Overcoming Anxiety
One of my daily struggles is anxiety. I have really bad social anxiety and it definitely effects everything I do outside of the home when I don’t just stick to myself. I decided that enough was enough. Nothing is too great for God! But how do I overcome my inner thoughts that make me stressed in my day to day life??!
2 Corinthians 3:17 says, “For the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom(NLT).” We have been set free. Christ died on the cross for our sins, setting us free. So why do we mentally struggle still? John 8: 31-36 says, “Jesus said to the people who believed him, “You are truly my disciples if you remain faithful to my teachings. And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” “But we are descendants of Abraham,” they said. “We have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean, ‘You will be set free’?” Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sings is a slave of sin. A slave is not permanent member of the family, but a son is part of the family forever. So if the Son sets you free, you are truly free.”(NLT).” We can be God fearing Christians and still struggle mentally. We need to change that! We are set free eternally but we are prisoners to our thoughts in the here on earth. God does not want this for us. We need to walk in peace, joy and confidence. God wants us to have freedom. Build up your faith, give your worries to God and live for him. Galatians 5:1 says, “So Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don’t get tied up again in slavery to the law (NLT).” Christ has set us free. God doesn't want us to be prisoners of our own accord. Give it to Him!
When we are low and we feel like life keeps kicking us while we are down we need to put our faith in Jesus. God wants to help bring us out of our low. Ephesians 2:10 says, “For we are God’s masterpeice. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago (NLT).” This helps create our own testimonies that may help someone else! God helps us meet our greatest potential even if there is a lot of lows first. Philippians 1:6 says, “And I am certain that God, who began the good world within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns (NLT).”When we are struggling we need to remember that God has something amazing in store for our lives. We can feel despair and feel like the world is ending but God has something amazing he is going to do in our lives. Numbers 23:19 says, “God is not a man, so he does not lie. He is not human, so he does not change his mind. Has he ever spoken and failed to act? Has he ever promised and not carried it through? (NLT)” God has a plan for us. We might feel overwhelmed and like we are in between a rock and a hard place but God will not take us down a road that we can not handle.
Fear and sadness are some emotions that we feel, maybe even regularly. God gives us emotions to humanize us and to protect us. John 10:10 says, “The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life (NLT).”The issue with the enemy and our emotions is that he likes to twist them around and around till we are spinning out of control. Fear can look like not putting your hand down a hole because you fear getting bitten by a hidden snake. Fear can also look like never leaving your house because you are so incredibly scared of what might happen if you go outside. You might not know what you’re scared of but you know something bad will happen if you leave the comfort of your home. Fear is being used against us by the devil making you miserable. When we lose something or someone important to us we need to give to move on. We need to feel sadness to help us be ok with our loss. Sadness sometimes doesn’t move on and it creates issues like depression, our sadness dooms us. The enemy doesn’t want us to have a success story. He wants us to be stuck. Christ died on the cross to save us from our sins and give us freedom. We are living in a broken world but we don’t have to be broke. 1 John 4:4 says, “But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already won a victory over those people, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the Spirit who lives in the world(NLT).” We have power in us moving in our lives if we give it all to God. Zach Bryan says “The Devil can scrap but the Lord has won”. This is so true, the enemy creates hard times in our lives in hopes we fail but as long as we put our faith in Christ we will not fail. 2 Corinthians 4:4 says, “Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t belive. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God(NLT).” The devi will try to destroy us but we will persevere through Christ.
