Uprooting Anxiety And Sin With Faith

[hollytree]

Fear and anxiety and worry are about the future. When I’m worried about the future I’m in my mind or ego. In the past this fear of being harmed or plotted against by others has caused me to drink and do drugs. Alcohol released my fears where I could communicate and talk with others but the next day I would feel more fear and shame. Shyness turned into social phobia and social phobia turned into paranoia. I have found that this fear is uprooted by having faith in God. Such a faith secures the future and gives one hope. Hope pushes the desires that lead to sin out of the heart as one relies on God like Christ did. It’s by the joy set before us. Not only does it push desires out of the heart but it brings strong desires to the heart as one is thrown into the current of love. It’s faith - hope - love. It’s faith working itself out through love. The joy of faith. In the Bible faith produces obedience. The power to love is the confidence that God will take care of my future. It’s the obedience of faith as one trusts and relies on God like Jesus did. It’s faith working itself out through love.Christ’s atoning death secures the future with his blood bought promises. Example:

Vengeance is Mine I will Repay

When my faith is in God the desires for sin is pushed out of the heart. I let go and let God handle it. Rather I love the enemy just like Christ did. Another example:

God works all things together for good for those that love Him.

I place my faith in God and Christ as it gives me hope.

Dealing with shame:

If we confess our sins He will forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

My faith is in God. Indeed. when facing shame that comes from the rejection, and ridicule of others I trust God when He promises to one day vindicate His children. Oh the glory that awaits those who are despised and rejected by others misplaced shaming. It’s faith working itself out through love. When my future is in the hands of an all powerful and loving God who promises to work out all my circumstances for good, anxiety is broken as the heart opens up to love. The desires that lead to sin are pushed out of my heart as God infuses me and covers me with His righteousness.

[hollytree]

I wrote about this in another thread but I will share it here because it’s basically saying the exact same thing with different words. Ego dissolves in surrendering and trusting God. Letting go and letting God have control. Instead of fighting against the flow of life we let go of control as we abandon ourselves completely to God. We navigate through life not control it. We usually have to hit bottom and shatter the ego before we surrender to God in humble trust that leads to obedience. In learning to let go we empty ourselves to be filled with the Spirit (word of God). This letting go and emptying the self is the goal in Buddhists meditation. It sharpens our focus to live in the now or moment. When we surrender we accept the past and future as the blood of Christ covers them both. With God in control the future is secure. For He promises to work everything together for good for those that love Him. And we love Him because He first loved us in His suffering death and resurrection. In confessing our sins and trusting God the past is blotted out and the future is secure because it’s in His hands. I have hope and am freed up to live in the present moment. One day at a time one moment at a time we are dependent on Christ as He secures our future because we love and trust in Him. He is the self-sufficient, all-knowing, all-powerful and all glorious one. In and of myself I’m nothing. I’m powerless and depend on Him in a humbled and surrendered trust in His Divine Providence. In letting go I’m no longer in control but the sovereign God is. I no longer try to ego control life and other people. In surrendering to God’s control we surrender to the flow of life and live from the heart. We no longer try to manage everything. God is our manager. His omnipresence permeates everything as He is the guiding Spirit behind the cosmic evolution. We put our faith in Him. We trust His promises.

[hollytree]

To go into more depth and detail here’s the book that changed my perspective:

Future Grace, Revised Edition: The Purifying Power of the Promises of God

Another good book dealing with the foundational promise of all other promises:

The Promise: God Works All Things Together for Your Good

It’s about trusting God or having faith and depending on Him to meet our needs. This secures the future and gives one hope. The grace comes from God and therefore we are grateful as we find our joy in glorifying Him not self. All the praise and glory goes to God.

[hollytree]

With shyness there’s the desire to be great but an intense fear of rejection that causes one to withdraw. Pride is based on the same fears and anxieties but is more aggressive. It boasts in it’s own wisdom, powers and resources. It’s a failure to trust God and manifests strongly in atheism. It’s a failure to trust in God’s power, God’s riches, and God’s wisdom to run things. With faith in God’s wisdom, power, and resources to run things we glorify God because we are trusting in Him to meet our needs. All gifts of grace are blessings from His hand as we are humbly grateful to Him. There’s no need to exalt ourselves. We glorify God by trusting Him for what we need and being grateful for what we have. He gets the glory or the credit because we are relying and depending on Him. Without this faith and dependence on God we take credit for our good deeds. This is self glorification. Taking credit for good deeds leads to self-esteem and self-esteem leads to ego and ego leads to sin. We develop an exaggerated sense of our own importance. This is a trigger for paranoid and suspicious thoughts. Thinking we are at the center we become so important that we think that we are being monitored or tracked by people. This leads to thinking others are coming after us to harm us when in reality they are not. We have an exaggerated sense of our own importance. With faith in God we surrender to His loving control over our lives as the future is secured and the fear is broken as one has hope… He’s the all-powerful, all-glorious one. We let go and surrender as we empty the self depending on Him in surrendered trust. All power, honor, praise, and glory go to God. This is where we find true joy. It’s not the same joy as self-exaltation or the praises of man. But a sober humble joy in glorifying God with faith, gratitude, and humble obedience. It’s not self-reliance but God reliance. The reality is that only God is self-sufficient. We are finite, limited, and dependent creatures.

