Can you add even one hour to your life by worrying?<\/p>\n
–Matthew 6:27<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Observation:<\/h2>\n
Uh- NO!<\/p>\n
This one is super straight-forward. I don’t know that a restate is needed. But I’ll try: Does worry help solve any problems?<\/p>\n
I might have changed the meaning a bit with my try, but I think the point remains: Worry does not make things better. Worry does not solve problems.<\/p>\n
Application:<\/h2>\n
So what do we do?<\/p>\n
Just ignore problems and challenges and just rejoice in the day the Lord has made as I wrote about a few days ago?<\/p>\n
No. I don’t think so.<\/p>\n
Yes, we are to seek joy and rejoice. Yes, we are to see challenges we face and that others face.<\/p>\n
But we are to do more than just wallow and worry.<\/p>\n
We can seek reliable counsel. We can take action. We can change our outlook.<\/p>\n
Yes, I am faced with challenges daily. Some are doozies, some are minor. In all cases, though, I DO have the power to change my response to the things which might cause worry.<\/p>\n
And I do have the power to look at the situations, size them up, make a course of action and move forward.<\/p>\n
Prayer:<\/h2>\n
Oh, Father, you know I need you big time.<\/p>\n
There’s stuff swirling about which is troubling me. Some of it I can control but most of it I cannot. And it is frustrating and painful to experience.<\/p>\n
Thank you so much for reminding me that it is not the worry that will solve the dilemmas and help the situation. Thank you for reminding me that YOU’ve got this. I should seek you and listen to you and take action in that way. And sometimes that action is just working diligently\u00a0in changing my outlook and response.<\/p>\n
Show me what I can change and how to change those things and also give me the wisdom to see what is out of my hands and let those aspects go.<\/p>\n
I trust you, God.<\/p>\n
I love you, God.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Dear reader, \u00a0hope you don’t mind my vague references here. Some stuff just needs to stay private. I bet you understand that, but I still wanted to apologize and explain.<\/p>\n
Okay, with that being said….<\/p>\n
A few things to think about:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nWhen things trouble you, what do you do about them?<\/p>\n
If you worry, how can you re-frame that energy?<\/p>\n
What can you do to add an hour to your life?<\/p>\n
What can you do to enjoy the hours you have?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Thanks, again, for reading along with me. I hope these daily SOAP devotionals, mediations are a great part of your day, too.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Are there any benefits to worry? I honestly don’t think there are. Yet so often I can allow worry to take over my thoughts and steal my joy. What good is that? Let’s take a look at what the Bible has to say about worry. Again. (Um, is there a reason I got this verse […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16396,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16397","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-soap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16397"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16397\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16399,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16397\/revisions\/16399"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/img_8274.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n