. Relationship
There can be no meaningful communication with God without a relationship. And there can be no relationship except by the grace of God that is activated by our faith in Jesus as our Savior. I cannot give you a roadmap to that faith here, but I can tell you that if you earnestly seek Him, you will find Him. I am certain that there are people here at Lifeword who are ready, willing, and able to help you.

It all starts here. Without that relationship established through faith in Christ, there is no path to a life of enduring and overriding peace.
“But seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.” (Matthew 6:33)

2. Communication
No relationship can thrive without communication. Just as the failure of communication caused me great anxiety at the surgery center, our failure of communication with God will cause us unnecessary anxiety. God is always ready and willing to communicate, and it is up to us to ask, seek, and knock. God’s communication to us can come through the words of the Bible, prayer, godly counsel, or directly from His Spirit to ours.
It is impossible to align our lives with His plans without that communication.
“Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you.”

(Matthew 7:7)

3. Alignment
Even the best communication has little value if we do not listen, heed, and act accordingly. It is this alignment which unleashes the power and blessings of God into our lives. It is this alignment which produces a life of peace beyond understanding instead of a life dominated by needless anxiety.
“But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling
yourselves.” (James 1:22)

So in closing, I can’t tell you that a life of following Jesus will eliminate every moment of anxiety from your life. That’s pretty obvious from my recent episode! But I can tell you that Jesus does offer breakthroughs from lifestyles of needless anxiety. As you communicate with Him, you’ll find He does offer help and comfort in the anxious moments. How foolish it was for me to suffer needless anxiety because of a lack of communication. May we come to Him, communicate with Him, and align with who He is and what He says.