As we all come off the emotional roller coaster ride that was the holiday season with all of its emotional highs and lows we now enter into the doldrums of the winter months. Some of us will come off of the holiday season with an emotional high with the warmth and love that was shared with family and friends. Others will exit the holiday season with emotional lows stemmed from family strife and turmoil, unmet expectations, or financial difficulties. Whether you find yourself in the former or the latter of these two groups, most will enter into the new year with some form of anxiety.
According to a medical study that was recently published, an estimated 40 million adults or 19.1% suffer from anxiety disorders. What is far more alarming is that the populous as a whole seeks secularized treatment for one’s anxiety. The word psychology literally means “study of the soul” and yet when it comes to such matters, many are grasping for a lifeline from ill-equipped individuals for treatment. For all of the advances in “modern medicine,” medical psychologists only offer solutions to manage one’s anxiety and yet the Word of God gives its readers a way to eliminate it.
If we look to the words of our Lord in Matthew’s gospel, 6:25, our Lord says, “do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?” The Greek word for “life” is used in the context of fullness of earthly and physical life. Jesus is telling his listeners in this passage to stop worrying about earthly matters of this life. In verses 20 and 21 of chapter 6, our Lord instructs his listeners to store up treasures in heaven and where your treasure is, there your heart will be. In short he is telling his listeners to focus on heavenly and eternal matters, not temporal earthly matters that will indeed pass away. Jesus further goes on to say, in chapter 6, in verse 27, “And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life?” Our Lord elaborates on the topic of anxiety even more when he tells his listeners what good will it do you worrying anyway, it will not add a single hour to your life. Lastly in 1 Peter 5:7, the apostle Peter tells us, “Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety on him, because He cares for you.”
As we enter this new year, I encourage you that if you are suffering with anxiety to adhere to what the word of God tells us, stop worrying for it will do no good, and to cast your anxiety upon God because he indeed cares for you and he will deliver you in the proper time.
The writer is is a student of The Master’s Seminary in Los Angeles, California. He is assistant to Pastor John Young of First Baptist Church in Sidney. Broughton resides in Wapakoneta with his wife Sarah and their children.
