Anxious about the future? This might just help…

With everything that’s happened so far this year, many of us feel worried about the future. Perhaps you’ve been poorly, lost loved ones, struggled with your mental health in isolation or panicked about how you’re going to stay afloat financially. Whatever’s going through your mind, let’s turn to God’s word for some answers…

Do you trust him?

During this season we will really find out where our trust lies. Does it rest in the hands of our employers, our doctors, our government… or with our creator? Obviously, it’s important to follow the latest health and safety laws and to keep the risk of spreading the disease to an absolute minimum. But just as David trusted God when he was fleeing from Saul, and Daniel trusted God in the lion’s den, your circumstances don’t have to define your destiny. Proverbs 3:5-6 says:

Trust in the Lord with all your heart,

    and do not lean on your own understanding.

In all your ways acknowledge him,

    and he will make straight your paths.

He will make a way

It’s not always easy to trust when everything seems so bleak, but when there appears to be no way out God’s amazing love and provision is repeatedly demonstrated. Remind yourself of times when you trusted him in the past and he came through for you. Believe that he can open doors that appear to be firmly closed. He brought the Israelites through the Red Sea on dry land and took Joseph from slave and prisoner to head of a nation. He can make a way for you. Isaiah 43:16-19 says:

Behold, I am doing a new thing;

    now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?

I will make a way in the wilderness

    and rivers in the desert.

His ways are better than ours!

Often we try to puzzle things out in our own minds, scrabbling around for solutions that just aren’t there. This can lead to disappointment, disillusionment and even despair. Isaiah 55:8-9 says: 

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

    neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth,

    so are my ways higher than your ways

    and my thoughts than your thoughts.

Tell him what you’re going through and ask for his wisdom at this difficult time. Ask him to reveal his heart to you. Just as he spoke face to face with Moses on the mountain and audibly to Samuel in his bedroom, God can minister to you right where you are.

Believe that he is able to meet your needs

Read stories of those in the Bible who saw God’s protection and provision in practice, for example Ruth and Esther. Think about the way Jesus paid his taxes with the help of a fish, and the way Elijah obtained his loaf of bread from the widow who had nothing. Matthew 6:26-30 says:

Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

Remember that he has the power to calm the storm, make the sick well and even to raise the dead. If you’re still feeling anxious, make Ephesians 3:20-21 your prayer in the coming days, weeks and months:

Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.