Stress and the Bible

I had this thought when I was reading through Psalms the other day: My stress and my worries are often slightly out of perspective. The Psalms are some of my favorite passages in the Bible because of how emotionally transparent the writers were. These guys were completely unchained when they bring their thoughts and feelings before God. I’m not really good at that. Sometimes I think that if I were just half as real with God about my feelings as the psalmists were, I would have a much easier time trusting and understanding Him.

Back to my initial point, stress. Lately (as in the past 10 months) I have felt the weight of very real life things–many of which revolve around money–that I have not ever experienced before. Stress, aside from being from being unavoidable and largely undesirable, is an interesting phenomenon. It has the power to push a person into abnormal behavior, usually to compensate for the collective “wtf” that the body is expressing at the given moment. I do many things to counterbalance stress, some good and some probably not so good, but rarely do I ever just take my emotions straight to God, and have Him work them out for/with me. This realization totally floored me when I was reading Psalm 11 the other day. Check out how legit David is…

1 In the LORD I take refuge.
How then can you say to me:
“Flee like a bird to your mountain.

2 For look, the wicked bend their bows;
they set their arrows against the strings
to shoot from the shadows
at the upright in heart.

3 When the foundations are being destroyed,
what can the righteous do?”

I’m pretty sure that bows and arrows aren’t metaphors for overdue rent payments or IRS woes, but that David actually means people were trying to kill him. Literally. Right then. Or maybe a few hours prior. Sure there is some room for contextual differences, but what struck me is that he still went to God first. Every time. No matter what.  Can you imagine some of those prayers?  “Hey God, there’s a 9-foot Philistine solider killing half of the army.. but I know you will take care of me” or “Hey God, 95% of my friends just decided to hate/betray me and run me out of my house/city… but I still love you”  And my personal favorite: “Hey God, I’ve been starving in a cave for the last three days and there is an army waiting to painfully end my life as soon as they find me… but I still trust you”  His peace is still in the Lord and the Psalms usually end with some sort of worship or hope.  And certainly humbling, especially since I’m so quick to dip down into something that isn’t God at the first sign of unrest.  David, you are definitely the man.

The Psalms are great because not only are they really easy to connect with on a basic human level, but they also pull you out of your own selfish worldview really quickly.  Something I know that I need as often as possible.  Check ‘em out sometime.  Here are some of my favorites. 38 42 51 61 119

Have a great day.  Been too long since I’ve posted.  I’ll try to be better at that this summer.

Morningmusic: Bon Iver – Beach Baby