It’s amazing to me how quickly one stray thought can turn to worry, worry turns to full-tilt panic, and full-tilt panic turns to upheaval, disturbance, and unrest. And when we get restless and freaked out, all we want to do is act. Of course, what exactly we want to act on is impossible to distinguish or decipher, but in the moment, that face seems entirely irrelevant.
There is one thought worming its way through what could otherwise be a wonderful, fertile mind. The disturbing part of it all is that one worm quickly splits, splinters, and replicates itself like a flatworm from hell. Each replicant disguises itself just slightly based on its focus, quietly coercing us to act in some new topic or frustration. Each slippery deception digs deep into our thoughts, until we finally snap from the sheer, overwhelming pressure of one million worries and anxieties somehow pulling us into three million different directions. And suddenly, we snap, in whatever way seems best at the time. Yet, it never has to go that far.
If you traced it back, one million hellish lies were born out of one single worry. That one single worry was the bastard progeny of one stray thought. Of course, it’s impossible to see that in the moment. No, in that specific instant, it tends to feel like you’ve found yourself juggling a thousand vials of nitroglycerine. With each catch, you try to throw the vial just a bit higher and farther from you, in the hope that you’ll have just a little more time to wait before you have to catch that same vial again, which will hopefully give you just a fraction of a second longer to focus on the other three vials that are falling all too quickly to the ground beneath your feet. All the while, there is the unsettling knowledge that if anyone of those vials were to make contact with the ground or the other vials, everything would explode and you would most certainly die.
Some might council you that its best to focus on the apex of the vial’s path, which is to say that you ought to look just beyond your worries and concerns because certainly someday, you’ll have everything under control and you’ll be able to set each vial down gently, one at a time and your troubles will surely be behind you. I tend to disagree. It’s of no use to set your hopes on some fictitious day in the “near future” when your worries will cease. That day will simply never come. Such “wisdom” also negates the fact that there’s some vicious jerk in a jester’s hat slipping extra vials into your hand at best. At worst, he’s actually slipping in a chainsaw or two.
No, forget that entirely ill-conceived plan. It sounds like wisdom and feigns comfort, but it’s frankly moronic advice that’s simply not grounded in reality. Instead, I choose plan B. I can’t take credit for inventing this plan, but I’ve found that it works well.
Rather than painstakingly snatching each vial out of the air and gently hurling it skyward, just stop. Take a deep breath. Count to three. And take a step back.
As painful as that seems, I have found that the moments when I do simply remove myself from all the anxious, chaotic striving in my life, I suddenly see clearly and realize that nothing is as it seems.
What once looked like glass tubes of highly-volatile, liquid explosive are actually just pebbles. That chainsaw that the sly, little jerk slipped into your hands is just a baseball. And that jerk is just a malicious, little devil intent on keeping you distracted from what really matters. And you watch as all those pebbles fall to the ground with, surprisingly, a modicum of beauty. The baseball bounces a few times there with the rest and suddenly, it strikes you that nothing exploded and nobody died. Then you turn to that Man that’s been beside you all along and as He smiles at you, your heart starts to slow back to its regular rhythm. He grabs the baseball from your feet and pegs that demon in the head, rendering it completely unconscious.
He leans in and whispers in your ear, “Shhh. I’ve got it under control, remember? I’m the One that created this world. I’m the One that fed five thousand. I’m the One that walked on water. And I’m the One that died and rose again. I can handle this.”
Suddenly, there is peace and quiet confidence welling up from some unknown spring deep within your soul. The storm is gone and now there is simply calm. You grab the pebbles from the ground and place them in His scarred hands.
Looking again into His eyes, you smile, knowing that everything is under control. Everything that so distracted you just moments before is insignificant. The only thing that really matters is this Man standing before you.
He takes your hands and leads you back to the path you can’t even remember straying from and you laugh. Sure, you’re leaving behind all the things that you’ve put so much energy into. But, you remember that it wasn’t worth all that pain and distress. You remember that He never asked you to become a professional juggler. And besides, you never really like the circus in the first place.
Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I will say, rejoice! Let your gentleness be known to all men. The Lord is at hand. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard you hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. – Philippians 4:4-7
