Anxious No More #4 - Trusting With Anxiety (Dr. Kurt Bjorklund)

Over the last few weeks, we've been in a series that we've called Anxious No More, and we've been examining some of the New Testament passages that use the word anxious or anxiety.

And I know just from conversations I've had with many over the last couple of weeks that this has caused many of us just to grapple with how we handle anxiety.

And today we're looking at this passage from Matthew chapter 10.

Matthew 10 · chapter mention

And my guess is if I had gone around this room, around our campuses, and said, name off the top of your head passages in the New Testament that deal with anxiety that many of us would have gotten, Philippians 4.

Don't be anxious for anything, but in everything through prayer and supplication, make your request be made known unto God.

It would have been like, I got that one.

I've heard it.

Or we would have talked about 1 Peter chapter 5, that you can cast your anxieties onto the Lord.

1 Peter 5 · chapter mention

He cares for you.

And we may have even gotten the one in Luke where Mary and Martha are going back and forth, and Jesus says, look, you're anxious about many things, but only one thing's needed.

And the other passage that we probably would have gotten would have been the one in Matthew 6, Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, Don't be anxious about what you'll eat or what you'll wear, how you'll live.

But my guess is very few of us would have said, oh, Matthew 10, that's about anxiety in this passage.

In fact, some of us would have never even probably heard this, thought about this, or if you had, it's relegated to one of these passages where it's Jesus is exhorting the disciples of that time, and it was for that time because I haven't been flogged.

I haven't been taken in front of the councils.

I don't know anyone who's been flogged who's been taken in front of the councils.

Therefore, that's a nice uh piece that Jesus had for them, not really relevant to you and me.

And I get how that could be our reaction.

I didn't choose, by the way, the Matthew 5 through 7 uh Sermon on the Mount because we did that a few years ago.

It's online.

You can go listen to me.

I didn't want to repeat that.

But but here's why this actually isn't as remote as you might think.

And that is we are living in a time where faith in Jesus Christ and holding to a biblical worldview is becoming increasingly at odds with the prevailing views in our culture.

And as a result, what Jesus says here about anxiety is actually pretty significant.

A couple weeks ago in the Olympics, there was a racing team, one of the Dutch regatta teams, sailing teams, and they were in line to win a gold medal.

All they had to do was finish third or higher in their final race.

And they were leading in the race.

They were in first place, and when they rounded the final buoy, they went around it and they saw what they believed was the finish line.

They pulled up to the finish line only to realize that it wasn't the finish line.

And they watched one boat go in front of them and finish, and then another boat, and they were able, just through a little bit of effort, to recapture a little wind and finish third and still win the overall gold medal.

But later they were asked about it, and they said, we just assumed that we had the right finish line because it had been a finish line in an earlier event, and they hadn't paid attention to where the actual finish line was.

And I was thinking about that in relationship to anxiety, and and here's what probably happens for a lot of us when it comes to anxiety, and that is we have the wrong finish line, and therefore we don't understand maybe how God can change how we interact with anxiety.

Here's what I mean.

Even in the title, Anxious No More, we may say that all anxiety is bad and therefore we should get rid of all of it.

And I don't believe it's probably possible to get rid of all anxiety, and some anxiety can be positive if you are thinking about it as saying, pay attention to this.

But where anxiety becomes problematic is when it's diffuse and it's persistent, and it and it's something where we just have a vague sense that something bad is happening.

And I'll even show why I believe this in this passage in just a couple of moments.

But here's why anxiety is problematic if it's not dealt with is it keeps you, keeps me from living our lives and enjoying our lives because we're so anxious about what could be or what is.

Have you ever been at a pool with little kids who are who are learning to swim?

Maybe it was your kids or grandkids or a niece and nephew.

And and you you'll you'll see this play out from time to time.

A mom or dad or a grandpa, grandma, uncle, aunt, somebody'll be in the water and they'll be coaxing the child to jump.

Have you seen this?

And and some kids, it's like, mom, dad, nobody, I'm just running and jumping, right?

They don't need anybody, and it's like, you'll jump in and save me, won't you?

Because I'm jumping in.

Other kids, it's you can stand there and coax them and they might jump, they might not.

It's this big scary thing.

And some kids will just recoil entirely.

And what's happening is their willingness to jump into the pool is directly in proportion to their trust of the person who's in the pool who they say is trustworthy to catch me.

Now, if you're their dad, their mom, and you're like, I've never given you a reason not to trust me, why wouldn't you jump?

And they're still saying, I can't trust.

And what happens?

They go, they sit on the side, their life shrinks for a little bit, and they they have this moment of not living, not enjoying what is possible.

Now, eventually all kids get it, right?

They they figure out how to jump in, but at least for a while it's there.

But but that is what happens when we let anxiety get the better of us in this world.

