Dial In with Jonny Ardavanis - Physical Recipes For Anxiety - Does My Body Affect My Mind? with Jonny Ardavanis

Episode Date: August 20, 2024

In this episode, Jonny Ardavanis breaks down some of the themes from his forthcoming book, "Consider The Lilies: Finding Perfect Peace In The Character of God" (Zondervan) and examines some of the physical factors that contribute to our anxiety and despair. Martyn Lloyd-Jones once said in his book "Spiritual Depression" that we are "embodied beings" and "we cannot separate the physical from the spiritual because we are body, soul, and mind." It would be an extreme statement to say that the root cause of all anxiety is "always physical," but it would also be incorrect and unbiblical to not identify the reality that different factors such as loneliness, temperament, exhaustion, grief, trauma, and physical infirmity make us vulnerable and susceptible to anxiety. These different factors never excuse an ungodly worry or lack of joy, but Lloyd-Jones explained that one of the first thing the anxious and despairing is to "know themselves" and to realize that our minds are not separated from our bodies.In this episode, Jonny examines some Biblical characters, who although commended for their faithfulness, were vulnerable to anxiety because of various physical factors in their life. You can pre-order Jonny’s book wherever books are sold! Releases October 8, 2024!Watch VideosVisit the Website Pre-order Consider the LiliesFollow on Instagram

We live in the most connected world in human history, connected age, and yet it's the most anxious generation we've ever had. And part of it is because even though there's this connection that people feel online, we live largely very lonely lives. A life of isolation is antithetical to a life of deep faith and deep trust. All right, welcome back to Dial In. This is Johnny Artavanis,

and I'm sitting here with Hank Bowen. I should say my name is Johnny Artavanis rather than this is Johnny Artavanis. But Hank, we're here. Everything going well today? Everything's going fantastic. I'm excited to dive in and continue the series. Dive in, dial in. Okay, I like it. So we're walking through some of the major themes of Consider the Lilies, Finding Perfect Peace, and the Character of God. And in this episode, we wanted to talk about some of the root causes, some would say, but I call them recipes or contributing factors because I don't necessarily want to make it sound like certain things cause us to be sinfully anxious. But what's the term you used? I said it would be foolish not to consider that there's fertile ground from which we could be

tempted. Yeah. Certain things that are recipes for anxiety. And in this episode, we want to talk about some of the physical contributions, different things about our body or what happens with our sleep and different patterns of life that would contribute to that anxiety. And I'll use a different, just a personal story to start. I remember I've told you before that I've loved to play basketball and I share this in the book, but I'm not like a legitimate basketball player. I'm kind of like the wannabe LA fitness guy. Like I used to have the finger sleeves like Allen Iverson. You're kidding. Oh yeah. Oh, that's brutal. Yeah. Like I, the tattoo sleeves, but I had no tattoos type of thing. That's not in the book. Yeah, no, no. They, they made me take that part out. You

know, like, um, used to play all the time and in basketball,, I tore my rotator cuff a couple of times. I've had multiple surgeries on my shoulders. And one of the things that I realized quickly is that different injuries, I've told you, I broke my knees, I've torn my shoulders. I've broken a lot of different body parts and ligaments. Johnny's actually incapable of giving a high five. That's actually very true. I know. Yeah. And there's a reason my nickname is Mr. Glass. But part of that, I just begin to realize very quickly that your physical well-being does play a component into the way that you're just thinking mentally. This is never to excuse an ungodly worry, but it is to maybe express the reality that we are body, soul, and mind. A.W. Tozer, I wrote down in the book that he says often it takes a whole Bible to make a whole Christian. And it's just the reality that

no one passage of scripture provides a comprehensive framework for any particular topic or subject. Therefore, it would be extreme and unbiblical to say that the root cause of anxiety is always physical. It would always be extreme and unbiblical to say that the root causes or recipes for anxiety are always spiritual, although I do believe it's much more spiritual than physical. Martin Lloyd-Jones, who wrote the book Spiritual Depression, and I kind of derived a lot of the way I thought about this topic, in particular from Martin Lloyd Jones' preaching and writing. He says that we are embodied beings and we cannot demarcate our spiritual lives from our physical lives. So in that regard, I go into a little bit of the story

