To worry, or not to worry: Q-TP#2

‎"Worry implies that we don't quite trust that God is big enough, powerful enough, or loving enough to take care of what's happening in our lives. Stress says that the things we are involved in are important enough to merit out impatience, our lack of grace towards others, or our tight grip of control." -Francis Chan

Que dramatic scene of girl overreacting (about anything, you name it, we've most likely overreacted about it) to her friend and then her friend hauling off and whacking her in the face to make her stop. *Deep breath. Thank you, Megan, for the slap in the face... I needed that.

My younger sister slapped this quote on my wall (fbook wall, is there any other?) yesterday and it stopped me in my tracks. For those of you who know me well, you know that I can be SOOOOO good at worrying when I want to be. I'm not one who stresses, per say, but worrying... yeah, that is my thing. And the things that I choose to worry about are the CRAZIEST of things. Not normal everyday things like, "why is everyone starring at me? is the back of my skirt tucked into my leggings again??" or "did I leave the house unlocked when I left for work?" I worry about freak accident stuff and things that I really have NO control over but would cause a great deal of pain or discomfort for me or someone I love, whether physical or emotional. I won't go into everything that I worry about but here is a clue... I couldn't have been older than 10 years old when I specifically remember crying myself to sleep because I was scared one of my siblings was going to fall through the ice at the pond near our house that winter. Or another time when Mom and Dad could not get home fast enough because I was convinced that UFO's were hovering around our house.

Okay, yes, I've stopped worrying about UFO's (eh-hem), but that's not my point. My point is that I am about to embark on a big, new, scary step in my life because it is going to require me to leave a lot of the things that give me comfort. And there is a lot that I COULD worry about. After all, there are a lot of unknowns and a lot of different directions my life could possibly take right now. But I am going to choose to trust rather than to worry. I can be confident that as I walk forward in this whole decision-making process that His Spirit inside of me will nudge me if I am headed in the wrong direction. Don't get me wrong, this does not mean that I'm putting my options in a hat and blindly picking my future. But I'm researching, talking to people, and pursuing doors that seem to be opening as I seek answers. Not to forget, looking at my past to see what passions God has placed inside of me from an early age and how I can pursue and nurture these passions in order to be who God has called me to be in the midst of His story.

Sure I could worry about things like, if I left this job to go back to school I may not EVER have the job security I have now.... And even in saying that I realize that I far too often make God out to be way smaller than he truly is because really my job, my benefits, flexibility and SENSE of security could all be wiped clean today, and then what would I be clinging to? So the quote_to ponder came right on time. I don't want pseudo security... I want God's security. Worry less, trust more....