LIFE HACKS Week 4: Creative Solutions for an Everyday Problem: Our Worries | Philippians 4:5b-6.

Thanks for downloading the SBC Elder Radio Services Podcast.

You're about to listen to Article Series called Live App.

In this series, we are looking for crime-centered solutions to everyday problems.

I hope the messages in this series are encouraged to you.

And you're familiar with the face of this now over 70-year-old man.

Yeah, Charlie Brown.

And for generations, children and adults looked forward to receiving that newspaper every single day, turning to the funny pages so that they could read the latest story about Charlie and his group of friends.

And people loved Charlie Brown in part because he is kind and innocent and compassionate.

People love Charlie Brown because they want to be friends with people like Charlie Brown.

But that's not the only reason that people are drawn to Charlie.

People are drawn to Charlie because Charlie, even though he is just a young boy, has very real problems.

And the realest of the real problems that haunts Charlie Brown every single day is worry.

One of Charlie's greatest worries is that there's this little red-headed girl that he likes, and he's really worried that she doesn't feel the same way about him that he does about her.

If we'll go to the next slide, he confides in his buddy Linus.

He says, I'm always thinking about that little red-headed girl, but I know she doesn't think of me.

Has anybody ever had that worry in your life that you had a crush on someone and you're thinking they don't think of me like I think of them?

And that was every girl I ever met and liked until I met my blonde-headed girl, until I met Lauren.

She doesn't think of me because I'm nothing, Charlie says, and you can't think of nothing.

So Charlie goes from like, she doesn't just not like me to she doesn't even notice me.

She doesn't even know that I exist.

Almost, Charlie replies.

Does a girl ever go around thinking of a.00001?

Because that's how Charlie views himself.

Charlie, though, one of his bigger worries is school.

And again, his friend Linus, if we'll go to the next slide, he tells Linus this one day.

He says, or Linus looks at Charlie and says, You look kind of depressed, Charlie Brown.

Charlie looks at Linus and says, I worry about school a lot.

Does anybody ever worry about school in the room?

Yeah, some of us, does anybody ever worry about work in the room where you have to go every single day?

A few of us are willing to admit that.

Most of us are like, no, I'm great.

I think you're lying.

All right, here we go.

Next, he says, I also worry about my worrying so much about school.

My anxieties have anxieties.

Man, Charlie.

Charlie Brown, though, he is like a next level worrier because he not only worries about the present, he finds a way to worry about what's already happened in the past.

On another day, uh, Linus, I guess it's wrong always to be worrying about tomorrow.

Linus is like, I'm a normal, a normal worrier.

I worry about what's happening tomorrow, and maybe we should think only about today.

And Charlie says, No, that's giving up.

I'm still hoping that yesterday will get better.

Any of us ever worry about what's already happened in the past?

Charlie, though, he worries from the moment he uh wakes up in the morning to the moment he lies down in bed at night.

So one day he thinks to himself, he's lying in bed all by himself, and he says, It's very strange.

He rolls over.

Sometimes you lie in bed at night and you don't have a single thing to worry about.

He rolls over again, he rolls over again, and he says, That always worries me.

Charlie was so comfortable with worry that if worry wasn't present, he thought something was wrong.

So it's been over 20 years since the final original uh Peanuts comic strip was put into a newspaper.

So it's been over 20 years since Charlie Brown last shared his worries with the world.

Yet worry is still the realest of the real problems.

There are worries in our world, and there are worries in your heart and in your life and in your home.

According to psychologists, you can know if something is one of your worries if it meets these three characteristics.

Characteristic number one, it's a repetitive thought.

It's a repetitive thought.

Psychologists and counselors would say this: like, worries don't come and go, they stick around.

Um, they don't leave you.

And then what happens is you have one worrisome thought, and it's definitely always followed by another worrisome thought that's linked to it, which becomes another worrisome thought and another worrisome thought, and it's just this spiral of thoughts that eventually in our life, these worrisome thoughts can run out of control.

And they run out of control with the outcomes they lead us to.

So the second characteristic of worry is that it is all about negative outcomes.

Now, let me clarify.

In our life, um, we can laugh about Charlie Brown because he's in a comic strip, but some of us in our life have some very real worries.

Right?

You were at the doctor last week and you heard a report you didn't want to hear.

Um, your child is really walking through a very difficult season of life and you're not sure how to parent them, or you're the child and your worry is you're trying to take care of your aging parents, and that negative outcome is real.

Okay?

