Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 524 | Why Everyone’s Freaking Out (& Why We Don’t Need To) | Guest: David Marvin

Episode Date: November 16, 2021

Today we're talking with David Marvin, director of the Porch at Watermark Church. David has written a book, "We're All Freaking Out (and Why We Don't Need To)," which aims to provide a Biblical way for Christians to deal with anxiety and depression. We discuss why Millennials seem to be so widely affected by anxiety, and David offers advice and solutions for people struggling with those feelings, explained from a Biblical perspective. David also shares his own personal experience with anxiety and how faith helped him through it. --- Today's Sponsors: Annie's Kit Clubs helps encourage your little scientist with their latest subscription, Genius Box. Each month your curious kids will get a new box bursting with 3 hands-on activities to explore an exciting STEM theme. Go to AnniesKitClubs.com/ALLIE & save 50% on your first box! Hunter Douglas helps you stay perfectly at ease in comfort & style with their innovative window shade designs, gorgeous fabrics, & control systems so advanced they can be scheduled to automatically adjust to their optimal position throughout the day. Go to HunterDouglas.com/ALLIE & take advantage of the Season of Style rebate savings event! Good Ranchers exists to support local American farms that help you make great American meals for your family. They're here to put America FIRST at the dinner table! Go to GoodRanchers.com/ALLIE right now & you'll get 10 FREE bistro filet medallions with your order. Or, better yet, subscribe & save $25 on each box of mouth-watering American meats for life! --- Buy Allie's book, You're Not Enough (& That's Okay): Escaping the Toxic Culture of Self-Love: https://alliebethstuckey.com/book Relatable merchandise: https://shop.blazemedia.com/collections/allie-stuckey

Hey, this is Steve Day. If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort. We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos. If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about where we are or where we're headed, you can watch this D-Day show right here on Blaze TV or listen wherever you get podcasts.

I hope you'll join us. Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. I have a treat for you today. We are going to talk to my friend David Marvin. We're going to talk about anxiety. Why we are all anxious, what we're anxious about. And we are going to talk about the ways biblically that we can work out of anxiety. anxiety and stop dwelling on our anxious thoughts because it's really robbing us of the joy that God

calls us to. And it is taking us out of this present moment. And that is where God's peace is. And so we're going to talk about all of that. David wrote a book. It's called we're all freaking out and why we don't need to. Don't we all want to know why we don't actually need to be freaking out in light of all the crazy stuff that is going on? And so he is going to give us such refreshing truth today. And I'm super excited for you to hear this conversation. Without further ado, here is David Marvin. Thank you so much for joining us. Can you tell everyone who you are and what you do? Yes, man, I'm so pumped to be here. My name is David Marvin. I work at Watermark Community Church to lead the porch, which is a young adult gathering, primarily in Dallas of a few thousand young

adults every Tuesday night. We've got 15 satellite locations throughout nine states in the country and have been there for 12 years, married my wife, Callie, nine years ago, and we have, two kids with one on the way. And yeah, I'm so pumped to be here, man. Yeah, I'm so glad to have you. So you have a lot going on. You talk to a lot of young people. One of the things that I'm sure that you hear about a lot is that young people especially, but maybe everyone feels really overwhelmed in general, but also with everything that's going on in the news, with politics, we're overstimulated because of everything we see on our phones. So we're just anxious. And I'm guessing that's why you wrote the book that she did, correct?

That is correct. So, you know, doing ministry, just like doing anything that has a sizable reach or people coming, publishers come, and I'm sure they do all the time with you and go, hey, would you consider writing something? I never thought, man, I'm going to write a book or that was just like my life goal to write something. So originally when they reached out, I was like, man, thank you. I'm so honored. I don't know that this is the time or write or whatever. And then they came back and they said, it seems like you're passionate about. anxiety. You talk about it a lot at the porch. I'm married to a counselor. So my wife primarily deals with people who battle with anxiety. Would you consider writing something on that? And so that led us to a journey where we just said, man, let's pray about if we could create a resource that would help connect the dots on what God's word actually says about anxiety and combating it to be a first line of defense. Because my experience in the church is often when someone struggles with mental health, depression, anxiety, they are quickly pushed to a counselor, medication, psychologists, all of which are great fields or, you know, I've personally

been offended from. My wife is, you know, doing that for a living. So of course I support, but not at the exclusion of what God's word actually teaches. And further in my experience, one of the reasons why they were so quickly pushed outside of the church to find solutions for anxiety is because I think the average Christian doesn't actually understand what God says or teaches it. Assumes God says, don't be anxious, just pray more. Or, just have more faith and you won't have anxiety, which is such an unhelpful and over-simplification, I think, of what the Bible actually teaches as it relates to anxiety. So that was how we came up with that and then worked on that resource and came up with, we're all freaking out and why we

don't need to. And even the title of that has a funny story that is behind because I don't think I ever would have named. Did you name the title of your book? Yes. I think we worked with the same public is this penguin this is penguin random house an imprint different imprints but yes it started out with one title that was even like in the contract and then over time it kind of changed i think we came up with it together i remember not liking actually the title that we came up with and of course it's grown on me and i couldn't imagine it being anything else yes i never would have landed so you know you know jenny allen yes so jenny goes to watermark and i remember one day i bumped into her it we were talking to church and I was like, I can't think of a title for this book on anxiety.