And here's what Jesus does He talks about this being taken to the council and to the synagogues and talks about being flogged.

So so the synagogue refers to religious persecution and the and the council to secular or to civic persecution.

He says, when you're taken, don't be anxious about what you'll say, because the spirit will speak through you in that moment.

So you don't need to worry about all of the worst-case scenarios that could happen in the world in which you live.

And he gives these three analogies at the beginning, verse 16, he says that you are to basically understand that you are sheep among wolves, you're to be as wise or as shrewd as snakes or serpents, and you're to be innocent like doves.

So he says, understand that you're like sheep among wolves, be like snakes, be like serpents.

So let's just look at those three for a moment.

So when Jesus says, you're like sheep among wolves, what he's clearly communicating is there is a vulnerability to those who are his followers.

And don't miss how he starts this when he says, I send you out as sheep among wolves.

This wasn't an unintentional, oh no, the world's out of control.

This is Jesus saying, I'm sending you, if you're my follower, into a world that is bent on your destruction.

Now, I don't know about you, but uh, there's peace in me that says, that doesn't sound like an assignment I want.

And for some of us who are gathered, you may say this is part of why I object to being a Christ follower, or why I've tried to have it a little bit both ways, why I try to be a Christ follower and not a Christ follower.

I don't actually want the wolves chasing me, so I want the eternity that God promises, but I don't want to deal with the reality of my life here and now being a Christ follower.

But Jesus sends, and the narrative of the Bible is this that is, God created Adam and Eve.

He put them in a garden, made it perfect to thrive, and he gave them a choice, and they chose to eat fruit from the tree in the middle of the garden.

And when they did, sin entered the world, and because sin entered the world, all of the things of this world that you and I look at and say, that's not the way it should be, exist.

And Jesus came to redeem and restore the world, and he invites his followers to be part of that mission.

So he says, I send you out as sheep among wolves.

So if you're a follower of Jesus, what that means is you live on mission for something greater.

It means that your life is not purely about saying, How can I get as much heaven on earth now as much as it is how can I bring a taste and a picture of heaven to the earth that is?

How can I bring about restoration like God is bringing?

And it means if you're not a follower of Jesus, he doesn't just invite you to be saved so that you can have your best life now.

And he doesn't just invite you to some future life, although that's guaranteed, but he invites you to a mission, to something that matters here and now.

But in that, don't underestimate the reality that it is a vulnerable place.

There are sheep among wolves.

And as I said, it it's possible for those of us who have lived in our point in time in history, our location, to say this seems distant and remote.

But here's the problem with that.

Historically, Christians have always been a persecuted minority.

Globally, Christians have been a persecuted minority.

Americans living when you and I live are an anomaly to the history and the global reality of Christianity.

So it should not surprise you, surprise me to say there may be coming a day when when when the scenario that Jesus talks about here exists.

In fact, it doesn't take fear-mongering to say there are some things happening in our country right now that are concerning about religious liberty and about the place that Christians could have in the future.

Just last year, there was a man who had protested something he believed to be unbiblical.

He did it in a lawful way.

The FBI descended on his house and raided his house and took him to prison.

If you hold a biblical perspective on certain things, you will be considered dangerous and out of step in your industry and in the world in which we live.

And Jesus says, don't be anxious about all of this.

It's not unexpected.

There are some real dangers, but but the danger isn't just out there.

There's a danger of our soul being compromised.

And the danger in our soul is that is that what happens is we we tend to see all the danger as being out there.

I saw something the other day, it was allegedly from C.S.

Lewis and his screw tape letters about the political environment.

And I say allegedly because I fact-checked it.

Somebody asked me how I fact-checked it.

They said, Did you go to like factcheckit.com?

Said, I don't know that that exists, and I probably wouldn't trust it anyway.

So I actually went and got my book, Screw Tape Letters, which C.S.

Lewis has, because I wanted to see the context of this.

And I couldn't find it, and then I Googled it and I found out that he didn't say this.

Um, so um the reason I tell you that, rather than just reading it, is you know, if you want a quote to go viral online, it probably would get more play if you say C.S.

Lewis said this than if you say I said this or you said this.

But but anyway, what was said was good.

And and the reason it's important to highlight this is screw tape was a senior demon writing to a junior demon about how to distract people of faith from their path.

And that's the context of this.

So again, not C.

S.

Lewis, but helpful to think about.

Be sure that the patient, meaning the person of faith, remains completely fixated on politics, arguments, political gossip, and obsessing on the faults of people that they have never met serves as an excellent distraction for advancing, for it uh from advancing, excellent distraction from advancing in personal virtue, character, and the things the patient can control.

Make sure to keep the patient in a constant state of angst, frustration, and general disdain toward the rest of the human race in order to avoid any kind of charity or inner peace from further developing.

