How Can a Person Win Over Worry?

Q: Worry has always been an enemy for me, but my husband doesn’t worry or show any emotion, and this worries me. How can a person win over this unwelcome companion? — W.A.

A: Almost no emotion is as common as worry. Most of our worries concern things that will never happen, or else things we cannot change. Jesus said, “[Who] of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life’s span?” (Luke 12:25, NASB). Someone once said, “Worry is the interest paid on trouble before it comes due.”

Trust is one answer to anxiety. Let’s cast our care on the Lord remembering that He is our salvation also in the time of trouble, and this is a continuing process. We aren’t only to take our burdens to the Lord; we are to leave them there.

A poet once wrote:

Said the robin to the sparrow, / I should really like to know,

Why these anxious human beings / Rush about and worry so.

Said the sparrow to the robin, / Friend, I think that it must be,

That they have no heavenly Father / Such as cares for you and me.

Jesus used the carefree attitude of the birds to underscore the fact that worrying is unnatural. “Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?” (Matthew 6:26).

He went on and spoke of the lilies of the field. “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these” (Matthew 6:28-29).

Since He cares for tiny birds and frail flowers, we can count on Jesus Christ for every aspect of our lives.

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(This column is based on the words and writings of the late Rev. Billy Graham.)

(c)2020 BILLY GRAHAM DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.