And in typical Jenny fashion, she was like, be at my office today, 2 p.m., we will name your book. I show up at like 158. And Jenny's like one of the best authors around. I mean, she's amazing. She's an incredible leader, if gathering's huge, just so much to celebrate what God is doing through her. And I'm assuming, you know, this could be like five minutes or I'm just honored to even get to be here. Somebody walks out, I ring the doorbell at her office and somebody leads me back to this room. and it's her entire team sitting in this room

and they're all these just incredible women leaders. It was like walking into a den of lionesses and Jenny says, sit down, start talking. And five minutes into the conversation, she flips to in the manuscript at something that said, we're all freaking out. And she goes, ha, that is your book title. And I had all these ideas like, you know, anxious no more

or battling anxiety, all of which she was like, ugh, ugh, oh. You need to say it like people feel it. It almost sounds kind of clinical. Yes. And so she was like, that's how people say it. That's how people feel it. Yeah, that's really good.

And so, yeah, pitched it to the publisher and they loved it. And so we're all freaking out why we don't need to, which again is connecting the dots, not as a last line of defense or to dismiss all the different helpful resources that God has given us through psychology and counseling, but as a first line of defense on what the Bible teaches. Yeah. So before we get to the why we don't need to part, why in your element, estimation, are we all freaking out? I think especially for so younger, and I know you talk about this a lot, the younger generation, Gen Z, millennials, young adults, are estimates put in between two and

three times more likely to have anxiety disorders, depressive disorders, and I think there's a lot of contributing factors behind that. One is the stage of life that they're in between 18 to 30 is especially post-college, one where for the first time, the train tracks of life have kind of run out. In other words, prior to that, everything is pretty mapped out for you, like first grade, then you go to second grade, third grade, junior high, then you go to high school, then you go to college, freshman year, and it's like at the end of senior year or your second senior year, the tracks run out, and you're in this free fall of going, where am I going to live, what am I supposed to do what I'm supposed to do for a living. Am I going to marry this person? Should I not

marry this person while I ever get married? How am I going to afford to pay off student? It's all of these uncertainties arise. And I think you add with that the average age of marriage, because loneliness has a relationship to anxiety and mental health and those feelings that would feel. The average age of marriage has so moved up from, you know, in 1980 was 24 and 23 was the average age people got married. Today it's 30 and some estimates put it even closer to 31 and 29. So you're walking through this really uncertain stage of life and you're doing it for most people alone. And then as you know, the digital connections that we have feed a lot of that anxiety and the superficial relationships that we have don't help prevent that anxiety. So I think all the comparison, you know, Instagram, one person on my team said, it's like a living to do list when I go on there of all the things that I'm confronted with, oh, man, I see somebody getting engaged to do.

find a date to find someone. Yeah. I see somebody's car that they're driving to do, make more money. I see the vacation that they have. I'm bartered with all these things and not just social media, but we're so connected. When Pearl Harbor happened, you think about our grandparents hearing that on the radio or reading it in the newspaper, maybe a week later. And today, if there's a terrorist attack in Sweden, you know, you can get a news alert that

bribards you immediately. So we're so connected to both all the traumatic things that are going on. And I think a lot of the digital connections that we have are promoting or producing anxiety. And the fact that we don't have authentic, real deep relationships are not preventing anxiety. So we live in this tension where we're constantly in a world that is producing anxiety and we're not having authentic or leveraging things that will prevent anxiety. So I think that's a short and there's a lot more that goes into that. But I think that's at least a real snapshot of what's contributing to it. Hey, this is Steve Day.

If you're listening to Alley, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort. We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos. If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about where we are or where we're headed, you can watch this D-Day show right here on Blaze TV or listen wherever you get podcasts. I hope you'll join us.

Something that we talk about on this show in a lighthearted way, but maybe it seriously connects with what you're talking about, is something that I call and I think it's maybe officially called millennial errand paralysis. So this is anxiety surrounding doing really menial tasks that should not elicit any anxiety. So like sending stuff back, say you order something from Amazon and you don't want to send it back or you got something from the store that doesn't fit and you have to return it. You don't do that calls on your phone when someone is calling you, the anxiety that comes from that, checking your voicemails, answering text messages, going to the post office, all of these little things. that really should just be such easy tasks that we take care of. I've talked to a lot of people, not just millennials, but mostly people our age, who just have this long list of little things that they've never been able to get to because for some reason when it comes to that list, we just freeze up.

