Worry ≠ Faith

Why does life get so busy and stressful sometimes? It's so easy to find yourself running all over the place, from one commitment to the next, without a moment to come up for fresh air and a breath. I'm an overachiever so it's easy for me to get wrapped up in a number of things. I work a full-time job, play on a softball team, volunteer on the production team at my church, lead a young adult small group, and tons more. Sometimes I get so busy going from one thing to the next that I start to lose focus on what's important - which is taking time for God each day. Yes, I talk to God all throughout my day when I'm in my car on my way to work, or listening to worship music like K-Love. But I mean really take some time for God...actually stop in the middle of my busy day to just rest in Him, tell him I love him, and remember that He is in full control of my life. I struggle a lot to stay consistent with my quiet times with the Lord and with consistent Bible reading. I can tell when I have been a few days without the Word - I start to get stressed and filled with anxiety and the thoughts in my mind start to process frantically.

Not only can you get so busy with your daily commitments and activities, but you can get lost among all the questions and uncertainties in life. What type of career should I pursue? What college am I suppose to attend? What degree should I obtain? Will I ever meet Mr. Right? When will I get married and have kids? What is God's calling on my life? Those questions fill our brains and make us worry and spend endless hours thinking WHAT IF or WHEN? When the honest truth is that we don't know the answers, we aren't meant to know the answers, and we are wasting our time trying to figure them out. Some questions, we are just meant to leave unanswered, trusting that the Lord has it all under control and all we have to do is have faith in Him. I remember in my 4th year of college, having a mid-year crisis about what type of job I was suppose to get after graduating. How was I going to use my degree? Where did God want me to go? All that freaking out and worrying got me nowhere and left me running frantic instead of seeking God first and trusting Him. What about my love life? For the first couple years after I graduated college, I watched all my best friends get engaged, get married, and now start having kids. My human reaction was to freak out and say "Where is my knight in shining armor?" "When will I find Mr. Right?" "When will I get married and have kids?" But honestly, the moment I stopped worrying about those things and stopped asking those questions to leave it in God's hands, that is the moment peace entered my life. God has it all under control. He knows if and when I am suppose to get married. He knows and has created the perfect person for me. He knows what type of career path I will succeed in and the direction I am to go. So, all I have to do is trust in Him. I no longer worry about these things; I simply feel peace about them all. It's amazing what happens when you relinquish control over to the Creator. I am so grateful for the Lord and His patience with me when I do get into those freak-out modes. But I often refocus myself with this scripture:

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.  But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Matthew 6:25-34