The Concept of Anxiety

by Jake Thomsen

Philippians 4

4 Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! 5 Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. 6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

One idea that I'm thinking about these days is just this concept of anxiety. We're with some entrepreneurs and they're doing fundraisers and they're sleepless nights and just more times. And I was reading Philippians about two weeks ago now and it really struck me. Of course, I got  to Philippians four, which is like the go-to for anxiety of "Hey, be anxious about nothing, but in everything, through prayer and supplication lift it up to the Lord. And the peace that surpasses understanding will come to you."

And in one sense I think that's such an encouragement and the other sense it can be kind of discouraging or even anxiety-inducing, because like us, especially now, we were going through a fundraise. Are you feeling that lack of anxiety? And if not, it's kind of like you think you got something going wrong.

But what really jumped out at me, this is the point I'm getting to is reading Philippians all in one sitting. I got Chapter two where Paul essentially has this riff, where he has his missionary friend and Aphroditus, who got really sick. The Philippians didn't know he was sick. They thought he might die. And so part of the letter, Paul wants to let them know, hey, he is OK, I'm going to send him to you. And it kind of talks about we're all very anxious about this. Aphroditus is anxious. I'm anxious about it. And the only way I'm going to solve it is by sending him to you so that my anxiety can be reduced somewhat.

And it seems as though it would be saying we do experience anxiety because of the brokenness of the world. And sometimes Paul at least was looking at the circumstance. And even when he was trying to address the circumstance, I didn't quite get him told to that peace that surpasses understanding. And yet he gets to Chapter four and says, this is what we strive for.

And so I don't have a clear takeaway from all that. But that's what I'm wrestling with, kind of looking at from different angles with God. And I think I'm landing just on the side of the "Already - Not yet" right. God has already accomplished the victory and it is not yet fully here. And so how do we live into that kingdom that is still coming? It's still on its way, and yet we know what that faithful living is like. And maybe some layer of anxiety sometimes doesn't necessarily mean that we're doing something wrong, which is that we're in this kind of following world in a tough spot and I don't know where to go from there. But that's what I'm thinking about.