And I don't, you know, I haven't totally psychoanalyzed this. I think it has something to do with the oversimulation that you're talking about. But what's your analysis of that? Yeah, I think that we do, there's so much comparison and we can get so trapped in thinking small things are such a big deal in life, or if I'm not where I, you know, see everybody else in life at in terms of success, in terms of whatever, fill in the blank, then I think I can get overwhelmed by that. And then to your point, we are so overstimulated and bombarded. And, you know, studies even show turning off your phone for an extended period of time, it

leads to physical symptoms of anxiety being reduced and stress and blood pressure. And so this, you know, a friend of mine created a book that Jeff Sembethke wrote, oh man, it's related to hurry to hell with the hustle. That's what it is. And he said in there something that I thought was potentially true, maybe even we're all seeing it and living in denial of it where he said it was a day and age when cigarettes were encouraged by doctors or certainly tolerated by society. And then 50 years later, people were like, oh, that was really bad. Like we were killing ourselves. And his proposal or his hypothesis was, I think there's going to come a day where we see that the phones that we were all carrying around weren't killing

us like via cancer. They were just killing our sense of peace, our ability to engage with people, or relational depth with other people. So I think all of that, to your point, is contributing to a paralysis and just heightened levels of anxiety. Yeah. I think it also shows us just how finite we are and how finite we are meant to be

because I heard a pastor a while ago, I don't even remember when it was, talking about how our phones give us this sense of omniscience and omnipresence. What you were saying about how long time ago something might happen across the world, you hear about a week later, you never hear about it.

Yeah. You don't even know what really happened across town. You're just focused on what's right in front of you. Well, now we are confronted with all these different issues that are happening globally that we feel like we have to have equal amounts of empathy and care for. And if we don't, then we feel inadequate or we're not virtuous enough and we have to say something about everything. We have to know something about everything. It's making us feel like we're God and we weren't made to be God. But through this little device, we feel like we are taking on Godlike characteristics.

and I feel like part of our anxiety is that crushing burden of being a God that we just weren't made to be. Do you agree with that? Totally. And it's not even just a God. It also brings up insecurities where there was a time for me to compare my life to you. I actually had to know you. You know, I had to come over your house. I had to like see it. And now I can, you know, in my living room compare my life to people. I'll never, like a Swedish billionaire can make me feel. insecure and can make me feel like I'm inadequate just by looking at, you know, something that he posts, and I'll never even meet this person or some celebrity and the relational drama I can carry on or someone could carry on about. I can't believe that they broke up. And I think all of that

is adding, whether it's exposing a weight that we weren't meant to carry and a godlike omniscience that we weren't meant to have. Yeah. It's that feeling of insecurity that human beings, I imagine, have always had, which is why one of the Ten Commandments is do not covet. Like, God knows that that steals our joy. And yet it is so much easier now to break that commandment because of our accessibility to those kinds of things. So you've established why we're freaking out. How do we not freak out?

Why do we not need to freak out? Because it sure seems like there are plenty of things that are demanding my freaking out. Yeah, I think if you're not a Christian, the solutions that I think God has for you will help. But at the end of the day, they're going to be superficial because they haven't dealt with the ultimate reason that you're on the planet. And honestly, the reason you should be freaking out is,

as a believer, a follower of Jesus, we believe first and foremost, everyone's going to live forever somewhere. And so if you haven't put your faith, and a lot of people don't understand what it means to be a Christian, which is why I'm thankful for resources like the one that I'm on right now in your show, of clarifying that, that a Christian is just someone who's accepted what Jesus did on the cross, dying for their sin, paying for everything wrong they've ever done or ever will do,

and they've accepted that payment for their sin and his resurrection from the dead. And if you haven't had a moment where you did that, in the kindest way possible, I would say you kind of should be freaking out because you're going to spend eternity somewhere. Yeah, but maybe for different reasons than Instagram is telling you too. Exactly. Yes. You should know that, man, I'm going to give an account for my life. But for Christians, one of the reasons that we don't have to, to freak out, and this is a short answer. I'll try to give some short answer, ultimately what the