whenever I preach on it about Moses and Elijah. At the Mount of Transfiguration, you have Jesus there with Peter, James, and John, and then it says that he was transfigured before them. And then on his right and on his left, you have the two heroes of the Old Testament, Moses, who is the lawgiver, and you would argue the most important person in the Old Testament. Then you have the law's greatest teacher and proclaimer and prophet and Elijah. And if you had to really consider the two most bold, faithful, godly characters in the Old Testament, Moses talked to God face to face, and Elijah is taken up the glory in a chariot of fire. And yet the reality is in scripture, those two figures that have a lot to commend about them. Also, the Bible includes their lapses and trust

and departures from joy and their own battle with both anxiety and depression. And so, I wrote down several different things in the book. And when I teach through it, I want to be fair because the Bible does speak to the condition of our heart, but there's some contributing factors even physically that would be those recipes for anxiety. Anything so far? No, we're good so anxiety. Anything so far? No, we're good so far. And so I think you were going to list out maybe a few of the different situations in which we could find ourselves

maybe especially prone to kind of fall into a state of anxiety. And I think if I'm listening to this, I'd be thinking through these would be oftentimes the situations in which I should actually be kind of proactively raising my guard and taking almost a physical inventory of are any of these things ringing true?

And is that maybe a place where anxiety is beginning to spring up? Yeah, absolutely. And the first of those, and I wrote down five or six, the first of those would be just your natural temperament. Martin Lloyd-Jones talks about this a lot in his book, Spiritual Depression. But when God does save an individual, he does give them a new heart, but that doesn't necessarily change their natural temperament or their disposition. There are people that wake up and they're extroverted and every day is great and every day is awesome.

And there are other people that are naturally more prone to introspection and to kind of calculative and analytical personalities that might be more prone to despair. It says in James 5, 17, that Elijah, who is going to call down fire from heaven, he's going to shut the sky and there's not going to be an ounce of rain for three years. He's going to heal and he's going to do a lot of mighty things and slay the false prophets of Baal. There's at one point that he is going to run for his life. And in 1 Kings 19, he begs for God to kill him because there's just these massive swings. 1 Kings 18, he is, man, this guy is a baller. And in 1 Kings 19, he's saying, God, it is enough for me. Just kill me. He's suicidal. And you have to consider, and James, it says that Elijah was a man like us. And I think in large

part, James may be referring to the power of his prayer, but is also just referring to maybe just his natural temperament. He had some monumental lows. He had some deep seasons of just kind of maybe a personality or temperament that I talked about where he might be more prone to despair. The second thing that maybe might be a contributing factor for anxiety and despair would be just physical infirmity. When God is talking to Moses at the burning bush, he gives him a commission to go to Pharaoh and say, hey, let my people go. And Moses says, send someone else. And God responds and begins to proclaim the mission once again. And then the reason for Moses's

anxiety at the thought and the daunting task of going to Pharaoh and the mightiest army and empire on earth is that he stuttered. And so there's this physical infirmity that may be provided or prompted this social anxiety for Moses, but that was the number one thing that he thought of. I can't do this. I don't talk good. And that's to your earlier point when you were saying when you were going through you shared with us personally just even prior surgeries i mean very practically it's one thing to struggle with a stutter but then also for those who are going through something like a reconstructive shoulder surgery being laid up in bed unable to

physically exert yourself can be a very, very lonely, isolating position. Well, yeah, and because God made us embodied creatures that were made to exercise and, you know, when we, different things like that. And so even Charles Spurgeon, I talk about him, he's probably most known for being the prince of preachers and being one of the most well-known expositors in history. And yet Charles Spurgeon is very well known for his lifelong battle with depression, that he contributed to a gout condition that would really prompt significant degrees of pain. He said over the last 20 years of his life that it was a great mercy of God for him to get a good night's sleep because of his gout. So whether it's a stuttering mouth, a gout condition, a thyroid irregularity, there are different things from a physical perspective that I want to clarify.

Never excuse ungodly worry, but do provide different recipes and contributing factors or fertile ground for us to be anxious because we're embodied creatures. The third would be exhaustion. In 1 Kings 18, I've told you that Elijah's coming off of a three-year drought. He really calls down fire from heaven. He defeats the prophets of Baal. They slay at least 450 prophets, maybe 850, depending on the way you read the passage. Then he runs from Mount Carmel 20 miles. He beats King Ahab and his chariot, and he goes to the city expecting national revival. And then when he arrives, he hears that Queen Jezebel is hunting for him, trying to kill him. And he goes from there and that's when he says,

oh God, it is enough, take my life. But you just have to think about the exhaustion that comes from a 20 mile sprint after a three year famine and drought. And there's real factors that Elijah was totally wasted. He's fatigued and that's never an excuse for disobedience, but we're vulnerable creatures. That's why in Psalm 103, it says that God is mindful of our frame.

