From "Heart of the Matter"...a daily devotional
Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul; (1 Peter 2:11 KJV)
...How does anxiety misfire? Anxiety can serve a useful function when it alerts us to trouble and drives us to bring those troubles to God. But usually anxiety is also part of the trouble. First, we overreact to real trouble. Second, we become upset about things that ought not to trouble us. In both cases, our bad anxiety reaction reveals what is really going on in our hearts. In every situation where you feel sinfully anxious, you believe something is threatening your world. Your world feels out of control; you are afraid something bad might happen; and you are trying to control your world to keep that bad thing from taking place. How do you respond when you don’t get what you want? Or when you get what you don’t want? Are you full of fear, anxiety, and worry? Do you have trouble sleeping? Do you become obsessed with your problem? Does your mind go over your troubles again and again? All of these responses give you a window into your heart. They help you see which of your hopes, dreams, and wishes you have organized your life around. They tell you what it is that you believe you can’t do without. They let you know which of your desires has become your master. The Bible has a very graphic phrase for those desires. It calls them the “lusts of our flesh” (Ephesians 2:3; 1 Peter 2:11 nasb).~David Rowlison
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