book is entirely about, is walking through, let me give one example of an area of scripture, I think is so misunderstood that is so much more helpful about why and what to do when you find yourself freaking out and is often misapplied or mistought. In Philippians chapter four, the Apostle Paul writes, do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with Thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God. So he said, don't be anxious about anything, pray about everything. And then he says, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Now, most people read that verse, and they assume Paul is saying something that seems impossible and like he's a superhero. Did Paul just say, don't be anxious, never worry about stuff, just pray. And if you read it that way, it will seem impossible and it will seem unhelpful. and it will be a wrong reading of what Paul's actually saying, and I'll explain why I say that. The Greek word that is used all throughout the New Testament for anxiety and the word that Paul uses in Philippians chapter 4 is the Greek word merrim now. And the Greek word merrim now for not be anxious is a word that was synonymous and is synonymous in Greek language, which is what the Bible was written in the New Testament was, with meditation. So Paul is not saying,

never have an anxious thought. That's impossible. What Paul is saying is when those anxious thoughts come, don't choose proactively or willingly to meditate and dwell on those anxious and fearful thoughts, which I've never met anybody who would say, I disagree with that. Like what helps me in life and what has brought more satisfaction and has changed my life for the better is I decided I'm going to meditate on every fearful, potentially anxious, bad thing that could happen today. And life, ever since I started doing that, it's been amazing. It's been awesome. Yeah, nobody says that. So no one would disagree with that. And candidly, that's far more helpful, I think, and practical. Because if I read it and just go, Paul just said, don't worry, just pray. That doesn't actually get

at what the root of what he's saying. He's saying, no, don't meditate on those. Which is why in that same chapter, the next verse, Paul says, finally, whatever's true, noble, lovely, worthy of praise, think about these things. So Paul's saying, don't meditate on these. Bring those things to God and choose to meditate on these things, what's true, what's behind that. And so that's one example, I think, of a way that the Bible is way more practical and way more helpful, because I can choose not to proactively decide to dwell on anxious, fearful thoughts. And I can't choose to dwell on what is true.

Yeah. Wow. What do you think the church has done well when it comes to helping Christians deal with anxiety and especially young people? And maybe you touched on this at the beginning, but maybe you touched on this at the beginning, expound upon it. And what do you think has maybe been unhelpful or misunderstood about anxiety from Christian leaders? Is it that aspect that you were talking about that maybe some Christian leaders have said, well, you shouldn't even think about medication, you shouldn't think about

therapy. If you're worried, then it's just because you're not reading the Bible enough. So what have been the goods and the bads there? You know, I can only speak from my own experience in terms of church world, the last church or the last 12 years working on staff. I think the gift of community and the gift of small groups, we call them community groups, but just having people in your life that are basically a support group and basically the people that walk alongside you in the highs and lows of life that provide a space, and hopefully your church has this, for you to have relationships where you can open up and you can talk with people. You know, you don't have to even be a Christian. Psychology would support that just by talking

about what you're feeling, your anxious thoughts, your levels of anxiety. are reduced. And so I think as Christians, we're commanded to open up our lives to other people. And I think that's a real benefit and real gift. What I think the church has done a poor job of is not, for whatever reason, it's made anxiety seem like, man, if you struggle with anxiety, and there are so many factors that influence if a person's going to struggle or the likelihood to struggle with anxiety more than another. And we have made it seem like if you struggle with anxiety you're living in sin or you should carry some sort of shame with that rather than embracing I battle against anxiety and coming along and helping them walk through and chase down the roots

of that anxious thought like I don't I don't love them all do you like them all maybe in like maybe like two thousand two alley maybe I liked the mall back in like you know when I was I don't know how old was I, 10 in 2002? That was probably cool. You go to Clare's, get your ears, peers. If you were like 13, your mom would drop you off with your friends and that was awesome. But, you know, I haven't been to a mall in a long time, I have to say. How about that?

Yeah. That's unusual. Yeah. So I like you, hate going to, well, I don't know if you hate going to the mall. I don't go to the mall as often as I can or I try to never go to the mall. but when inevitably, you know, Apple produces some product I quote unquote need or something breaks on my phone, I have to go to the mall to go to the Apple store. And every time that I go there, I don't, because I never go to the mall, I never know where

the Apple store is. So I park on the wrong side of the mall and I walk in and I'm like, where is the Apple store? Even though you've been there several times, it's like every time you go, you can't remember. Yes, exactly. Or they're moving the store around or something. That's probably what it is. It's a conspiracy against it. to you. They're moving the Apple store every time David Marvin shows up at the mall.

We're going to find whoever's behind this conspiracy. So anyways, I go in and I look for the last physical map in society, which is that big like it's like a, you know, one foot wide, eight feet tall physical map. And I look for two things on it. I look for where is the Apple store and which is where I want to go. And then I look for something that without it, I can't get to where I want to go. And that's the little star that says you are here. In other words, if, If I don't know where I am, I can't get to where I want to go. It's not helpful to know that's where the Apple store is if I don't know where I am. And I think on anxiety, in order for you to get to where you want to go, you've got to embrace where I am.

