What are your plans for this summer?

What are your plans for this summer?

"Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you." 1 Peter 5:7

What is your first reaction to this verse? Maybe... "easier said than done!"

As I looked at this verse, it seemed that the scales, with anxiety on one side and care on the other, were not evenly balanced but tipping severely to the side of anxiety. The anxieties, the worries, the troubles that we have can be heavy and immense. On the other side of the scales, care, meaning "to feel concern or interest, to look after" somehow doesn't seem equally matched in weight to our worries. It seems light-weight.

But God tells us to cast our anxieties on Him. A definition of cast is to throw or discard. There is no attachment to something that we throw. God tells us to put our anxieties on Him. The word care may seem light-weight but God is not. He is sufficient to deal with our worries.

We tend to look after and take care of our anxieties. We nurture them, we revisit them in the morning when we wake and constantly throughout the day. And when, and if, we do bring them to God, we question God's ability to care for us.

In Mark 4:35-41 we read a story of how Jesus, asleep, was with his disciples in a boat during a storm. The disciples wake Jesus saying "don't you care if we drown?" In Luke 10:38-42

Martha is overwhelmed with preparations for entertaining Jesus in her home, without the help of her sister. Martha asks Jesus "don't you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself?" Isn't that how we feel sometimes - "Don't you care God, that I'm so worried, concerned... that I'm going through this?"

But, Martha and the disciples did cast their anxieties on Jesus. We too should put our anxieties on Him too. In Philippians 4:6 it says "Do not be anxious about anything but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God".

Sometimes it takes practice and most likely it will take more than one prayer. When you feel the anxiety rising - pray. But also find a special place where you can quietly spend time with God. Read Matthew 6:6 (The Message). Begin the communication with God and let Him do His work in you. The verse following Philippians 4:6 tells us that when we pray we will receive peace from God. Philippians 4:7

Read Philippians 4:6-7 in The Message paraphrase: "Don't fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God's wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It's wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life."

Practice "casting" this summer.