[hollytree]

A good book on humility from a Catholic:

Humility Of Heart

[hollytree]

Because I’ve surrendered to God and have faith in Him impatience is broken. Whatever the cause of my impatience (a flat tire, traffic jam, rebellious teenagers) I know that God in in control. I have faith in His timing, plans, and wisdom to run things no matter what they may look like at the present moment. I stand on the rock solid atonement that guarantees that God works everything together for good for those that love Him. He will bring good out of the circumstances I’m in. Whether that’s 30 seconds from now or 90 billion years from now all the way into eternity. He brings beauty out of ashes and when I rest in Him with faith impatience is severed and a lot of sinful behaviors that go along with impatience.

[hollytree]

[hollytree]

Faith in God and gratitude to God bring contentment in God. When I turn away from Christ satisfaction in God is replaced with covetousness or an out of control desire for material things like money. But when God says, I will supply all of your needs in Christ Jesus according to my riches in glory and I trust Him or have faith in Him all the riches of eternal life bring contentment as I lose the out of control desire for things. The atonement secures eternal life for all those that have faith. It secures the future as anxiety is broken by faith and the heart fills up with the hope of the inheritance of glory, riches, and joy beyond comprehension. He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? (Romans 8:32). The out of control desire for things is broken by faith in God.

[hollytree]

In dealing with lust I place my faith in God when He promises:

But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to depart into hell.…

The consequences are immense if one doesn’t turn away from lust and find contentment in God. This superior satisfaction in God is found by having faith in God. I place my faith in Christ when He says:

The pure in heart shall see God

The ecstasies and delights of the promised vision of God face to face outstrips the promised pleasures of lust. We fight the promised fleeting pleasures of lust with the promised eternal pleasures of having faith in God. This secures the future and gives one hope as the desires that lead to sin are pushed out of the heart. When tempted we are also reminded to

Resist the devil and he will flee

With faith in God one has hope. God promises to work all my frustrating circumstances together for my good because I love Him and have faith that He’s in control.

[hollytree]

It’s in my Devotional of the Carmelites by Father Gabriel of Saint Mary Magdalen O.C.D. and their conception of God. I mention the book because the mystics of the Carmelite tradition include such holy figures as St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avilla. They lived exceptional lives of holiness because they were surrendered to God in total trust. They had a humble faith in God’s providence as they abandoned themselves completely to Him. Here’s what it says on page 693:

Nothing exists without a reason, nothing in the world happens by chance; everything, everything, without the least exception, is part of the magnificent plan of divine providence. In this plan every creature, even the lowest, has it’s definite place, it’s end, it’s value. Every event, even the most insignificant, has been foreseen from all eternity and regulated even to it’s slightest detail.

When my future is in the hands of an all powerful and loving God who promises to work out all my circumstances for good because I love Him, anxiety is broken as the heart opens up to love. The desires that lead to sin are pushed out of my heart as God infuses me and covers me with His righteousness. Faith - Hope - Love

Divine Intimacy

From pages 708 - 709

One who lives by faith can repeat the beautiful words of St. Elizabeth of the Trinity: “Everything that happens is a message to me of God’s great love for my soul.” To attain this living and profound gaze of faith, we must accustom ourselves, in our relations with creatures, to pass over secondary causes in order to reach the first Cause, God, who by His providence rules and orders everything for His own holy ends. Since we know and believe that He who directs all things is our Father, we will entrust ourselves to His direction with absolute confidence, and thus we will remain serene even in adversity, strong in the conviction that He can make use of evil, of man’s errors, and even sins and malice for the good of the elect. "To them that love God, all things work together unto good! (Romans 8:28). The gaze of faith is most comprehensive and real because it takes into account the total reality of creatures and events considering them not only in their maternal entity, but also in relation to their dependence on God. The more we know how to look at everything in this light, so much the more closely will we approach the eternal thought and infinite wisdom of God, judging everything according to God’s infallible truth. With this view of faith it will be easier for us to accept the painful situations and hardships of life, for we will be able to see in them God’s paternal hand ordering everything for our sanctification

[hollytree]

Bible verses about paranoia

https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Bible-Verses-About-Paranoia/

[hollytree]

Is God Really in Control? Trusting God in a World of Hurt

[hollytree]

Written by a Catholic who believes in abandoning oneself to Divine Providence

Trustful Surrender to Divine Providence: The Secret of Peace and Happiness

[hollytree]

More Bible verses on paranoia

https://www.openbible.info/topics/paranoia