In order for me to live a life that's not crippled or not unable to deal with anxiety. I've got to first embrace. Man, I'm crippled with anxiety about my singleness. I'm crippled with anxiety about my kids' health. I'm crippled with anxiety about being able to pay off loans. And I think for whatever reason, we don't encourage people to say, hey, and you can say, that. You can say I really struggle with that. In fact, the first step towards not struggling with it is embracing it. And people feel like they need to pretend they don't or deny those thoughts or try to

dismiss those thoughts. But I think what the brilliant teaching of Jesus in Matthew chapter 6, one of the things that he leads us to is establishing and kind of chasing down what am I anxious about and why am I anxious about it or what's fueling and what's underneath those anxious feelings and thoughts. Yeah. And I don't think the church has done a good enough job of encouraging or facilitating. And that may not apply to every church of every person that's listening. Yeah.

You're going to go to a great church. But of encouraging that conversation to really help people. Yeah. Why do you think it is that, and I won't speak for other people. But for me, sometimes even though I don't want to be anxious or I say that I don't want to be anxious, I actually find myself hanging on two fearful thoughts and not even wanting to let them go. So I know when an anxious thoughts.

It typically happens with, it starts with a what if, what if this happens to my kids or to me or to our situation, whatever it is. Yeah. And then I know, like there's a point where I can say, don't keep going because there's no point in continuing this, but I do. And there's almost this sick satisfaction that you get out of saying, well, let's just play out the worst case scenario and dwell on it for a little bit. Why do we do that?

We know it's just going to, you know, tear us up inside. we're not going to be able to fall asleep. We don't feel good about it and nothing's been solved. Why do you think we hang on to that? I think, okay, I'm going to say something that is going to be really unconventional. Okay. And it may or may not. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Okay. I think you should chase down and play it out. But I don't think you should stop there. And here's what I mean by that. I think the what if question, because that's really what anxiety and fear is built off of. It's that those two words, what if blank? What if I lose my job? What if my wife dies of cancer?

What if our kids, you know, if something happens? What if I am single forever? What if I, whatever? And so often people are like, good for you. I think it sounds like you take the next step and you answer that and you play it out. And yet I think there's even one additional part of that equation in playing it out that people should add that I found really personally helpful in my own life. Because anxiety plagues off of this kind of vague feeling of fear that, oh no, what if my wife did die of cancer? and I just want to think about that.

You know, that's not productive. Yeah. And I think, and I learned this in counseling, that there is a freedom that comes by playing it out and then adding to the end of that equation, but God would. So what if my wife dies of cancer, which would be, candidly, the most extreme, terrible, that's a worst thing I could think of. Yeah.

And I'm left to raise three babies on my own. What if? And I answer the what if. and I walk through, that would be the hardest season of my life. That would be probably the most pain I'll ever experience or could even imagine experiencing. That would not be what I want. I just answer those what ifs.

And at the end of that, I don't forget to reinforce, but God would. So but God would meet me there. God would carry me through that. He promises that he's near to the brokenhearted. God has promised this life is a vapor. And so as hard and as almost impossible as it is for me to imagine how painful that would be, there's going to come a moment where I look back for all of eternity and this life that seemed so full of pain.

I'm an infinite joy with him forever. And as hard as that would be, God would meet me through there. And I would encourage somebody to walk through that. I work with young adults. And so dating and relationships and singleness is a real fear. And one of the biggest fears is what if I'm single forever? and in talking with people, I would encourage them answer it. And it's only by answering it and by facing it that you can fight it.

And you can also reinforce it with God's word. What if I'm single for forever? That would not be what I wanted. That would not be what I hoped. Then I would be sad. Like answer, however you would answer it. And then bring about what's true, whatever's noble, all that stuff Paul commands and reinforce from God's word.

But God has promised life is found in him. it's not found in a spouse. God has promised that he still wants to use and has a purpose and a will for my life. God would give me strength and would use all the hard things that I walk through to bring about good. And so I know that sounds unconventional,

but I think it's in Matthew chapter 6, and I don't want to go too long if you want to go somewhere else. No, it's fine. Jesus asks what I think is so profound, and he's talking about anxiety. It's in the sermon on the Mount, and he's teaching a lot of topics,

and he brings up anxiety. And he brings up what his audience worried about where he brings up food and clothing. That was real. You know, you didn't have a target and there wasn't, you know, Uber Eats. Yeah. Food was, there wasn't refrigeration.

I mean, those are real fears. And he brings it up and he would bring up whatever you're anxious about or I'm anxious about because it still applies and what he walks them through. And he says, do not be anxious about what you will eat

or what you will drink or what you will wear. And the profound question that he gives is, isn't life more than food and the body more than clothes? And the reason I think that's profound, and if you almost, it wasn't until I really stopped to like think about, why would Jesus ask that question?

