HAVE NO ANXIETY - HFS



HAVE NO ANXIETY

Speaker: Ed Aljian

Ed Aljian takes care of the Bethel Home Departments that do services for the Bethel family and has worked there since 1972. Raised in the Blairhaven, New Jersey congregation his parents got the Truth when he was 2 or 3 years of age.

The September 1987 O.K.M. states:

The Watchtower and the Awake have offered fine information and advice on dealing with medical problems and upholding God's law on blood. They have also had scripturally based articles on fears, depression and other emotional disorders. These articles have been provided to inform but not endorse certain types of diagnoses, therapy, doctors counsellors and treatment centers, as personal decisions and must be made on such matters. So in harmony with this, our talk is not designed to endorse any specific treatment or diagnosis: nor designed to promote anybody's private material. In fact, almost all of the quotes we are using are straight out of the Society's publications.

With that in mind then, what is anxiety? Are you unemployed? Or seriously in debt? Or are you or a loved one afflicted with a serious illness. Maybe your marriage is under a strain at the present time. Maybe you are single, looking for a marriage mate, to the point of being anxious over that. Or perhaps you are anxious to become a elder or a ministerial servant in the congregation and can't get the appointment yet. It is causing you anxiety.

Maybe a member of your family has left the truth. Maybe your anxiety is guilt over some past event, some mistake you made. You can't forget it. You can't forgive yourself. Maybe you worry excessively about the future the outcome of certain things. Or maybe you have feelings of worthlessness, inferiority. But now they call it "low self esteem." That can cause anxiety. Maybe it is people at work or at school that make you anxious. Maybe your anxiety is a spiritual one, struggling to build up a necessary spiritual quality or overcome a flaw; and maybe your anxiety is something that I haven't mentioned. It might even be something unique to yourself. Whatever it is, I am sure there is little or nothing you would not do to rid yourself of it, or at least minimise its force and its intensity. And the good news is, you can do it! It is possible. Now how? There is a unique and infrequently read Scripture in the middle of your Bible. We don't read it much. But the Society has used it and explained it. Once you have read it and understood this Scripture you have in your possession a most powerful weapon with which to fight anxiety and unhappiness of every sort.

PROVERBS 15:15 As we read it, note the two opposite individuals identified here: "All the days of the afflicted one are bad: but the one that is good of heart (has) a feast constantly." There are two individuals: The afflicted one; and the one of good at heart. The afflicted one is the person with a negative or unhealthy viewpoint towards life, especially his own life and the things that have happened to him; and the one who is good of heart is a person who has a healthy, positive viewpoint towards life. What makes the Scripture unique is this - Most of us are not used to thinking of life that way. Most of us think in terms of conditional happiness. That means, "I'll be happy as long as things are going well for me and, when things are going fine, I feel good. But when problems come into my life; now I feel worried or anxious or depressed or afraid or guilty," and so forth.

In other words, we make our happiness dependent on having no problems. We make our happiness dependent on things going right for us all the time. And yet, only the person who learns to be at peace with himself amidst problems is going to be a happy individual ---good at heart. And he will have a feast constantly, like the Scripture says - even when things are not going well for him; because he will have made his happiness dependent on something other than external circumstances. In other words, happiness is an inside job - it has little to do with where you live, whether you are rich or poor,sick or healthy, young or old, married or single, elder or ministerial servant, pioneer or publisher. It has everything to do with thinking; learning scriptural, healthy thought patterns that make us good at heart. So when you and I encounter problems that tend to make us depressed or worried or anxious, let's not give in to pity, regret, guilt or the blaming of others, because as long as we give in to those things, we will continue to be miserable. Instead, let's ask ourselves the productive question, "If I cannot improve my situation - better yet, change it- if I can't do those things - then what can I do mentally to make myself good of heart? How can I discipline my thinking so as to have a feast constantly?" Now that question is an anxiety killer. If you want to read more about Proverbs 15:15, here are some references you can jot down. Watchtower 1976, pages 69 and 320. Awake September 8, 1981, pages 8 & 9.