Ensure the patient continues to believe that the problem is out there and in a broken system rather than recognizing that the problem is within himself.

You see, the danger to our soul is that what happens in a political environment like we live in is that it's always somebody else who's the problem and the danger is out there rather than saying the danger is actually in me.

And that is exactly why we need a savior.

Here's something C.

S.

Lewis actually did write in um Screw Tape.

He said, We want the man hag-ridden by the future, haunted by visions of an imminent heaven or hell upon earth, ready to break the enemies, or in this case, God's commands, in the present, um, is by so doing that he we can make him think that he can attain or avert either.

And here's what he means that you turn every political conversation, every event into either this is the absolute best, this is the absolute worst, and therefore, if I do something, I can either gain the one or avert the other.

So the danger to the soul is that you start to turn everybody else into the problem.

Now notice what Jesus does here.

He says, Understand, I send you out a sheep among wolves.

And then he says, But don't be anxious, don't underestimate that I can and do provide you with a path forward.

I'm the God in the pool saying, you can jump because I'm here is what he's saying.

And that means that when you find yourself in a place where you're saying, it doesn't seem prudent to take a position or a stand that I know is biblical, you can still do it because you say there's a God who has bid me to trust him.

So understand, sheep like wolves, and then he tells us what this means.

He says, Therefore, basically, be wise like snakes.

Now, here's my guess.

Very few of us have studied the patterns of snakes or like to think about them.

But snakes were considered to be shrewd, prudent, wise, because they could avoid being captured and could get into all kinds of places and and situations.

And so he takes this analogy and he says, here's what I want you to understand.

He says, I want you to think about where you are and not simply take the approach that says, Well, if God's in charge, therefore I don't need to do anything.

I can let go, let God.

Have you ever heard this kind of kind of mindset that says, God's got it, therefore I don't need to worry about it?

Jesus doesn't say that here.

He says, Be wise like serpents.

So, translation, if you have kids and they're in the school system, they are probably being taught some things that are counter to the biblical worldview.

And to be unaware and not taking any steps to think about what you're doing with that is not to be wise.

When you're at work and there's politics being played, and I don't mean politics in the voting sense, but politics in the office that says, if you hold this view, if you think this way, if you express this, here's what it means for your future, that that you can be shrewd in terms of how you understand how you position yourself, that you're not out of bounds to think about that.

That if you're in a social setting and you realize that there's certain aspects of a biblical worldview that that maybe this isn't the exact moment to express it.

You're not being untrue to God to say I'm being wise in the moment about knowing when and what to say.

In other words, you don't have to speak all of the truth that you believe all of the time.

You can be wise as serpents, but there's something else here that's that that's probably true.

And again, this is if we go to our soul, instead of kind of the danger out there, but in here.

One of the ways that God exhorts us through the scripture, Jesus, New Testament writers, is this phrase, watch out.

Be careful, is sometimes translated.

Pay attention.

In fact, if you take a concordance and you trace those words throughout your New Testament, you will find that there are a host of times we're told to pay attention, watch out, be careful.

Some of just the examples of this are these.

In uh Matthew or Mark chapter 8, verse 15, we're told to watch out.

Mark 8:15

This is Jesus speaking, for the leaven of the Pharisees.

And the leaven of the Pharisees means the self-righteousness that comes from saying, I feel like I'm superior to others, I'm okay with God because of my effort, not Jesus' effort, and that leaven makes us self-righteous in the way that we live.

When we talk about the environment in which we live, the political environment, what could be more dangerous than self-righteousness?

Another place, Romans 16, 17.

Watch out for all of the divisions that come from people teaching doctrine that's counter to what is taught in the Bible.

And then watch out, Galatians chapter 5, verse 15, for relational strife.

Galatians 5:15

These are ways that you can find yourself in a place where you're basically saying, I am not paying attention, and all of a sudden I find my soul in a compromising place, my life in a compromising place.

And here's how anxiety fits into this anxiety happens in our lives when we say, I must have something.

And if I don't have something, then my life will be somehow less than.

And what happens when we're distracted with just busyness and life instead of being intentional and calm and focused, is we're not paying attention and our soul begins to drift.

Do you know how your soul drifts?

Here's how this happens for many of us, and that is you go through a day, it's maybe been a challenging day in a lot of ways, and you get home and you say, you know what I need right now?

I need some me time.

Anybody know what I'm talking about?

Me time?

All right, now some of us, uh, me time is you go to the gym, you work out, good for you.

Um, so some of us is me time, I putter on something important, but some of us, me time means that that I hit the liquor cabinet a little earlier.

Some of us, me time means I get on Netflix and I find something to binge for hours.

Some of us it's it's sporting events, and we say, I'm gonna watch something for hours.

Some of us it's news about the market or politics, and we just we just zone into this.