Well, he's God, so it's not that he doesn't know the answer. He's not like, hey, guys, I'm really trying to figure this out. Is life food? Is the epitome of life food? Anybody know? It's because he is attempting to put into a bigger perspective, their fears. his audience would of course gone.

No, life is not food. Or at the end of the day, that's not all that matters in life. Life is more than just food. And he's trying to through questions, really do what counselors do today, help them deflate some of the power of their anxiety to more accurately see it.

Doesn't make the fear go away, but at least allows you to more accurately see it in order to then face it. And then Jesus does what I'm kind of saying of like, what if, and helping them play it out, like life is so much more than that, right? and then he brings up the truth from God's word

where next he goes, you have a Heavenly Father, remember, who's promised to provide for your needs. Not all of your wants, he has promised to provide for your needs. So he helps him more accurately see the thing that they're afraid of, and then he reinforces,

hey, the pagans run after those things, but you have a Heavenly Father who's promised to provide for your needs. You can trust him. And he really walks through that equation, which is where I really take it from. And so if somebody's battling anxiety, I think chasing it down, chasing those fears down, and also holding on to what's true from God's

word really has brought a lot of freedom and help in my own life as it relates to that. I think that a lot of us want the promise that our fears won't come true, that you won't be single forever, that your spouse won't die, that nothing will happen to your kids, that you won't get sick. That's certainly the assurance that I find myself wanting, especially when it comes to my kids. I mean, as a mom, like, that's where my, you know, biggest fears and biggest concerns lie. what is the future going to be like for them? Are they going to stay healthy and safe in all of these different things? And, you know, there are some things that we hear.

Some more helpful than others. Like, well, you know, God loves your kids more than you do, which is absolutely true. But then I think because I, you know, I can be so addicted to anxiety. I'm like, well, yeah, God does love my kids more than I do. He created them. He died for them. I know all of that. But also, I know that God would allow things to happen to my kids that I wouldn't if I had

the choice. He might allow them to get cancer. I would not. If I had the choice, I would not, but he will. And so I have to remember myself that his faithfulness and goodness is not dependent upon whether or not he allows a certain circumstance or his love for my kids isn't dependent upon what he allows, but it's dependent upon his character, which doesn't change, and his commitment to his glory, which might mean that bad things happen. But like you said, you don't end there. You say, but God, but God is going to meet us there, but God is still going to be faithful, but God isn't going to change in that circumstance, even if I don't know what to do. Somehow the piece that passes understanding will meet me. And so like you were saying earlier, without the gospel, like,

there really is no next step after we take our what-if to their logical conclusion. Because if the end of it is, well, yeah, you know what? My kid could get cancer. That really sucks. And there's nothing I can do. about that, which it does. It does. And that what if does suck, but there's nothing after that for comfort, for peace, then that sucks a lot more. Yes. In fact, what you just brought up, I think, is a really, Jesus in the next verse in that passage, so he walks to, don't be anxious, isn't life more than that, and the body more than the clothes, and then he uses illustrations. Or he's like, look at the birds of the air, look at the flowers of the field. God cares for them, don't you think, go care for you? And then he brings up what I think is one of the most,

most misunderstood verses as it relates to anxiety out there period. He says, seek first, so then he transitions, the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added to you. Yeah. And then he says, don't worry about tomorrow each day has trouble of its own. That idea of seek first, it's the same Greek word for prioritize. And the word for kingdom, he just brought up, or God's will, he just brought up God's will as it relates to prayer 20 verses earlier. So Jesus says, prioritize God's will and God's kingdom for your life above your own. Surrender your kingdom, in other words, and put on the, let there be no competition for my life, God's agenda, God's will.

That is the priority. That is the kingdom. And that's the one that's going to sit on the throne and take precedent over my own. And the reason I think that's so relevant and important is most of all of our anxieties deal with our kingdom, my own kingdom. And by that, I just mean my desires, my wills, my wants. your desires for your kids, for your life, for your wants. They don't deal with God's kingdom.

And in life, the will of God unfolds in two ways. As Christians, we know, there's the Bible. That's kind of like the revealed will of God. And we can read it and go like, oh, this is what God wants for marriage, you know, sexuality, parents, and money. Then there's the unrevealed will of God that can, that's basically God's sovereignty unfolding in our life. And what Jesus says, the reason I think it's so profound is he basically says,

Hey, if you can learn to surrender your will, your kingdom, and embrace gods, even when it contradicts your own, you will experience peace. You getting everything you want in life is not possible. And like you said, we kind of want the promise that like everything's going to be okay. Everything's always going to go the way that I want, which is crazy because if you've lived five minutes, you know not everything will always go the way that I want. So getting everything that I want is not possible. but peace is.