He knows that we're dust. We're not made from steel. We're made from the dust. God made us to sleep. And sometimes, you know, even in that scenario with Elijah, the main theme of the book that I'm writing is on how God proclaims his character to those who are anxious. But before God ever proclaims his character to Elijah, he first gives them a nap and a snack because God made our bodies and he's mindful that we are

embodied beings. And as Martin Lloyd-Jones says, you cannot demarcate our physical lives from our spiritual lives because they're wedded together and there's an intricacy and interdependence in ways that we may not fully fathom, yet the Bible speaks about with a great level of clarity. The fourth thing I think that might be a contributing factor is loneliness. You know, in Genesis 2, you know, God looks at his creation, everything is tov ma'ov, it's very good, it's good. But in Genesis 2, it says there's something was not good, and it was not good for man to be alone and of course this passage is about adam and finding a helpmate and eve but i think the reality of it and the principle of it remains

true it's not good for man to be alone you know one of the interesting things about the world in which we live we live in the most connected connected world in human history connected age and yet it's the most anxious generation we've ever had. And part of it is because even though there's this connection that people feel online, we live largely very lonely lives. And so that loneliness, however it may feel, you can live in a crowd of people and yet live a very lonely life because you're not fully known and not transparent. We live kind of secret lives. That loneliness is a contributing, I think, factor for both anxiety and despair. And sometimes what people who are

anxious and despairing think they need is isolation. Like Elijah, he went outside of the promised land thinking that may be the solution. And yet God was so gracious to bring him out of that because sometimes what we think is the remedy for our anxiety and despair is actually just perpetuating it by prolonged seasons of loneliness, if that makes sense. Yeah, absolutely. And especially, I think today, to your point about with the prevalence of social media and just constantly being connected with one another, it's probably a conversation for another day that we can dive into more deeply. But suffice it to say, quick interactions on social media and hiding behind a screen is not the biblical community

or the biblical model laid out for living in community, united with brothers and sisters in Christ in a local church context where they truly get to know you. That's not the same as the social media kind of, hey, like from afar. Yeah, I have 2,000 friends, whatever that means. Yeah, and at the end of the book, I have a chapter on that faith is a community project, meaning like that if the remedy that God provides for the anxious is to have a greater and enlarged and magnified view of his character, sometimes we read a book on it by ourself and think that we can implement these truths by ourself. But the reality is faith is a community project.

That's why God gave us the local church. And so a lot of people may attend church, but there's no verbiage in the New Testament for anybody attending church. You belong to the church, you participate in the church. And so really a life of isolation is antithetical to a life of deep faith and deep trust. So that would be the fourth.

The fifth maybe contributing factor or recipe for anxiety and despair would be trauma. And I know that trauma is kind of a trigger word because it's become so relative. You know, some say, yeah, I had kind of a traumatic situation. Like, well, what does that mean? But in the Bible, bare minimum, there are some traumatic experiences from God's people. And like, I would say David, who marries Saul's daughter, is anointed king. And then we often talk about the Psalms that David wrote when he's saying, oh God, you are my rock, you are my stronghold, you are my deliverer, I will trust in you. David's not writing that from a Jerusalem palace. He's writing that in the caves as David, and many people don't realize

this, is anointed king as a teenager. And then for the next 10 years of his life, he's running for his life from his father-in-law, the guy that was supposed to love him, take care of him, provide for him, and is the one that's hunting for his life with his army. And David's in the caves with his mighty men saying, oh God, help me to trust you, help me to trust you. And there's a true level of trauma there. You know, even when you look at Elijah, Elijah experienced real trauma because all of the other prophets of God were slaughtered. That's real significant, you know, tragedy. And there's a lot of different other, you know, stories in the Bible that you could highlight. But the theme that is worth even examining is,

