In Chapter 4 (“Woe, Be Gone”) of Fearless, Max Lucado tells the story of a friend’s 6 year old daughter rushing to get dressed for school. In her hurry, she tied her shoelaces in a knot. With the school bus coming and the clock ticking, her thoughts were so focused on untangling the knot in her shoes that she didn’t notice her father standing nearby, ready and willing to help. Angry and exasperated, her tears began to flow freely.
A ministry downsizing or position loss has the potential to produce numerous worries: How will I pay my bills? How long will I be underemployed? Will I ever have another ministry? The danger with such worries, Max notes, is that what begins as legitimate concern morphs into toxic panic. The Amplified Bible’s translation of Matthew 6:35 refers to this phenomenon as “being perpetually uneasy”.
Max Lucado goes on to describe “the continuous mind-set that dismisses God’s presence. Destructive anxiety subtracts from the future, faces uncertainties with no faith, tallies up the challenges of the day without entering God into the equation. Worry is the darkroom where negatives become glossy prints.”
Our heavenly Father is standing by, ready to help us. All we need to do is ask.