So I can either not have everything always go the way that I want and have anxiety because I don't surrender it and I hold it tightly and I clinch onto it. Or I can not have everything that I want and have peace. Having everything I want is not an option. But peace is. And I think Jesus brilliantly brings back, like I said, in 20 verses before Matthew chapter 6, he uses the same word of kingdom and will. Or he says, this is how you should pray.

Your kingdom come. will be done. Yeah. And Jesus models, furthermore, what it looks like to embrace or seek God's kingdom first, God's will first. When in the garden in Mark chapter 14, Jesus was faced with overwhelming feelings, and he's anxious or he's overwhelmed at the point of grief and sorrow. And he prays a prayer that really reflects, I think that's surrendering your kingdom and seeking gods, where he says, God, please let this cut past. In other words, I don't want to die. Please let my kids not get sick or something happened to their health, but not my will, but yours be done. And he releases or surrenders that. And I think the more we can get in the habit of, there was a time

where our daughter was flagged with a chromosonal disorder when we were pregnant. So we found out we were not, no, 12 weeks pregnant. This was in December. It was a Wednesday night. We were pumped and we get a phone call from the doctor at 9.30. Which immediately you know, like doctors don't call at 930 on a Wednesday just to be like, hey, holiday plans. I mean, it's hard to even get in touch with them most of the time. So if they're calling you, it's like, oh. Yes, exactly. And I walk into the room.

My wife, she's clearly on the phone, puts it on speaker and is like, hey, it's the doctor about the baby. And the doctor. So would you all have just had like the blood test that you do around 10 weeks? How long had it been between that test and when the doctor calls? I guess it was like a week. Okay. Maybe two weeks. So y'all were kind of waiting on the gender and things like that.

Exactly. Okay. Like waiting, hey, we're pumped and you normally get an envelope and you go put it in a cupcake or whatever, the color, you know, gender stuff. And she says, hey, I wanted you to know you're having a daughter. And the reason we know you're having a daughter is because she's been flagged for a chromosonal disorder that is unique to girls. And if she has it, there's a 99% chance that she will die before she gets out of the room.

And if she's in the one. 1% that makes it, then she will have severe complications with her health. She'll have to have immediate heart surgery or heart transplant. And she'll never be able to have kids, be able to have kids, and have complications for the rest of her life. Wow. And it was like, honestly, I get emotional to talk about it because it was like a bomb went off. You're like, that those scenes and movies when a bomb goes off and all you hear is the ringing

and things feel like they're speed up and slow down at the same time. Yeah. And that put us on a job. journey of praying every day, God, we don't want our daughter to die for the next six months. God, will you please let her daughter live? Will you please let her daughter live? And it was in that season, you know, I wish I as a pastor could say every moment of that season of some of the highest levels of anxiety I've ever felt was one that, you know, we surrendered and gave him to God and had peace. And I can't with integrity. But what I can say is every moment I had peace was.

every moment that I had peace, in other words, was marked by a posture of God, we don't want our daughter to die. But if that's your will, and I can understand how that would be your will and how that could be something that is a part of your plan. But if that's your will, we trust you,

or we're trying to trust you. We help us trust you. And every moment that was the posture of our heart. There was a peace that I can't put into words that I experienced what Paul was describing. And it's not like you're going or we were going to thwart the will of God either way. and so freaking out wasn't helpful.

It's natural and normal, but in those moments of surrendering it, we experience peace. And then six months later, either miraculously or there was a false flagging and she was healthy, but that doesn't always happen. And sometimes the flagging is accurate

or sometimes the miracle doesn't happen. And that's going to happen in life. So she didn't have that disorder. And y'all didn't find out until she was born? We couldn't without, there's a test, you may know it, There's a test they can do with a needle that increases the risk of...

Yeah, or they test the amniotic fluid or something like that. Yeah, it was something that would increase... Yeah, the rate of miscarriage. And so we didn't want to do that. Yeah. And so they couldn't test until she was out of the womb. And so every day, though, we were in... The more we went through it and the more we saw...

That's a long time to have those fears and to feel the unknown. Yes. And I think God, I taught on this subject so many times before. But in that season, God was at least grown in my heart and my faith, my confidence in him, and putting into practice the things that I had taught on. It just becomes so much more real when you're like, God, man, we don't want our daughter to die. But we trust you. And your will comes before my will, your kingdom before my kingdom. And I can't understand how that would be the case. But if that's true, we trust you. And so I think even the word of control, because it feels so hard to give up control, is improperly used a lot of times and that we talk about it as though it's something we have. People say, I struggle with control. I've said, I struggle with control. And the reason that's, I think, not a great way to put it is it's like saying I struggle with X-ray vision. You know, my kids will be like, and my son will push over his. sister and he'll go like, Dad, I'm sorry, I struggle with Hulk strength. Yeah. It's like, no, no, you don't. You've never had Hulk strength. You'll never have Hulk strength. Or me saying, I struggle with X-ray vision. No, you don't. You've never had it and you never will. Yeah. And control is one of those things where even we say, I struggle with control with control. It's like, no, you struggle with not having control. Yeah. You've never had it. You want it. You want it. Yeah. And but you'll never have it.

