By A Thread

Anxiety: (n.) a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome.

Anxiety has never been what I would call a theme in my life. Those of you who know me would probably label me as a pretty easy-going person. I have never really been one to stress about my grades, or get worked up about having too much to do. Truth be told, I’ve never really felt like I’ve had more on my plate than I could handle, so naturally I wouldn’t feel like anything was out of my control. However, that has not been the case over the past few weeks.

Since returning to school after fall break, I have felt increasingly more overwhelmed each day. Classes have reached the point where the word “final exam” is mentioned with regularity, and the end of the semester assignments are starting to roll in. I have started a new job where I work 15-20 hours a week between Thursday and Saturday. I am currently about 3 weeks away from a $4000 fundraising deadline that I am nowhere close to meeting, and I am trying to find time to submit transfer applications and prepare for six of my next eight months overseas. All of this, coupled with the usual stress of being a college student attempting to salvage some kind of social life and be involved with a campus ministry has left me feeling like I am woefully unable to keep up with everything that my life demands.

In the midst of reading this, I know what you’re probably thinking. “Just let go, and let God” right? It’s that simple. Just remember that He is in control of everything and stop worrying about it.

That’s what I tried to tell myself for a while, but I was still faced everyday with more than I could handle, and nobody responsible for it but me. I could do all of the hoping and praying and quoting verses I wanted to but at the end of the day I still had exams to study for, papers to write, a job to go to and fundraising to worry about. It was still all up to me, and I had to find a way to get it done.

This mindset drove me deeper and deeper into a state of panic. I found myself staying up late every night working on assignments, and rolling out of bed the next morning with just enough time to shower and leave for class. I felt like I had no time for anything. Friends would ask to hang out and I would either decline, or feel guilty about wasting time doing something that wasn’t productive. I was finding myself deviating from my usual extroverted personality and becoming increasingly more withdrawn. Not only was I feeling like I had too much to handle, but I was retreating from the only people that were able to help.

This continued for a few weeks. I was still going to church and meeting with groups of guys to talk about spiritual things, but I felt somehow distant from it all. In those setting I often feel as though I’m supposed to “have it all together”. I’m having conversations with guys that are asking for advice, or being asked to do things to help others and I feel trapped in this battle between presenting this façade of having everything under control while struggling to make it through the day without breaking down. Still, I did the only thing I knew how and just kept on going.

One of these weekly gatherings that I attended was a meeting with my d-group. This is a time where we get together and share with each other about our struggles, and take some time to share what we have learned in the Word from the week before.

The guys in my group are all very solid guys that I respect a lot, so naturally I don’t want to admit that I’m going through something that I can’t handle. (I know intrinsically that this is completely contradictory to the entire purpose of these meetings, yet that seems to be my mindset each week.)

For this group, our college pastor asks us to read a chapter or two out of John, and then pick something out and share it with the group.

Before this particular meeting I hadn’t had a quiet time since before we had met the previous week, but I still opened up to the book of John about an hour before we were set to meet and quickly skimmed the assigned chapter to find a tidbit to share with the guys because that’s what I always do. It just so happened that this week, I was in John chapter 7. As I was flipping through the chapter, there was a particular verse that caught me eye:

“If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ ” (verse 37-38)

I won’t lie to you, a large part of the reason that this section caught me eye is because Jesus said it and I have one of those Bibles where the words of Jesus are in red. However, I couldn’t help but feel as though God himself was at my tiny kitchen table with me, speaking these words to me himself.

I read them over and over again. It’s so simple; “Are you thirsty?” he asks, “then come to me and drink”. That’s it. He never says “then clean yourself up and then come to me” or “go to this place and you will find water”. No, He simply states that the solution to our thirst is simply to go to Him and our thirst will be quenched.

It’s incredible to me that I can know all of the things that I have been taught about God, and yet I forget the simple things like this. In the midst of this season where I found myself growing more and more thirsty each day, I forgot to take the time to simply to go to Jesus and ask for a drink. All too often it’s my time in the Word that is the first to go when my schedule starts to get “too busy” and yet, it’s the only thing that I can do that promises to fill me up every day instead of leave me feeling drained.

As I thought about these verses, I couldn’t help but think of the first part of Psalm 63. It says:

1 O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you;

my soul thirsts for you;

my flesh faints for you,

as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.

2 So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary,

beholding your power and glory.

3 Because your steadfast love is better than life,

my lips will praise you.

4 So I will bless you as long as I live;

in your name I will lift up my hands.

This is my favorite Psalm because in it, David is in the wilderness of Judah. He is struggling to find food and water to meet his physical needs, and yet he is made even more aware of his soul’s yearning for spiritual nourishment. He realizes that even more than our bodies crave to be fed do our souls yearn to be filled with the word of God and the power of the Spirit.

My prayer is that you and I would be able to recognize the same things in ourselves each day. Though it’s easy to feel overwhelmed with the pressures of life, I can tell you first hand that the only lasting relief can be found in the rest that Christ provides. Even when I feel as though I can’t make it through another day, Christ reminds me that He is the true desire of my heart and there is nothing else that will satisfy that yearning for Him.

The same thing is true for you so I challenge you, find time today to feed your soul’s desire to spiritual fulfillment, and continue to do so everyday and then let me know if you still feel as though you can’t make it through.