Like you are in the middle of the negative outcome.

That's a real worry, but there's also imagined worries in our life.

There are uh circumstances that arise, and what do you always do?

You focus upon the worst case scenario that maybe will only unfold 2% of the time.

If that.

So real worries have negative outcomes, imagined worries also negative outcomes.

The third characteristic is this emotional distress.

And no matter if it's a real or imagined worry, emotional distress is the ultimate result.

You have physical sensations, uh, you have a dry mouth, you have a racing heart, and even fits of anxiety.

And with those three characteristics named, it could be that your worries quickly come into focus.

You see circumstances, you see people, you see events, and you're like, I am worrying about that.

I think about it all the time.

I always think about the negative outcome.

I I'm I'm feeling it, like my heart's racing.

I'm having palpitations in my chest, just the thought of it in this moment.

So maybe like Charlie, you worry about relationships, you worry about respect, even being noticed.

You worry about all that's happening in the present, you worry about what may happen in the future and even happened in the past.

But you may have some worries that you want to add to your list: finances, health, your children, your parents as they grow old.

I think when it comes to people like you and me, we have this capacity and this ability to worry about every aspect of life.

We worry about anything and everything.

Now, here's the thing: whether your worries are few or they are many, worry is a problem.

And its effect on your life is undeniable.

In fact, scripture and science agree on the impact of worry on a person's life.

First scripture, Proverbs 12, 25 says this: worry weighs us down.

Worry weighs us down.

That phrase, when I read it this week, it reminded me of the face of Charlie Brown.

It reminded me of just like his countenance.

That there's always a sadness and a distressed look in his face.

And honestly, when I survey the room, I see that same weight of worry.

The same worry that we read about on a comic strip.

But it's not just scripture, science really has verified the claim of scripture.

Science has proven it.

So a team of researchers at Penn State University did a pretty long-term, all-inclusive study on worry and anxiety.

Um, and this is what the lead psychologist concluded.

In his summary statement, he writes these statements.

He says, It makes you miserable in the present moment to try and prevent misery in the future.

Hear that again.

It makes you miserable in the present moment to try and prevent misery in the future.

Has that been proven true in your life?

He goes on to say, for chronic worriers, this process leads them to be continually distressed all their lives in order to avoid later events that never happen.

But this statement that he wrote really stuck out to me.

He says, Worry sucks the joy out of the here and now to prevent an unrealistic then and there.

Worry sucks the joy out of here and now to prevent an unrealistic then and there.

Didn't worry suck the joy out of Charlie Brown's face.

And isn't it true that worry has sucked the joy out of so many of our lives?

Worry is the realest of the real everyday problems.

And today, as we uh continue our series, Life Hacks, we're gonna discover the Christ-centered solution for this problem of worry.

And it's a solution because Christ is at the center that if we give it enough time, if we practice it faithfully, it will begin to what?

Lift the weight of worry in our life.

If we follow through with the solution, it has the potential to restore the joy that worry has stolen out of our life.

So listen to this story in Matthew chapter 6.

Matthew 6 · chapter mention

I'll begin by just reading a single verse.

These are the words of our Lord Jesus, Matthew 6, 25.

He says, That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life.

Whether you have enough food and drink or enough clothes to wear, isn't life more than food and your body more than clothing?

So Proverbs 12, 25 and Matthew 6, 25, really what they proved to me is this worry isn't a new problem for the modern world.

Every generation before us has had a company of Charlie Browns, has been filled with Charlie Browns, people who were worried.

They feel the weight of worry.

They want their joy restored because of the worry that they face on a daily basis.

And for so long, I think people who have faced worry have turned, especially in the United States in 2022, we have turned, when it comes to worry, to a single cultural solution for worry.

How do we eliminate worry?

We try to eliminate worry through money and materialism.

We try to drive it out of our life.

And I didn't grab that out of the air.

I didn't uh find it in a psychology report or a cultural demographic study.

Like this is Jesus' opinion, I think, on how people try to solve worry in their life.

Just consider this that immediately before Jesus gives his discourse on worry, he talks about his disciples' relationship to money and material goods on this earth.

Matthew chapter 6, verse 19, just a few verses prior, Jesus says, Don't store up treasures on earth.

Matthew 6:19

Don't do it, don't live that kind of life.

And I think Jesus knows, he knows, like it's not gonna benefit your life, it won't eliminate your worries, and in fact, it will probably expand your worries, grow your worries.

