God’s Answer to Fear, Anxiety & Worry: Giving Our Worries to God

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Sign up at harvest.org. What do we do when worry hits? What do we do when we're suddenly filled with anxiety? What do we do when we're overcome with fear?

Answer. We need to give our worries to Jesus Christ. When those crises hit, we don't have to give up.

We can give over. Pastor Greg Laurie says, give our problems over to the Lord. He wants to take your cares. He wants to take your worries. He wants to take your anxieties off of you. In the stillness of the night, we hear things, the faucet dripping, a dog barking in the distance, a car going down the road. We also think about things. It's often when worry moves into our minds and sets up shop for the night. What if, how come, if only, why didn't I, how can we get worried to pack it up and be on its way? Today on A New Beginning, Pastor Greg Laurie helps us put our worries to bed so we can get back to sleep. How many of you struggle with worry, fear, and anxiety? Raise your hand.

All right. Well, you're a stressed up bunch of people, aren't you? Well, I've told you this before, but you know, I heard about one guy who was known as a worry wart.

You know, I think sometimes we think worry is a virtue and it really isn't. But this guy was a worry wart, always worrying about everything, always stressed out. And one day his friend saw him and this guy was totally chill. He was calm. He didn't have a care in the world. And his friend said, man, what happened to you? He said, hey, I gave up worrying. He said, really? How did you do that? The guy says, I took an ad out and I hired someone to worry for me.

Really? How much are you paying? The guy says, $5,000 a week. Man, that's a lot of money. You don't make that kind of money.

How are you going to pay him? He said, that's for him to worry about. So many of us just worry all the time.

You know, when things are going well, we worry about how long it will be until they start going badly again. You're just constantly worried. You're worried about what other people think about you. That's a big thing for a lot of people. What do these other folks out there think about me?

You know, it's been said, you wouldn't worry so much about what people think of you if you realize how seldom they do. But there's a great theologian that had a very insightful thought about worry. The theologian known as Charlie Brown. And he said, quote, I've developed a new philosophy I only dread one day at a time.

Pretty good. Jesus said, sufficient for the day is the evil thereof. In other words, you have enough problems to face today. Don't start worrying about tomorrow and the day after and a week after and a month after.

But I'll tell you what. Anxiety, fear and worry are big issues in our nation today. Proverbs 1225 says, anxiety in the heart of man causes depression.

Well, how insightful is that statement? Now all of the medical experts are telling this effectively the same thing. Experts tell us the prevalence of anxiety across the country and around the world has reached a crisis level and it continues to grow, especially among young people. A recent Pew Research poll revealed that teens see depression and anxiety as their number one problem.

Isn't it interesting? They see depression and anxiety, number one, it ranks above bullying, drugs, alcohol, poverty, teen pregnancy and gangs. Number one, anxiety and fear and depression. Maybe that's one of the reasons that the suicide rates have increased in the last two decades in 49 out of 50 states and 25 percent of those states have seen an increase of 30 percent in suicide rates. And so we are filled with anxiety and worry.

And it is something that we need to learn how to handle. There is a story told about a man who came face to face with the dangers of worry. One day death was marching toward a city. And the man said what are you doing? And death said I am going to take 100 people today. The man said that's horrible.

Horrible. So he ran ahead of death and warned everybody about the fact that death was coming. At the end of the day as the sun was setting death was leaving the city. And then man went back to death and he said wait a second you told me you were going to take 100 people. A thousand people died today. Death said I kept my word.

I only took 100. Worry took the rest. And that is what worry can do is it can just send you into a tizzy. And we live in a nation full of warriors. You could put on a lot of American tombstones today. Hurried. Worried. Buried.

We are the only nation in the world with a mountain called Mount Rushmore. We are always on the go. Always moving. Always stressed out. 43 percent of all adults suffer mental effects due to worry and stress. And here is an interesting step. 75 percent to 90 percent of all visits to primary care physicians are stress related complaints and disorders.

In other words it is not real. Here is one thing I guarantee will get you stressed out is if you have an ache or a pain and you Google your ache or pain. And then you get advice online. Have you ever done that?

I can illustrate this personally. I was feeling pain in my chest. And I think someone I knew had just had a heart attack.

So it was sort of in my mind. And I felt this kind of pain in my chest. Sort of a pressure on it. And I thought wow what is this.

