1 Peter 5:6-7–Humble Yourselves and Cast Your Anxieties

1 Peter 5:6-7: "Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time He may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on Him, because He cares for you."

Perhaps the most difficult task for humans as well as one of the most essential is the task of humbling one's self.  The very idea itself can sometimes be a humiliating proposition.  It is thus ironic that there is nothing more liberating and more empowering than humbling yourself and laying your anxieties on Christ.  This is the task for Christians.  It is our call, that we would humble ourselves before the Holy Lord as we cast our worries upon the Lord.  But it turns out that this is, in actuality, a simple task when we place Christ upon the throne of our lives.  Let us then strive to humble ourselves with all sincerity and devotion.

Relying on the Lord in times of Fear

Jonathan and Susan had been married for over a decade when Jonathan was offered a promotion from his company.  The Job was considerably more salary and benefits, and was simply too-good to refuse.  Unfortunately, the new position required Jonathan to be traveling three or four days a week.  Although they were apprehensive, after some prayer and counsel, it became clear that God had prepared this career move for the family and Jonathan accepted the position.

For the next several months, Susan had began to grow accustomed to Jonathan being away, though she still missed him greatly when he was on the road.  She would feed the children and put them to bed, always remembering to say prayers.  She had never felt unsafe or unprotected when Jonathan was away, because Susan knew that God was watching over the family.

One night, when Jonathan was away, Susan woke up in a dreadful fear.  She glanced at the clock, which read: 2:00.  She couldn't understand why, but she was simply rigid with fear.  Susan, though an adult, pulled the covers over her head and said a brief but earnest prayer for relief and for protection from her prayers.  She prayed that God would not allow any evil to injure her or her family.  She breathed a couple deep breaths and drifted back to sleep.

When she woke up in the morning, she went downstairs to brew herself a cup of coffee.  She peered out her window and across her lawn to see a police squad car parked in the street in front of her house.  She closed her robe and walked outside to see the neighbor girl who babysat the family's children running towards her.  The teenage girl was so excited that she could barely speak but Susan could pick out that a burglar had robbed three houses on the block last night but that they had caught him.

Susan walked over to the police officer and, after exchanging pleasantries, Susan asked the officer for some clarification of the previous night's foray.  The officer shared that indeed three of her neighbors had been robbed last night and that her house had almost been robbed too but not to fear because they had caught the burglar.  Susan was startled by that and asked for more information.  

The police man said that the burglar had made it to her house after he had robbed the other houses and was about to break her in through the side window when, suddenly, the burglar suffered a minor cardiac arrest and passed out on the ground outside of her house.  She was astonished and asked the officer when that happened. The officer looked at her and said, "Oh, about 2 o'clock."

God had saved Susan's family.  Her prayer had been efficacious and God protected her and her family.  This is incredibly scriptural.  The writer of Hebrews, quoting Psalm 118, writes: "So we can confidentially say, 'the Lord is my helper; I shall not fear; what can man do to me?'"  If, when faced with fear and gripping trepidations, we would turn to God for our support, we will always find that God is there.  Although the above example may seem a bit far-fetched, it is a true story.  God is our fortress and our shield, our ever-present help in times of trouble and need (Psa. 46:1).  Let us then turn to Him when we feel uneasy with fear and find comfort in the shadow of His might!

Carrying One Stick of Trouble at a Time

John Newton, a sailor and clergyman during the 18th century, has a wonderful analogy of worry and anxiety worth paraphrasing:

All the worries and troubles of an entire year of life are life a giant pile of sticks. And each day, God hands us a single stick to carry for the entirety of the day.  At the end of each day we return to God and return the stick to him.  The next day, we wake up and God hands us another stick.  Each day has its own stick, not more and not less than we can handle.  Occasionally, we come to God and we ask him to hand us today's stick and tomorrow's, and by the end of the day we seem tired and beaten but we return again to God to give him back the sticks.  And some days, we feel haughty and sure so we ask for a week's worth of sticks.  And though God warns us, he hands us the sticks and tells us that he will be there to help us if we can't handle the sticks.  We turn to God, smile, and proceed to take from him the sticks, tie them into a wide bundle, throw the bundle over our backs and leave for our day.  At first, the bundle seems only annoyingly heavy but as the day bears on, the sticks begin to weigh on us as an ever-growing burden.  Thus, by the end of the day, we can barely move and each step feels like a trudge throw the deepest of mired bogs until we finally collapse under the weight of bundle.  As we lay there, beaten under the force of our own troubles bundled beyond our ability to care for them, God comes up behind us and picks the overwhelming bundle of sticks off us us with ease and helps us back to our feet.

The point is that, though our natural inclination is to take on today's, tomorrow's, and next week's challenges and worries, God has ordained that we should not take on more than what we can handle, for each day has enough trouble for itself (Matt. 6:34), and we should only attempt to take on that which God has placed before us for the moment.  God desires that we, in humility, press into Him to cover and care for our troubles and our worries.  Let us then do so with consistency, clinging to Him to preserve us when we would rather pick up the bundle of troubles and to be reminded to carry one stick of trouble at a time.