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by
Max Lucado
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December 13 - December 28, 2022
Anxiety and fear are cousins but not twins. Fear sees a threat. Anxiety imagines one.
The presence of anxiety is unavoidable, but the prison of anxiety is optional.
Your belief system has nothing to do with your skin color, appearance, talents, or age. Your belief system is not concerned with the exterior of the tent but the interior. It is the set of convictions (poles)—all of them unseen—upon which your faith depends. If your belief system is strong, you will stand. If it is weak, the storm will prevail. Belief always precedes behavior.
Perceived control creates calm. Lack of control gives birth to fear.
Anxiety increases as perceived control diminishes.
That’s why the most stressed-out people are control freaks. They fail at the quest they most pursue. The more they try to control the world, the more they realize they cannot. Life becomes a cycle of anxiety, failure; anxiety, failure; anxiety, failure. We can’t take control, because control is not ours to take.
“There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the LORD” (Prov. 21:30 NIV).
“Who can act against you without the Lord’s permission? It is the Lord who helps one and harms another”
God calmed the fears of Isaiah, not by removing the problem, but by revealing his divine power and presence.
Lift up your eyes. Don’t get lost in your troubles. Dare to believe that good things will happen. Dare to believe that God was speaking to you when he said, “In everything God works for the good of those who love him” (Rom. 8:28 NCV).
Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, And whose hope is the LORD. For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters, Which spreads out its roots by the river, And will not fear when heat comes; But its leaf will be green, And will not be anxious in the year of drought.
“But all these things that I once thought very worthwhile—now I’ve thrown them all away so that I can put my trust and hope in Christ alone” (Phil. 3:7 TLB).
“I am still not all I should be, but I am bringing all my energies to bear on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I strain to reach the end of the race and receive the prize for which God is calling us up to heaven because of what Christ Jesus did for us” (Phil. 3:13–14 TLB).