But we all tend to believe, don't we, that if I just had a new car or a bigger home or went on better vacations, or if I just had more money in my savings account or my retirement account or my checking account, that all my worries would simply drift away.

When in fact they only exaggerate and expand our worries.

All you need to do is really consider the life of King Solomon, the king we learn about so much in the Old Testament.

In Ecclesiastes chapter 2, Solomon evaluates his life with this statement.

Ecclesiastes 2 · chapter mention

He says, I collected great sums of silver and gold.

The treasures of many kings and provinces.

I had everything.

Underline that word, everything.

I had everything.

I had it all.

I had everything a man could desire.

And on its own, you read that statement and you think to yourself, he's living like a hakuna matata kind of life, right?

It means no worries for the rest of your days.

We need to sing and dance right now, Chris Williams.

How about we do that?

He down?

Will's down, I know.

We can do a little Lion King rendition.

It'd be very fun.

You would think Solomon has this hakuna matata kind of moment.

Bobby McFerrin, don't worry, be happy.

But then Solomon goes on to say, but as I looked at everything I had worked so hard to accomplish, it was also meaningless.

Like chasing the wind.

There was nothing really worthwhile anywhere.

Solomon had it all, yet he still faced one of life's greatest worries, the worry of a meaningless, purposeless life.

Money and material couldn't eliminate that.

Yet even with Solomon's example, we still believe that cultural solution is our best option.

Yet just consider the fact we live in one of, if not the most prosperous country in the hist in like recorded history.

Yet people like you and me have these immense worries when they go to work every single day.

Like 60% of the U.S.

workforce reports that when they go to work, they experience work-related stress, which kind of manifests itself in things like they don't have interest when they go to work, they lack motivation when they go to work, they don't have the energy to perform the job they were hired to do.

They are emotionally exhausted and they experience intense physical fatigue.

But they have it all.

Or consider the fact that our children are raised in, by global standards, luxury.

Toys and vacations and plenty of clothes and food on the table and food in the pantry.

They get to have it all and experience it all.

But among our children and students, you know, things like anxiety and depression are skyrocketing.

They still have great worries in the world.

And with inflation climbing, and you always see headlines about it, that means everything costs more.

You need more money in retirement, and you want more money in savings and more money in your checking account, and you wish the economy was better.

It's like we have all this money, but because inflation is climbing, we're like, we need more money, we need more of it, we need to make better plans.

Like, I don't have enough.

The worry still exist.

Here's the thing: no purchase, no promotion, no one-time experience, no life-changing vacation will ever eliminate worry.

It may numb you to the worry in the moment, but the worry still remains, and inevitably the worry will grow.

So we've got to stop experimenting with that cultural solution of money and materialism and turn to this true Christ-centered solution.

So listen to what Jesus says next.

Matthew chapter 6, verse 26.

Matthew 6:26

He says, Look at the birds.

They don't plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly father feeds them.

And aren't you far more valuable to him than they are?

Verse 27, can all your worries add a single moment to your life?

And why worry about your clothing?

Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow.

They don't work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are.

And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you.

Why do you have so little faith?

The Christ-centered solution to worry actually has a really unusual starting point, doesn't it?

Jesus says, Stop and just look at the birds.

In that moment, would you have said to Jesus, I don't have time to look at the birds?

I've got worries I've got to think about.

Like, I don't have time to be a bird watcher, Jesus.

I don't have my binoculars, I don't have my sunscreen, I don't have my hat, I've got other things I've got to worry about.

There has to be a better use of my time.

And she's like, no, no, no, no.

Just bear with me.

Bear with me.

Stop.

And look at the birds.

And watch them fly in the sky.

Watch them in the air because the air is their home.

You see, God didn't create birds to plow fields or to plant crops or to harvest crops or to store up grain.

Instead, what did God do?

God created birds and they could fly.

And when a bird lives where God created it to live, and it does what God created that bird to do in all of creation, that bird doesn't have a worry in the world.

It's existing and being the bird God created it to be.

Jesus says, look upward, and then he says, look downward, and he says, look at the lilies of the field.

These wildflowers are far more beautiful than even Solomon was.

He had all the money to buy the nicest designer clothes.

He could have the greatest robes and the biggest closet.

And they are more beautiful than he could ever imagine.

And they didn't do it on their own.

God just made them to be beautiful.

That's what God created those wildflowers to be.

It's just beauty in the world.

Yeah, they may make you sneeze.

That's me.

But you know, like they're meant to be beautiful.