And and and don't get me wrong, I intend to watch lots of games this fall.

But do you ever, after hours of binging on any of those things, go, wow, do I feel refocused and energized towards spiritual things?

No, you don't, because it's a distraction from what it is that that moves you toward Jesus Christ.

Now, again, I'm not suggesting that there isn't a place for good me time, but what I'm saying is understand that there's a drift, and Jesus' exhortation to pay attention, to be wise like serpents, isn't just be wise about the threat out there, but be wise about the threat in here, that you can drift and get yourself in a place where your anxiety is getting the better of you because you have not focused on who Jesus Christ is.

And then he gives us this image of being innocent like doves.

Now, innocence is something that we don't often talk about.

The word in the original language here means unmixed, that you don't mix vice with anything else.

And so to be innocent, Jesus, I think, is saying a couple of things here.

One, be innocent so that when you're dragged in front of the council, when your reputation is at stake at work or socially or in anything, that that there's nothing other than the charge of what's against you for faith's sake that's against you.

But I think it's also an internal thing because when you're innocent, it means that you feel like you're living with nothing to hide before God.

And when you feel that way, that's when you trust God.

And when you don't live that way, it's when you say, I can't trust God, therefore I have to go outside of God to get the things that I think that I need.

And the way that this often works in our lives is that.

What we we end up doing is we end up living in a way in which we start keeping little secrets.

And our little secrets become something that if we trace it leads to where a lot of our anxiety is because it's our anxieties, our anxiety that says, I need this, and therefore I can't get it legitimately, but I keep a secret.

Here's what I mean.

H.J.

Ironside was the pastor of the well-known Moody Church in Chicago about 90 years ago, 100 years ago.

And at one point, a young woman in her 20s started attending Moody Church and got real engaged.

And her dad was a player in the kind of community in Chicago, and he hated that she was going to the church and engaged in it, thought it was a bunch of malarky.

So he hired a private investigator to tail H.A.

Ironside to expose whatever was going on in his life.

And here's what H.

A.

Ironside said when he heard about this.

He said, you know what, you can write my life in the skies.

I have nothing to hide.

What would happen if somebody hired a private investigator to tail and find out everything about your life?

Would you be able to say, it's all good?

Have at it.

When I used to work with students in the church before I started in a role as a lead pastor, one of the things I would say to students often is if you can't tell your parents what it is you're doing, it's probably a bad choice.

And students would always push back.

They'd always say, Oh, no, no, no.

My parents, I mean, they don't know anything about anything.

And then I'd always ask them, like, like, like, when were your parents like growing up?

What what decade was that?

And when I was doing this, it was usually the 70s that the parents were waking up.

And then I would say, Yeah, there were no things like sex, drugs, and rock and roll in the 70s.

They know nothing.

Now, to be fair, some parents will have an agenda for you that isn't biblical, and for you to say, I disagree with your conviction.

I have a different conviction about what's biblical, therefore I don't need to upset you and tell you every detail of it.

Like, I'm not talking about that.

I'm talking about when you say, I'm keeping a secret from somebody, when you keep a secret from your small group, when you keep a secret from your parents, when you keep a secret from your spouse, what you're doing is you're showing that you're not living in innocence.

And when you don't live in innocence, what will happen is anxiety will become part and parcel of your life.

Not just that you're found out, but that you're saying, what you're revealing, again, anxiety is a sign for something deeper.

What you're revealing is you're saying, I can't get what it is I think that I need legitimately.

So I'm trying to get it illegitimately, and that's why I'm making it a secret.

And nobody can know.

And Jesus says, You want to live without anxiety, understand, I send you out as sheep among wolves, but be wise like snakes, innocent like doves.

And trust me, when you come to the edge of the pool, that I am the one who will catch you.

I know many of us will naturally be either prone toward the shrewd like serpents or innocent like doves.

Meaning, some of you heard as we talk through this, and you're like, Yeah, that that point about the shrewd like serpents, yeah, that that that's helpful.

Ah, the innocent thing, whatever, it's somewhat negotiable.

And some of you are like, oh, the innocent thing, I'm all over that, but I'm uncomfortable with the with the shrewd like a like a serpent idea.

Maybe, just maybe, Jesus hits both sides of this because by nature you are probably bent toward one or the other.

And what he's saying is, I want you to understand that there's something on the other side of this equation that will help you navigate the uncertainty of this world.

So lean into that.

Father, we come to you today and acknowledge that the world in which we live has some pitfalls.

And there are people who maybe because they want a lot of clicks, can exaggerate those pitfalls and make them seem enormous, and yet you have said thousands of years ago that your followers are sent into this world like sheep among wolves.

God, I pray that you would help us to accept a mission from you anyway and embrace it with shrewdness and with innocence.

And we pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Thanks for being here.

Have a great day.