I want to share something I wrote in my journal after a Lectio Divina session a few months ago. Lectio Divina is a way of prayerfully reading a short passage of scripture, reflecting on it, and allowing God to speak to you through it. I’m sharing this not because I think I have some great insight but in the hopes it might help someone else.
The Passage
Mark 9:30–37 (RSVCE)
30 They went on from there and passed through Galilee. And he would not have anyone know it 31for he was teaching his disciples, saying to them, “The Son of man will be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him; and when he is killed, after three days he will rise.” 32But they did not understand the saying, and they were afraid to ask him.”
When reflecting on this passage, the phrase that stood out most to me was “they were afraid to ask him.” The more I reflected on this the more I realized that the reason it stood out to me is that I too have been afraid of asking him. What follows is my journal entry.
The Journal Entry
I am often afraid. My husband once said I operate out of a place of fear. He isn’t wrong. Anxiety is often my default reaction to any changing situation, the suggestion of changing situation, or an unknown situation. This also affects my relationship with God. I am often afraid to listen to what he might want me to do because I am afraid it might be something that makes me uncomfortable. I imagine the most uncomfortable situations. I catastrophize even what I think God might call me to do even though he’s never called me to do anything that hasn’t been of my benefit.
I’m just always afraid of the worst-case scenario even when it hasn’t happened. I need to learn to trust in God. I know intellectually that he wants what is best for me and listening to him is always to my benefit. I need to internalize that knowledge and live it.
It’s hard and I know I can’t do it alone. But I am not alone. I need to write down the times I’ve followed God and the benefits that came of it. I should also write down the times I had anxiety and didn’t trust but God was faithful and my anxiety was unfounded.
Further Reflection
The more I think about this passage and what I wrote, the more it occurs to me that my anxiety might also be a way of knowing what earthly things I’m too attached to. What am I afraid of losing by doing whatever God may ask of me. My house? My comfort? My pets? My job? My spouse? My family? And yes, all those things have occurred to me at one point or another. As I said, I can really go down a rabbit hole of worst-case-scenario thinking. But let’s for a moment think that the worst-case in my brain happens? What then? Well, it would result in some suffering on my part. It would be hard. But is there any level of suffering that God can’t reward with even greater joy? No, there isn’t. God can either reward those who follow him in this life if he chooses but most certainly will in the next life. And isn’t that, as Christians, where our focus is supposed to be? Everything in this world is fleeting and will pass away. For as John said in his Apocalypse:
3and I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself will be with them; 4he will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.”
Revelation 21:3-4 (RSVCE)
So, what have I to fear after all?
Final Thoughts
I do not claim that now I am suddenly over this anxiety. I’m not. There’s a vast difference between me understanding intellectually that I need not fear and me living that out. I’m a work in progress and aren’t we all. Thank God that he sent his Holy Spirit to work in us and it isn’t all up to us.