And when that wildflower just does what God created it to do, they don't have a worry in the world.

Jesus, I think his invitation is this he says, look upward to the birds, look, look downward to the flowers in the field, and then look inward to yourself and realize why God created you, disciple.

God created you not to fly in the sky or to be a flower going up out of the ground, but he did create you to live in a relationship with him.

And to realize the same way that God cares for the birds and the flowers, he will care for you if you live into that relationship and just learn to trust that he will take care of you.

And when you realize that God will care for you, that begins to lift the weight of worry.

It doesn't mean that your life will be just totally free of hardship and difficulty.

There will still be problems in life, I can assure you.

But you don't have to worry because there's a God who cares for you.

Address the hardships, face the hardships as they come, navigate them.

God is with you, but you don't have to worry about them.

And there's a difference between facing a problem and worrying about a problem, isn't there?

And there's something about the birds and the flowers in the field that also restores our joy.

I think worry, often how it works in my life, is it it tries to isolate me from other people, and for me to believe that I'm all alone in this world, it pulls me out of my relationship with God.

It tries to pull me out of my relationship with other people and says, this worry, this thing you're thinking about, you're the only one who's ever gone through it, and you're gonna have to do it all by yourself.

But scripture reminds us, Philippians chapter 4, that the Lord is near.

Philippians 4 · chapter mention

Don't worry about anything.

So, child of God, even when that train of thoughts is out of control, when you're imagining the worst case scenario, when you're in the middle of the worst case scenario, even as you want to worry, even as you're the anxiety, you can feel it coming on and take heart because the Lord's near.

So if our culture's solution for worry, we summed it up in money and materialism, then maybe the Christ-centered solution can be summed up in the word mercy.

Mercy, God's undeserved kindness that he shares with his people, and we experience God's kindness through his care for us on a daily basis.

We experience God's kindness for us through his continual presence in our life.

And in just a moment, um, I want to provide all of us with this practical step that is gonna allow you to move this Christ-centered solution uh from uh your head, right, from what you know to be true to your heart so that your life is transformed.

But before I move to that step, I want it's critical, okay?

It's so critical that I say something.

Some of us experience worry in very debilitating ways.

Okay?

It manifests itself, and it's your um your distress is panic attacks and anxiety and depression, burnout.

You're unable to get out of bed in the morning, you find it difficult, difficult to function day in and day out.

And if that's you this morning here, first thing I want you to hear is this.

I'm so glad you got out of bed today.

I'm so glad you're listening on the radio or watching online today from your bed.

Great job.

I'm so glad.

But I want to remind you that God can extend mercy to you through the ministry of our church, specifically through the ministry of living well.

Um Living Well, our counseling ministry in partnership with the Arkansas Baptist Children's Home offers Christ-centered uh counseling to members of our church and anyone in our community who could benefit from their services.

We should have a slide for living well, Carl, if we could put it up on the screen.

Um yeah.

Oh, we almost had it.

We'll go back to it.

That's the number for living well.

To schedule a first appointment.

So if you are struggling and your worries are manifesting themselves in a deep way with anxiety and depression and panic, and you need to talk to someone, call that number.

Say, I need to schedule and see someone in our El Dorado office, and they will set you up with an appointment.

And it could be that the ministry of living well is the first step in your life of God, what?

Lifting the weight of worry and restoring the joy that worry has stolen.

Just make an appointment.

Take the first step.

We want to offer that to you.

That's why we have this ministry.

Now, let me give you that practical daily step that I think moves the um Christ-centered solution from our head to our heart.

Recently, I've been listening to podcasts and reading a couple books by a guy named John Eldridge.

You may be familiar with his name.

Several years ago, he published kind of a bestseller Wild at Heart.

So you may have read Wild at Heart.

But one of his more recent books is a book called Get Your Life Back.

And in this book, he diagnoses all the ways that he sees how our frantic world constantly wilts our soul.

This is how he describes what our world does to the human soul.

He says this.

I love this description.

He says, Our world dries out the soul like a raisin, making it almost impossible to receive the life God is pouring forth.

Does anybody have a soul that's like a raisin this morning?

And maybe one of the causes is the worry that's in your heart.

And so, Eldridge, he identifies worry as one of the uh topics he considers in that book.

And um the solution that he offers for worry after he discusses it, and he just tries to give a simple daily practice that you could follow is a practice that uh reflects a verse from 1 Peter chapter 5.

