Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice! Let your gentle spirit be known to all men. The Lord is near. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. —Philippians 4:4-8
I had a long drive alone yesterday. My morning had begun at 4:30 a.m., sheltering with my sleep-addled and anxious family in a bathroom to the sound of tornado warnings, all the while praying for the families to our west who had already experienced this storm and had lost everything. I had gone to bed the night before to the news that our beloved Snohomish County, WA— our home for so many years— is at the epicenter of America’s burgeoning COVID-19 outbreak. I have several dear friends walking through the most heart-breaking and faith-stretching seasons I can imagine. I got in the car with my shoulders in a knot. Being alone with my thoughts was not necessarily what I wanted.
Of course, God met me there.
I listened to a few minutes of breaking news out of Middle Tennessee. It didn’t take long before I was sobbing over the image my mind brewed of a family caught unawares in the middle of the night, unable to make the desperate streak in the dark to safety that we had made only a few hours before. I switched off the news and found myself in one of those long, meandering conversations in which I poured my heart out to God.
Lord, why?
Jesus, You are so powerful. You could have…
Please, Lord, show mercy.
Come, Lord Jesus.
Be with Your children, Lord.
Open the hearts of those who don’t yet submit to You, Father.
And on and on.
It was perhaps not the hour and a half I wanted, but it was the hour and a half I needed. Like a child, I exhausted myself with my wrangling, and finally found the space to be still.
In that place, there was peace.
The world and its worries are too large for me to wrestle, and too heavy for me to bear. Every time I allow my anxious spirit to pick up another of the stones of grief that are constantly churned up through the plowing of life’s soil, I find myself burdened beyond my own capacity. I know this… and yet some days I walk through the fields I am supposed to tend, and purposefully seem to gather every rock I see. And then, when my arms aren’t quite full enough, I visit the fields of others and see if I can find more sadness, more fear to add to my load.
We are supposed to care. We are supposed to cry out, to seek God’s face. We are to walk alongside one another, to share our joys and our pains. We are to ask for those who do not believe to join us at the foot of the cross. But we are not designed to carry the weight of anxieties we cannot possibly answer.
The Lord is near.
It is His job to bear the burdens.
Be anxious for nothing.
Shelter in His promises.
Let your requests be made known.
Share your heart with Him.
And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Amen.