And so I Googled it. Symptoms of a heart attack. Pressure on your chest.

I had that. And it said nausea. I was immediately nauseated.

And I am the kind of guy who never goes to the doctor. So I called my doctor and I said I think I need to get an EKG. I might be having symptoms of a heart attack. He said come down here immediately. They hooked me up and did all the tests on me.

And then he said you are perfectly fine. Your heart is in great working order. And then I got the bill for it about a week later and I did have a heart attack.

No. So I am trying to figure out what is all this pressure. Well I had started playing racquetball again and I was going to chase the ball and I slammed up against the wall and just kind of bruised my massive chest. And that is what it was. But I thought it was something else. And I got myself all worked up about something that wasn't even happening to me at all. Dr. Walter Calvert reported a survey I am worried that indicated only 8% of the things people worried about were legitimate matters of concern.

The other 92% were imaginary or they never happened. That is why it has been said worry is advanced interest you pay on troubles that rarely come. So what do we do when worry hits? What do we do when we are suddenly filled with anxiety? What do we do when we are overcome with fear?

Answer. We need to give our worries to Jesus Christ. Or to put it another way we need to take out the trash. I took the trash out last night.

I don't know why I put this off. It is not a big deal. I even have these trash cans with wheels and a handle. But still I don't want to take the trash out. I hate to take the trash out. And for some reason this has become the job of men universally. It is like I don't know where the guys are supposed to do it so I dutifully take out the trash.

It is really no big deal. But sometimes in life we start finding ourselves filled with anxiety and worry and stress and we need to take the trash out so to speak. We have a trash man that comes and picks up our trash once a week.

I am really glad he does it. And even more you have a Savior. You have a God who cares about you. And the Bible says you can cast all of your care upon Him. I am not saying Jesus is a trash man.

Here is what I am saying. He wants to take your cares. He wants to take your worries. He wants to take your anxieties off of you. In fact Jesus said in Matthew 11 28, come unto Me all of you that are laboring and are carrying the weight of your burdens. Come to me and I will give you rest. Pastor Greg Laurie will have the second half of his message in just a moment.

Whenever you send us an email, text, or post a comment on social media, we read every word. Hello Pastor Greg. I don't know if you will ever see this or not, but I just wanted to say thank you for all you do. I was raised in the church and was saved at a very young age. But like a lot of folks who grew up in church, I fell away. Then one day I heard you on the radio and your message made me realize that I needed to get my life right with God.

Thank you. We're so grateful to hear of the changed lives through Harvest Ministries. And if you have a story to tell of how these studies have touched your life or that of a family member, I hope you'll contact us today. Email Pastor Greg at gregatharvest.org.

Again, that's gregatharvest.org. Well today, Pastor Greg is presenting a helpful message called God's answer to fear, anxiety, and worry, part two. Let's dig into God's word. First Peter chapter five, starting in verse six.

By the way, I'm reading from the New Living Translation. So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God. And at the right time He'll lift you up in honor, underline this phrase, casting all your cares upon Him for He cares for you. Casting all your cares upon Him for He cares for you. Stay alert. Watch out for your great enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.

Stand firm against him. Be strong in your faith. And remember that your family of believers all over the world are going through the same kind of suffering you are.

We'll stop there. So how do we deal with our stress, our anxiety, and our worry? Point number one, remember this, you are not alone in your suffering. You're not alone in your suffering.

Verse eight, remember your family of believers all over the world. They're going through the same kind of suffering you are. I know you're going through something right now and you think I'm the only person that's ever gone through this.

Actually you aren't. Others have gone through it. Others are going through it. Others will go through it.

You're not alone in your suffering. Others have experienced something very similar if not the exact same thing. The Bible even tells us in 1 Corinthians 10 13 there is no temptation or testing that will come your way that is not common to others. And God will with that temptation or testing make a way of escape that you may be able to bear it.

Loose paraphrase. There's others that are going through the same thing and somehow it's comforting to know I'm not the only person going through this right. So if you're suffering with something and you find somebody else that has suffered with the same thing or maybe something even worse it's really helpful to talk about it. This is where community comes in. This is where the church family comes in. This is why you should not try to be a solo Christian. You need Jesus and you need your Christian friends.

