I’ve also found irony in these words of Paul: “Be anxious for nothing.”6 I know that what he means is that we should not allow anything to make us anxious, but the truth is that it is usually nothing that is making us anxious. Our anxiety, our distress, our worry—when stripped to its very essence—is rooted in nothing, or at least in nothing we can control. Paul’s solution, of course, is to be anxious in nothing, but in all things, through prayer, we should bring our thanksgiving to God.7 It seems he’s telling us that anxiety comes when we try to control things that are out of our control. We
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