Anxiety and Worry: Not on God's Watch

The title of this blog post is credited to Pastor Scott Burmeister, my pastor at Christ The Redeemer Lutheran Church. Because being healthy isn't always about eating healthy and working out, but also being mentally, emotionally, and spiritually healthy I try to post on things that have helped me in my journey and that could possibly help someone else.

Now,  real quick just to be clear, my opinion of being spiritually healthy doesn't mean being religious, or even being a Christian or any other religion for that matter. It's about being at peace with yourself internally, which helps you stay mentally and emotionally healthy. I know not all my readers are Christians, and I know all my readers won't be able to relate to this specific post, and there's nothing wrong with that. However, I do encourage those readers to just look at their own spiritual journey and reflect on what causes their stress and anxiety, and how in your own journey ease that stress and anxiety so you too can ensure you are also mentally and emotionally healthy.

So, now on to what came out of my meditation from the sermon. Today's sermon was great and something I relate to often. The title alone said it all for me, "Anxiety and Worry: Not on God's Watch". I mean I had so many thoughts about this before the actual sermon, but once Pastor Scott spoke I ended up with many notes which I'm going to highlight what I got out of the sermon. It's like Pastor said, we do have many things to worry about, just turning on the news causes us to worry. So, the big question he asked us today was "What worries have you brought to God's house today?" Is it something financial, job related, a relationship, the future of our country, the safety of our communities? Whatever your worry is there's one simple answer, DON'T DO IT! But, as most things, that's easier said than done. We are human, we worry about things we have no control of and we worry about the outcome of certain situations. But, why do we worry like that, and what exactly are we worried about? That's the question I asked myself and I meditated on as Pastor continued his sermon, and referencing back to the Gospel reading for today, I came to my own conclusion.

The Gospel reading for today's sermon is Luke 12:22-34, but what really stood out for me were verses 30-32. 

"For all the nations of the world seek after these things, and your Father knows that you need them. Instead, seek his kingdom, and these things will be added to you. Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." - Luke 12:30-32

After really thinking about this, my own personal conclusion is it's our own selfish wants that cause us anxiety and stress. The anxiety and stress is that the outcome won't be what we WANT, but instead of having faith the outcome will be what God knows we NEED! So, as Pastor mentioned in his closing, "Don't Worry, Have Faith".