Live Free with Josh Howerton - Don’t Let Anxiety Sink You | Ep. 62 | Tuesday May 2, 2023

Episode Date: May 2, 2023

What do you do when you feel worry, fear and anxiety creeping in? Pastor Mike teaches through Philippians chapter 4 and provides practical steps to move towards peace and joy. A key step in this process: shifting our focus off anxiety and instead celebrating God’s goodness. Be sure to share this episode with someone who might need to be reminded of this truth! For more information, text DRIVE to 20411.

Thanks for tuning in to today's daily drive with Lake Point Church, a daily dose of God's word for your morning drive. When the word, not the world, becomes the majority of your week, your life will start to change. For that reason, our prayer is that God will speak to you through today's devotional. For more digital content to feed your faith, text Drive to 20411. And now let's dive in to today's devotional. It's so great to be with you today on the Daily Drive podcast. My name is Mike, and we're walking together through a book of the Bible called Philippians, and we are all the way to Chapter 4.

And so for the next few days, we're going to talk about worry and anxiety. Now, I love the old recovery line that says serenity is not found in calmer seas, but in learning how to build a better boat. And this chapter is kind of a manual for building a better boat that can handle the seas of anxiety. it really has been my go-to text through the years when I feel anxiety coming on. A guy named author Roche said this about worry. Worry is a thin stream of fear trickling through the mind. If encouraged, it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained.

So let me ask you, what's draining your thoughts these days? Perhaps what's started as just a thin stream of fear has now turned into this raging river of anxiety, and it has you living with your head barely above the water line. Well, if so, you're not alone. The latest stats show that some kind of anxiety disorder affects over 40 million adults in our country. And I'm sure that is continuing to surge upwards. In fact, all of us wrestle with anxiety to some degree,

whether physiologically or emotionally or because of stressful circumstances, all of us have to do battle with fear and anxiety and worry. And so what Paul writes here, has literally been some of the most meaningful words to me in my entire life. When I get stressed out, when I start to worry about stuff, when I feel like anxiety or fear is about to get the best of me, this really has been my go-to. Now I want to read the whole thing,

then I'm going to come back and break it down a little of the time over the next few days. Philippians 4, verse 4 through 7. Rejoice in the Lord always. I'll say it again. Rejoice. Let your gentleness be evident to all, for the Lord is near. Don't be anxious about anything, but in every situation, my prayer and petition, with Thanksgiving, presents your request to God, and the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your

hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things. What a great passage of Scripture. I got the idea from Max Licato to take the word calm and use it in a practical way to deal with anxiety when I feel it coming on. It's been really helpful to me. The letter C in the word calm stands for Celebrate God's Goodness.

The A stands for Ask for God's Help. The L stands for list things you're grateful for, and the M stands for meditate on things that are true. So let's just take the first one today, the letter C, celebrate God's goodness. Did you notice how Paul starts here? And again, remember, he's writing us. letter from prison, unjustly incarcerated for his faith, and he writes, Rejoice in the Lord always. He knew that if he was going to push back anxious thoughts and fears, if he was going to endure, he had to make sure that his focus was on the goodness

of God. Now, when he says rejoice in the Lord always, he's not just echoing the simplistic line from the famous Bobby McFeran song, Don't Worry, be happy. He's not saying, turn that frown upside down with the power of positive thinking. No, he's saying shift. your focus to the Lord and celebrate his goodness and his faithfulness and his strength, his provision, his power, his sovereignty, his better view from above, and his unfailing love for you. Not just suck it up and rejoice. He says, find your joy in him throughout your day. Rejoice in the Lord always. And then he does something here that he does nowhere else in writings. He repeats himself. He says, rejoice in the Lord always. And let me say it again. Rejoice. Nowhere else to

Paul do this. He doesn't say, don't steal. Let me say it again. Don't steal. He doesn't say, don't envy. Oh, let me say that again. Don't envy. It's like he's found something that really works, and he's trying to convince us to give it a try. It's like he's saying, I've discovered something here in prison that I know will keep you on track. Celebrate God's goodness. Stay focused on him. I can't stress this enough, so let me say it again. Celebrate God's goodness, because when you keep your focus there, you will discover that he is where the joy is. Your fears and anxieties will start to dissipate as you intentionally shift your mind to the reality of his constant care for you. Plus, he says, others will notice the calm spirit that you live with,

the gentle spirit that you have, and that it reminds us, the Lord is near. He's saying, lean into him, and you'll see that he is good, that he is love, he is in control, he sees, he cares, for he is near. He's not far. He's with you. He's in you. I can remember a story one time that Chuck Colson, the founder of Prison and Fellowship tells about taking gifts for Project Angel Tree. Some of you may remember the Project Angel Tree where you'd buy gifts on behalf of inmates for their kids. Of course, they couldn't get out and shop. So you deliver those gifts. And he delivered these gifts one time to a home in Washington, D.C. You see, he walked up to this little like a row of apartments there was a broken screen door kind of hanging there

and he knocked on the door and these little kids came to the door and he says, is your mom here and they shook their head no, he goes, well, my name is Chuck and I came here to bring you some presents from your dad well they opened the oldest kid opened the door and this little kid comes running off from the back probably like

three or four years old and he sees all these presents and he goes, what's your name? What's your name? He goes, my name is Chuck. He goes, what's your name? He goes, my name's Emmanuel. And Chuck said he knelt down on one knee, he got eyeball to eyeball to this little boy and said, do you know what your name means? Your name means God is with us.

And the little boy got all excited about the time the mom came home from work and walks in. The little boy goes running to his mom, and he says, Mom, Mom, God is with us. God is with us. God is with us. And Chuck said he left those presents there with that family, and he walked down the street. And he said, I could just hear that echoing in my mind.

God is with us. God is with us and that's the hope of the world and Paul says he is he's with us he is near he's not far and if you're a Christ follower he's not just with you he's in you as well so if you start to feel anxiety rise up today

if that thin trickle of fear is about to turn into a raging river shift your focus to him celebrate his goodness today and you will sense his calm settling you down man I'm praying for you today and we'll pick up

there next time. Thanks for tuning in today. For more biblical teaching and worship, join us for our church online live weekend services on Saturdays at 6 p.m. and Sundays at 9.30 and 11 a.m. Central Standard Time. Also, if this podcast was helpful to you, would you be sure to rate, review, and share this podcast to help get the word out. For more information about all digital ministries of Lake Point, text drive to 20411. Oh.