12.10.23 Willisburg Bulletin
Are You Stressed?
“Your eyes were bigger than your stomach,” my mother gently scolded as I brought her my half-filled plate. This was a frequent occurrence at the big family get-togethers in our home. The meal was potluck. Only, with all the noise and excitement and chatter, most of my food would go untouched. The dishes were gathered up and washed before dessert, so my uneaten food was always discovered, and that’s when the scolding came.
Many of us scoop more onto our plates than we can handle in a day. It all looks good. A little more couldn’t hurt. But pretty soon we realize our ambitions were bigger than our time. That’s when the stress begins to weigh us down. Do you have too much on your plate? Stress is defined as a state of mental or emotional strain resulting from demanding circumstances. It can also lead to physical symptoms, including headaches, increased heart rate, muscle tension, and trouble sleeping. We all know what it is like to be stressed, right? Ps 143:4 describes it as overwhelmed and distressed – it’s an emotional turmoil within a stressed-out heart. You know what situations bring on these feelings in your day. But sometimes it’s our own faults. We let ourselves get too busy, and we pay for it with our ragged emotions. Do we need to be as busy as we are? Psalm 39:6 says, “Surely every man walks about like a shadow; surely they busy themselves in vain; He heaps up riches, and does not know who will gather them.” We need to be sure we are making ourselves busy for the right reasons. I would vouch to say, if we busy ourselves with the right things, we will be less stressed of trying to meet all these expectations. Of course, there are times we all feel pressure and responsibilities start piling up, especially this time of year, and we allow stress to sneak up on us. So, we need to be turning to God when we start feeling overwhelmed, just as Psalm 102:1 says, “Hear my prayer O Lord, and let my cry come to You.”
Buying Time
When we allow ourselves to have schedules full, we often cut corners on the most important things, such as prayer, bible reading, and worship. We stop finding ways to serve God and we start turning our excuses into reasons we don’t have a relationship with God. Yet, time is still fleeting! Ephesians 5:15-16 says, “See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.”
When our schedules are tangled up, and there’s no hope of straightening them out, it’s time to make some changes. If we don’t address everything that is stressing us out early on, they will only get worse – until there’s nothing left to do but bring out the scissors and cut them all out. So as you face a tangle of responsibilities, and you feel the tension building in your heart, you know where to turn to dispel the mounting levels of stress. Psalm 119:143 says, “trouble and anguish have overtaken me, yet Your commandments are my delights.” We need to find the responsibilities the Lord has called for us to do and weave out the extra that take up too much time.
What is taking up your time that doesn’t yield a harvest? What are you doing in your day knowing nothing comes of it? Are you spending too much time on your phone? Are you worrying about what’s to come? Are you working all the time?
Take time this week to sit down and think about your schedule. See how much time you spend in God’s Word, praying, at worship services, writing cards, taking care of the Lord’s work in comparison to everything else you do. It’s humbling.