Now at this point, some of you are thinking, "Nah, it's impossible. Nobody can be happy in the presence of problems. Not while his problems are still unresolved and unsettled, no matter how he thinks." Now I am thinking of a person who can do it, and has done it many times. A person who knows how to remain happy, even when things are not going well. He has had a number of serious concerns come his way - some affecting his loved ones, other affecting him personally - throughout it all, he has maintained his joy and his tranquillity uninterrupted. You have probably guessed, I am thinking of Jehovah himself. But think of that. If you or I faced a circumstance similar to Jehovah's how would you feel? You know you are innocent, but everybody else wonders. The elders are making an investigation. Some of your friends wonder about you. Most of the congregation at lease have their doubts, and many of them are convinced you are guilty. Can you imagine how troubled you would feel? Can you imagine how unsettled you would be until you were proven right? Until you were exonerated and everybody understood once and for all that you were innocent all along? But what if that exoneration did not come right away? What if the situation dragged on for several weeks or several months? Day after day, living with that? What about 6,000 years? That is how long Jehovah has lived with his name and reputation unfairly in question and with many individuals believing him guilty. And his name is not vindicated yet. Is he postponing his happiness? Is he saying, "I won't feel settled until my name is finally vindicated?" Not at all! Jehovah is concerned and he is determined to vindicate his name, and he will, but he is not postponing his happiness until his name is completely vindicated. He is happy now, while his circumstances remain unsettled. He is not anxious. He is not depressed. He is not worried. he is not thinking thought - variations on the theme, "poor me" or "If only Adam had not sinned," or "What if my prophecies never come to complete fulfillment?" "What if the Devil is right?" "I won't feel settled until this whole thing is over with." Not Jehovah. He doesn't think that way.

And if Jehovah can remain happy even amidst external pressures, he can help us, who are made in his image, to learn the same kind of unconditional happiness. Granted, we are not perfect like Jehovah. We are not almighty, but we can make a lot of progress in that direction if we work at it, because we are made in Jehovah's image, and we do have his help. So, let's get specific. How is it done? How can we take Proverbs 15 principle and apply it to the specific anxieties that you and I face in our daily life? Let's take one anxiety at a time and explore it.

WORRY

We will start with worry, and please don't confuse worry with a healthy concern for anything, for a problem even. If you are concerned about a situation and that moves you to look into it with a viewpoint of, "What can I do to tackle this and solve it and handle it?" excellent. The question is, what if you have done what you reasonably can with a situation and the worry still grows in your head, and you are telling yourself, "I will have no peace until this whole thing is over."

At this point, the answer becomes to get control of your thoughts and emotions. How? Let's turn to Philippians 4:4-7. Paul says, "Always rejoice in the Lord. Once more, I will say "Rejoice!" Let your reasonableness become known to all men. The Lord is near. Do not become anxious over anything." or, as the New English Bible says "Have no anxiety, but in everything by prayer and supplication along with thanksgiving let your petitions be made known to God: and the peace of God excels all thought will guard your hearts and mental powers by means of Christ Jesus." So yes, the scriptural direction here is to go to Jehovah in prayer, leave the problem with him, ask Jehovah for the peace of God to be with you in the meantime while your problem is still unsettled.

Now, you might be saying to yourself, "Well I know that. I have been in the Truth a long time, and I know Jehovah has the ability to solve my problems. He has the power to do it. But is Jehovah going to be actively interested in the personal, unique, relatively minor matters that drive me crazy? The problems that I face are not directly related to the vindication of Jehovah's name or the preaching work, so my problems must be very small to Jehovah. How concerned could he be? Or what about myself?"