And so having control is not an option, but peace is because you know the God who does have control. Yeah. So that was by far the most real experience of that in our life. And so what you're saying is the surrender was a continual thing that it didn't just say, okay, I surrendered this morning, I'm good for the day. Or even I surrendered for this minute and I'm good for the minute that it sometimes it had to be a continual Holy Spirit empowered choice to say, I'm feeling anxious, I've got to surrender.

It wasn't a one and done deal. Yes. Which is why Jesus is teaching, I think is so brilliant. because in the passage, you know, we're talking about Matthew 6 and surrendering and seeking God's kingdom. The next verse he goes to is take each day moment by moment, day by day, you're going to continue to have to do this. Yeah. And it doesn't just go away. Yeah.

And it is an ongoing moment by moment surrender. Anxiety will be with us the rest of our life. And to go through and take each day and surrender moment by moment is really the way that we battle it. Yeah. Because it isn't just like, oh, I surrendered my kids to you. Yeah. We go through life and then, boom, I'm anxious again about those feelings. Yeah.

But each time they happen, I can choose to, God, I surrender your will, your kingdom before my own. Yeah. And he is not saying that if you don't have anxiety or you're not worried about something, then you're not going to have any trouble because he says sufficient for the day is its own trouble. He's saying, look, you got trouble. Like, I get it. You have trouble. You have problems.

But you can only deal with what you can deal with today. You can't deal with the trouble. that may or may not happen tomorrow. And I think one of the most comforting things that he also says in that chapter is, who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? That is super convicting. Because if I'm honest with myself,

that is kind of what I think that I'm doing when I'm thinking through these what if scenarios. I actually think that I'm, and maybe it is somewhat preparation, like you were saying, playing out those, you know, logical conclusions of my anxieties. But I almost think that if I worry about something or if I think about something as terrible as cancer,

then somehow it's not going to happen because, I don't know, that's so superstitious and silly. But I do think that we almost think that we are giving control to ourselves by thinking of all of these things that could happen. Somehow we are diminishing the possibility of them happening. And Jesus is like, you can't even add a single hour. not one hour is added to your life by worrying, which tells us, you know, God is the author of our beginning and end. So what's the point? What's the point of even trying to add minutes to our lives, to our kids' lives, even a minute to our careers, whatever it is, if we just don't even have the authority to do that in the first place. Yes. In fact, the irony of the brilliance of that

statement, to your point is, you know, now medicine and medical fields tell us worrying doesn't add to your life, if anything, it takes away. Yeah. Like Charles Mayo from the Mayo Clinic wrote about, I've never seen somebody die from symptoms related to overwork, but I've seen many people die from symptoms related to anxiety. It affects your adrenal glands. It affects your heart rate. It affects all those things.

And so it is brilliant that Jesus is just pointing out, let's at least all agree. Worrying is not beneficial to anything in the future. It just robs you of your ability to be present to, you know, in this moment. here. So I think, yeah, you're spot on in that idea. Yeah. Wow. All right. I think that we have to end there, although I could talk for a lot longer about this. If people want to know more, if they want to hear more from you, or if they want to read your book, which I certainly encourage everyone to do, where can they buy it? Anywhere books are sold, Amazon, Barnes & Noble. Do you buy books anywhere about Amazon? Oh, I really want to say that I purchase books from like the local indie bookstore.

Yeah, yeah. But I don't. Yes. I, uh, Jeff Bezos, um, you know, lines his pockets with all of my book purchases from Amazon. It's just the easiest thing to do. I totally agree, but there's a niche. I've said that before. I was like, does anyone who buy books other than it? And, uh, I've heard from so many people that are like, yes, I want the physical copy that moment that day. So if that's you, you can get a Barnes & Noble or wherever books are sold. it's on Christianbooks.com too, which is maybe a good alternative. Yes, that's a better alternative, Christianbooks.com. And then if you want to know more about the porch, you can go to the porch. Dot Live if you are in any of the 15 cities, whether that's Phoenix, Arizona, or Tulsa, Oklahoma, or Boise,

Idaho, or any, you can go to the Porto Live and find locations near you or if you're in Dallas, come see us on a Tuesday. But, Ali, so fun to be here. Thank you for having me. Thank you. Thank you so much for coming on. Hey, this is Steve Deast. If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort. We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over

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