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How many times have you made changes in your life only to see it all fall apart as soon as the right buttons get pushed? Originally, the topic of stress started to seem cliche and commercialized to me. The subject seemed to only come up when companies made an effort to help employees stay healthy. And I get that. But outside of that it always involves that frame of mind of being on the mental treadmill of life. Slowly making you feel completely overwhelmed the further you get. Like a 1000 pound plate you try to carry around trying not to spill it and make an even bigger mess. Why is it so hard to get out from underneath these kind of problems? Stress can even change the way our blood flows through our veins. Cutting off oxygen from getting to our organs, believe it or not, throwing us into the flight or fight response when stress comes alive.
I believe our levels of stress are directly tied to our views on love. Because at the very heart of all stress you will find worry. Sometimes just a small frustrating feeling of what might happen making everything so irritating. The best way to get rid of that is to start learning how much God cares about you. If you have the assurance that God loves you in a personal way, which he does. It gives you that little bit of confidence you need to keep going. Keeping us from going over the edge and risking our health. If stress comes with a little bit of worry then it also comes with a little bit of fear. That little bit of fear is small enough to ignore because it doesn’t seem like such a big deal. But it’s the right size to be a nagging problem that can affect everything else in your life. Changing the way you feel, affecting your relationships with the people you love and work with. Altering your perspective and your attitude with your kids and everyone around you. Like the people who care the most but are also stressed out and having trouble showing it too…
1 John 4:17 says “perfect love cast out fear because fear involves torment.” So even a little bit of that fear comes in to torment you with the thought of “what if” and “oh my gosh.” But if you know the perfect love of God, who cares about you, those problems will become minimized in your mind. And if you can minimize them in your mind they’ll be minimized in your heart, and in your life. Because the scripture also says “if God is for us who can be against us?” Romans 8:31. If you believe God is real, and that He is all-powerful, you’re either doubting how He feels about you or you just don’t have a clue. If all three are in sync why would we care about that person offending us?
But I am also talking to myself here. I start over-thinking, over-analyzing, and focusing in too much on things that aren’t as important. I start doing this without realizing it, even with this blog.
I was talking to Anne last night and sharing with her all the things I’m trying to figure out. Then I realized the mistake I’ve been making is over-complicating everything, trying to make it better than it already is. Instead of accepting the simplicity of what I’ve been given, and trusting him that it’s good enough.
I said all that to say that I see that I am becoming my own guinea pig. Before I can ever share with others how to ‘let go’ I am having to learn how to do it myself. The problem I get caught up in is allowing my mind to get in the way. Even though I know this already, it’s still one thing to know it and another to actually live it. It’s not easy, but it’s not confusing. I think God is actually trying to bless me a little more and I am putting up walls every now and then. This whole thing is simply learning how to walk in rest.
If we are trusting in our own logic more than anything else, we will fail. We will never be able to meet the requirements all the time, and neither will the people we have in our lives. If we don’t know that, we will be bound my the old law. Setting ourselves up for disappointments, trying to live a life of works that we will never be able to meet. “Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace.” Galatians 5:4
God is trying to make our lives simpler by blessing us and loving us until we are a little uncomfortable by it. Our nature makes it difficult to embrace that kind of love.
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