You know, any of us may reason, "Look I am not on the Governing body. I don't write the Watchtower. I am not in full-time service even. Am I significant enough to Jehovah to merit his interest when I pray on a personal concern?" The answer is. Nothing has ever been too small to merit Jehovah's personal interest. To illustrate that, think about something unimaginably large, like the universe. The universe is huge. There are 100 billion galaxies in the universe: probably more than that. We are just talking about what man knows. A hundred billion galaxies. Two hundred billion stars just in our galaxy alone. How long would it take you to get from our galaxy to the next nearest one? Going at 186,000 miles per second? It would take 1,400,000 years just to get to the next nearest galaxy; and there is 100 billion of those things out there. The universe is unimaginably large, and in the universe we see reflected Jehovah's perfection, his precision, his interest. When he put the universe together, you could tell - well he wasn't a perfectionist, because that is a negative term - but he really applied his perfect ability, his interest and his precision. Clocks and watches are timed to the universe. Plans are made because man knows that those heavenly bodies are precisely times. Jehovah is interested in those large things.

But now, think of something unimaginably small, like the atom; something you can't even see. Now the atom is small. You say "How small is it?" The atom is so small, that there are more atoms in one drop of water than there are blades of grass in the whole world. But now, when with aid you look at the atom, do you find Jehovah doing sloppy work now? As if maybe he said to Jesus in the creative process, "Now listen, this thing - no one is even going to see it, it is so small, so let's just slap it together real quick, and we can be a little sloppy now." Not a bit. In the atom you see the same perfection, the same precision, the same interest that you see in the universe. In fact, in each atom, particles meticulously orbit at 10,000 miles per second. What interest Jehovah has in something so small. It just illustrates though, that you and I can go to Jehovah in prayer, and perhaps we feel small and insignificant like an atom. We may feel that our problems are insignificant. We may feel like those problems are so bit to us, but to Jehovah, they must be like those little particles whirling around in the atom, and yet Jehovah is interested enough to get actively involved in the things that we pray about. He will.

But if you ever start to approach Jehovah in prayer and doubt or feel that perhaps he is not interested, something you can always remember is to mentally review all of the Scriptures where Jehovah COMMANDS you to pray, and remind yourself that Jehovah did this voluntarily. You know the Scriptures: Persevere in prayer. Throw your burdens on Jehovah. Throw your anxieties on him, the one we just read in everything. Paul said, IN EVERYTHING make your petitions known to Jehovah.

God himself had those Scriptures written. He could have made another arrangement if he didn't want to be bothered. That's the way it's done. In a human organization - let's say a large business organization - you have the man on top of it all, the president. He delegates as much as possible to his subordinates so that he can spend as much time as possible handling the large issues, the issues that are so important that wants to have his finger in it personally. He doesn't want to delegate these matters. But everything else he delegates. Jehovah does it that way too; running the largest organization in the university; and yes he delegates. He has us preaching. He had delegated the Messianic Kingship to Jesus and the 144,000. But there are matters that Jehovah considers so important that he doesn't delegate them. Not even to Jesus. And one of those is your prayers. He may delegate the answer to it, but he wants those prayers directed straight to him. That is how important Jehovah considers your prayers. Again it is voluntary. He had a choice. He did not set it up that way. Jehovah could have made an arrangement. "Listen when you are praying at your conventions, when you are praying as a group, direct them straight to me; but when you as individuals are going to pray about your petty concerns, I will give you the name of a certain angel whose job it is to listen to your prayers." That would have been a loving arrangement. You know the angel would have had the power to follow through the interest. It would have been a loving arrangement. But Jehovah didn't do it that way. he set up the arrangement and said, "Direct all your prayers to me and in everything petition me." Voluntary. And he knew what he was in for when he put those Scriptures in the Bible. Yes, he knew that there would be individuals in his organization - thousands! - praying to him all at once over small matters; matters that are large to his servants, but to Jehovah, they barely relate to the universal concerns that he has on his mind. He knew that was what was going to happen. He set the arrangement up. He is obviously interested.

Jehovah will help you with anything you trust him with, anything that affects you spiritually, but we need strong faith and a personal relationship with Jehovah t o supplication, and confidently leave that matter with Jehovah and cease to be anxious. Yes. That takes a growing faith.

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dean.huff@

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