1 Peter 5 · chapter mention

1 Peter chapter 5, verse 7 says this give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you.

1 Peter 5:7

Has anybody ever read that verse before?

You know that verse, you've underlined that verse, you've highlighted that verse.

Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you.

It's wonderfully in line with the teachings of Jesus from Matthew chapter 6 this morning.

Matthew 6 · chapter mention

Well, uh John Eldridge takes that single verse and turns it into kind of a two-statement prayer.

And here is that prayer.

He says, Every morning wake up and in a quiet place pray this.

I give everyone and everything to you, God.

I give everyone and everything to you.

Eldridge talks about in his book how the worries in our life and the worries of this world, the human soul is not meant to bear.

We are not meant to carry.

Yet we have decided, because there's this endless stream of information, an endless stream of news, we know everything good and bad in everyone's life, and we carry it with us.

It weights us down and it steals our joy.

And so he says, just wake up in the morning, and before you face the day, or maybe even in the middle of the day, when something hard emerges and you want to worry, and just pray those words.

Let's put that statement back on the screen, Carl.

I give everyone and everything to you, God.

I give everyone and everything to you.

And he just says, pray those two words and just wait.

And it's amazing when I pray those statements, it's amazing to me how God has this cascade of images that come through my head.

How the Holy Spirit just kind of helps me see what I'm worrying about.

How the Holy Spirit reminds me, one of the reasons, Jonathan, that you worry is you like to control every outcome in your life, and you can't control every outcome in your life.

You're worrying yourself into a frenzy.

And I think one of the reasons like that seems so simple, doesn't it?

Almost too easy.

But I think the hard part of that prayer is you gotta sit and you gotta wait.

And you have to do it more than once.

It's not a one-time quick fix.

Because I think Jesus knows worries are gonna come to us every single day.

We're gonna be confronted and reminded of them every single day.

And he's still the God who wants to bear our worries, he wants to hear them from us.

So, what we're gonna do right now, if you just bow your eyes and close your eyes and bow your head, um I'm gonna read this prayer over you slowly, and I want to ask that you would just let this be your prayer.

And as God brings those worries to mind, would you name them and give that worry to God?

Again, first Peter 5:7, give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you.

1 Peter 5:7

I give everyone and everything to you, God.

I give everyone and everything to you.

To God.

What are you holding on to?

What are you trying to control?

What outcome are you uncomfortable with?

And give it to God.

Would you give your children to God?

Your aging parents to God, your best friend whose life is a mess.

Would you give them to God?

Your grandchildren.

Give everything to God.

Would you give your business to God?

Your future to God, your home.

For he, hear it again, for he cares about you.

Amen.

It's not a quick fix.

It's not an easy solution that um is gonna revolution your life day one.

But it is a habit, a Christ-centered solution that, if practiced day by day, by day by day, begins to what?

Lift the weight of worry and restore the joy.

Because you realize that God cares about you.

And here's the thing: if we can trust God, if we can trust Jesus with the worries of today, if we can trust Jesus with all that we worry about, we can also trust Jesus and believe that he is the one who carries our greatest worry, our greatest burden, the sin of this world, the sin of our lives.

Another, one more scripture, 1 Peter chapter 2.

1 Peter 2 · chapter mention

He personally carried our sins in his body on the cross so that we can be dead to sin and live for what is right.

By his wounds, you are healed.

You see, we can give our worries to God.

Give our worries to Jesus because he first carried our sins to the cross.

And the grace of his salvation on display at the cross.

And the mercy we taste every morning when we just say, Jesus, I give everyone and everything to you.

You have given me the greatest gift, and now I just give it all to you.

Anything that's I'm concerned or and worried over, God, Jesus, I trust that you will still care for me in this moment.

Are you willing to give your worries to God, to give them to Jesus, so that the weight of worry is lifted and the joy that worry stole is restored in your life.

Let's stand together.

Almighty God, we are grateful that your word speaks to this very moment and to a problem that we still face to this very day.

The problem of worry.

And that you will bear them for us because you care for us.

Thank you for your care in our life.

Thank you for all the blessings that we have that are a sign that you are near us and with us and you know what we need.

And God, I'm just reminded, that's such a profound point that Jesus makes, that if we will kind of follow the example of the birds and the lilies and just like live into how you created us to live, live in the fullness of relationship with you, our worries seem to go away.

Because you didn't create us for worry.

You created us to live in that relationship with you.

Draw us closer to that relationship.

In Christ's name we pray.

Amen.