Your Christian brothers and sisters. You should never isolate yourself and disconnect yourself from other believers. You need to talk with them. You need to pray with them. And as collation 6 2 says you need to share each other's burdens. So just say to someone man I'm going through something hard right now and and I want to share it with you and then you talk about it and sometimes just talking about it alone helps a great deal. And then you find yourself praying about it as well. So this is what we're all called to do. Let's say you find out that you have cancer and that's a very frightening thing to hear from a doctor.

And then you say well I don't know what to do. And then you find out that there's someone in the church that is a cancer survivor. So they're going to tell you their story. How they've been able to cope with that. How the Lord has been strong for them during that time of difficulty. And that's very helpful to you. And then one day you become that survivor or you become that person and you can now as the Bible says comfort with the comfort that you've been comforted with. So you meet somebody else that thinks our world has just ended and you can say I've come through this and here's what I've learned and here's what the Lord has done for me and let me share this now with you. So remember you're not alone in your suffering.

Point number two. You need to give your burdens to God. You need to give your burdens to God. Verse 7 cast all your care upon him for he cares for you. Here's the New Living Translation puts it give all your worries and cares to God because he cares about you.

And by the way the word used here for cast is not the normal word for throwing something. Rather it is a word that signifies a definite act of the will by which we choose to stop worrying about something and let God assume the responsibility for our welfare. So I'm saying I am going to deliberately not worry about this and I'm going to intentionally throw this on God.

I'm going to put it in his hands and I'm going to leave it in his hands. And the word that is used here for care as in he cares for you means he is mindful of you. He's thinking about you.

Now just let that sink in for a moment. God Almighty the creator of the universe right now is thinking about you. And he's so amazing he's also thinking about me. He's thinking about all of us right now. Remember in our last message on fear anxiety and worry I quoted from Luke 12 32 where Jesus said fear not little flock it is your father's good pleasure to give to you the kingdom. And we learn three things about God from that simple little verse. And God is our shepherd. God is our father. And God is our king. First of all he's our shepherd.

We're a sheep. He watches over his flock. And it's interesting Jesus says fear not little flock for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. We're a little flock but we have a big God. And our big God is watching over his little flock. But he's not just our shepherd. He's also our father who cares. And notice Jesus said it is your father's good pleasure to give to you the kingdom. God loves to bless his children.

Let me put it another way. God likes to spoil his children dare I use that phrase. He likes to indulge you give you things you don't deserve. The Bible says he's able to do exceedingly above and beyond that which we could ask or think. He loves to bless you. And thirdly he's your king which really speaks of the sovereignty of God. So he is looking over you. He's caring for you.

He is your father. You know the other day one of my grandkids asked me pop up are there more stars in the sky than sands on the shore. How would I know.

I said you know I really don't know. Scientists and astronomers tell us that there are billions of stars out there. A hundred billion galaxies in the universe. So billions and billions of stars.

And but here's what I do know. God says my thoughts toward you are greater than the sand of the sea. Wow. So go down to the beach and pick up a handful of sand and let it just pour through your hand for a moment. Look at all of that sand and think about this. God's thoughts for you about you are greater than all those grains of sand.

That's an incredible thing. He thinks about us. He cares about us. And finally he is our king. It's his pleasure to give us the kingdom. But when we say he's our king it speaks of the sovereignty of God.

And the sovereignty of God simply means that God's in control. God is in control of your life and nothing catches him by surprise. It may catch you by surprise but it doesn't catch him by surprise. He knew it was coming.

And if it's a concern to you it's also a concern to him. And here's another thing you need to remember. There are no accidents in the life of the Christian. Only providence.

Let me say that again. There are no accidents in the life of the Christian. Only providence. We as believers do not believe in fate. We believe in faith. And we believe that God is in control.

Right? This is very important stuff to remember. Because when it seems like your world's coming apart you're like, God hello. Are you aware of this? God's seeing you. I'm totally aware of it. I knew it was coming and I've got this.

I'm in control of this. And he gives us this wonderful promise that we all know well. Romans 8 28. We know that all things are working together for good to those who love God and are the called according to his purpose. Notice that does not say some things. Notice it does not even say we know that the good things are working together for good.

It says all things. David speaking of this in Psalm 119 wrote, everything serves your plan. So with this in mind we need to cast our cares on God. This is something we need to do daily.

And quite honestly it's something we need to sometimes do hourly. Because sometimes we give something to God and we take it right back, don't we? Oh Lord I trust you in this. I know you're in control.