and we'll talk about this in future episodes, is that God's goodness is so pervasive and his love is so sure that it has the power to pervade even the darkest and most evil moments of our life and his sovereignty rules even there. The sixth, I would say, catalyst for anxiety or recipe for anxiety is grief, especially even for despair. The Christian life is not one high after another high after another high. Our lives are often lived in the valley of the shadow of death. And in that valley, it's often where we experience true levels of grief you know grief because of a lost loved one a lost friendship a lost baby miscarried child grief is not wrong at all prolonged seasons of grief are not wrong but when grief takes place without as its own terminus, rather than carrying that grief to God,

that grief can ultimately turn into a deep level of despair and depression. It speaks to a need. We return to the Tozer quote, I feel like more than any other quote, maybe in this podcast, but it's there for a reason. And that another reason it strikes me to be reading through the totality of scripture is that by following the stories, I mean, you get to 1 Kings 19 after 1 Kings 18. But if you kind of pick up the story in 1 Kings 18 and leave it, you're maybe missing the fact that these real men and women who live these lives are facing these very real challenges that are very akin, oftentimes more extreme, but for many folks, very relatable to many of the challenges people are facing today.

Yeah. Well, the Bible is unfailingly relevant. You know, sometimes we read the stories of different heroes in the scriptures and we wonder, do they ever fail and falter like I do? And then we read of the reality that Moses was anxious. Abraham lied. Noah got drunk. David killed and committed adultery. Elijah, the prophet of boldness and faithfulness, begs God to take his life. And none of these stories excuse any sin on our part, but it does go to show us that God is so gracious to help and redeem all of those who are made in this image. And there's no perfect people in the story that God is writing, only a perfect God.

And so, yeah, I'm encouraged by that. And I think just even as you take those different contributing factors, I think, and we turn a little bit, you know, I always want to end with a remnant of hope. You know, sometimes even when we think about Jesus issuing the prohibition, do not be anxious, right? In Matthew 6, 25, and we'll get here in a couple of weeks. Sometimes we imagine those Israelites sitting on the hillside of the Mount of Beatitudes as so different than us.

What could they possibly be anxious about? There's no this or this or that. But we often fail to remember that they were under the regime of Rome. It was literally Rome and the Tetrarch that chopped off the head of John the Baptist, the greatest prophet and preacher that they had seen in 400 years. The Roman Empire was known for raping women and crucifying their enemies for 40 miles leading up to a city so that the whole world would know that you can't mess with Rome. So when Jesus is telling his followers not to be anxious,

it's not like they're growing up in an environment that is so different than the one that we live in today. There was the constant prospect of fear and brutality and ruthlessness from the Roman regime. And yet he's still going to tell them, do not be anxious. Thankfully, and we'll talk about this in the episodes to come, he doesn't stop there. He doesn't just say, snap out of it. He gives them all the reasons why they should trust him and who they have as a heavenly father.

Absolutely. So last episode, we looked first and foremost at culture today wants to tell us to look inward to kind of find the root cause of all of our anxiety. Blame it on them or something like that. And the general thrust of the argument you're setting up for us is actually, first, we need to consider our Heavenly Father. We don't consider our inner child. We consider our Heavenly Father.

Today, it strikes me, there's actually a lot of reasons to be anxious. You mentioned the J.I. Packer quote, basically saying the world is a mad place. The natural response would be to be anxious. And so the uncommon response that we're gifted through Jesus is actually joy amidst suffering. And peace that surpasses all understanding. Absolutely. And so then as we go forward, I think it might be helpful to delineate exactly what we're talking about. You even mentioned in grief, it's okay to grieve for a period of time, but we don't want the grief to be an end in and of itself. Maybe the question practically would be, can we set ourselves up to understand where

does grief become sin? Where does worry become anxiety? Where do natural cares of this world start to teeter over into a sinful attitude towards God. Yeah. So in the next episode, I think, yeah, delineating between, you know, a grief and maybe an ungodly joy, Paul says we are sorrowful yet always rejoicing. So sorrow definitely has a place in the Christian life. Paul says he's sorrowful yet always rejoicing. So how do you marry those two realities together? And then secondly then secondly i would say when does care and concern become an ungodly worry or anxiety and i often use worry and anxiety interchangeably but to have care and concern those are good and godly things but the same word is used throughout the new testament to define good concern godly care and, care, and then sinful, anxiety.

And so we'll talk about that in the next episode. Awesome, I'm looking forward to it. All right, thanks, Hank. Yep, thanks.