How to Battle Your Giants

What is the “giant” you are battling?

What’s the enemy you’re facing that feels like an unbeatable giant? It might be:

  • Financial debt.
  • Your marriage, which feels like it’s 
  • Your kid, who is on the wrong path.
  • A job (or boss) you can’t stand.

You Can Do It

Whatever it is, if you’re anything like me, you probably give yourself, “You can do it!” speeches. You remind yourself of your undefeated track record in overcoming impossible odds. “I am smart enough. I am good enough. I can do it!”

You Can’t Do It

Then you remember that you’re actually not undefeated. That you’ve failed quite a few times. Actually, you’ve maybe lost more than you’ve won. And then… anxiety kicks in! You start feeling overwhelmed and boxed in and afraid that you are going to lose again.

Moving Out of the Middle

This week at Verve, we continued our series Anxious For Nothing by talking about “Moving The I Out of Anxiety.” We looked at the famous story of David beating the giant warrior Goliath, and David’s famous Psalm 23, in which he shares how God walked with him through the valley of the shadow of death. A key learning comes directly from the word anxiety:

Anxiety

Notice what’s in the middle of the word? I. That’s what leads to anxiety, having I at the center of our lives. When I depend on I to beat the giants I face, I am going to freak out because I know that I can’t really do it.

That’s why I need to move I out of the middle and put God at the center of my life. In the Bible, in 1 Peter 5:7, we’re told, “Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.”

Wow. What an offer. We can transfer the weight of our anxiety onto God because he loves us. But how does that work? That’s the verse before. 1 Peter 5:6, “Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.”

Humble yourself, or, in other words, move yourself out of the middle. Stop relying on you being smart enough or good enough. Start relying on God. When you humble yourself in that way, you allow God to lift you up. You allow Him to give you victory over your anxiety and over the giant you’re facing.