Hallelujah. Comes back again. And you brought it back again. You started worrying about it again. So maybe you have to do it over and over and over again.

That's alright. You just empty your trash. You know you don't empty your trash once a year.

At least I hope not. You don't empty your trash once a month. You do it weekly. Sometimes even daily. Constantly cleaning.

Constantly emptying it. And sometimes we have to keep coming back to the Lord again and again. Some days we have to bring it to him more often than other days depending on what we're facing in the given moment. Pastor Greg Laurie with important insights today on how to reorient our thoughts to break free from the trap of fear, anxiety, and worry. And there's more to come from this presentation here on A New Beginning. And then we're so excited to make available a new book called The Jesus Music. You know, Pastor Greg, in the mid-70s I was a DJ at a Jesus Music station not far from Calvary Chapel of Costa Mesa where so much of that music was born. And our entire library was about 60 albums. So even by the mid-70s it was still a fledgling music format, nothing like it is today. And we tried to expand its reach.

We tried to work through the churches to get the word out about this new music. And frankly most resisted. You know, it was different. It had drums and guitars and they didn't want any of that stuff.

Well, things have changed, haven't they? I mean, it's not uncommon to see electric guitars and drums and all that in churches today. A lot of the things that you see in the church today actually came from the Jesus movement.

One of them is contemporary Christian music. Another is, I would say, a more casual approach by the preacher, maybe dressed in a more relaxed way. A lot of things that are commonplace in the church were born in this time of revival that started somewhere around maybe 69, went on through the 70s, and one of the big things was the music. The Jesus music was the soundtrack of that movement.

And I had the privilege of having a front row seat. I didn't know that I'd walk smack dab into the middle of a genuine spiritual awakening. In fact, I wrote a book about it called The Jesus Revolution.

By the way, it's being made into a feature film that will be released in 2022. But this music was happening. Amazing, fresh, new music that was current for our generation.

And not only was it made back then, but it continues to this present day. So a book has been written about this called The Jesus Music. It's a beautiful hardbound book with glossy pages filled with photographs and stories about these artists, the ones who pioneered the Jesus music, people like Love Song, Andre Crouch and the Disciples, and of course, Larry Norman, on through artists like Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith, through bands like Petra and Striper, to the present day with bands that we listen to today and artists that we listen to today.

Fascinating origins. And this book is a story of, well, flawed individuals that God worked through. A lot of these artists weren't perfect people.

But who is a perfect person? It's not the whole Bible, the story of flawed people that God worked through. So this is a book that will tell you things about this music that you've probably grown to love that you have never heard before or seen before. It's a brand new book called The Jesus Music. I had the privilege of writing the foreword, and I think you're gonna really enjoy this.

This is the kind of book you'll probably sit down on your coffee table and keep out to look at again and again. So we're encouraging you to order your own copy of The Jesus Music, written by Marshall Terrell, who I wrote three books with, and I'm working on a fourth book with, by the way. And this is something you're gonna love, and it will be yours for your gift of any size. Now, some of you can give a lot. We appreciate that. Some of you can only give a little. Whatever you give, we will send you your own copy of The Jesus Music as our way of saying thanks to you.

Yeah, that's right. And we hope you'll contact us today with your investment in this ministry. And we'll send you this beautiful, hardback edition of The Jesus Music.

So many great pictures and such great stories of the birth of contemporary Christian music. You can write us at A New Beginning, Box 4000, Riverside, California, 92514. Or call anytime 24-7, 1-800-821-3300. That's 1-800-821-3300.

Or go online to harvest.org. Hey everybody, Greg Laurie here. You know, my uncle, Fred Jordan, had one of the first Christian TV programs out there. It was called Church in the Home.

I remember watching it as a little boy when I was living with my grandparents. Well, we have Church in the Home for you every weekend. It's called Harvest at Home, and you can find it at harvest.org. We have worship and a message from God's Word. So join us this weekend for Harvest at Home at harvest.org. Well, next time, Pastor Greg brings us more freeing perspective about fear, anxiety, and worry. Good encouragement for the stresses you're facing right now. Join us here on A New Beginning with pastor and Bible teacher Greg Laurie. This is the day, the day when life begins. Thanks for listening to A New Beginning with Greg Laurie, a podcast made possible by Harvest Partners, helping people everywhere know God. Sign up for daily devotions and learn how to become a Harvest Partner at harvest.org.