The Bible instructs us to pray about worry. Why? Worry is a sin plain and simple. God is all out against His children worrying. A child does not worry all day long whether his house will be there when he gets home from school or whether his parents will have a meal for him that evening. Children do not worry about such things, because they trust their parents. In the same way, we as Christians should trust our heavenly Father to supply what is best for us.¹ How do you pray about worry? That’s our focus on this week’s Light on Life.

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One Necessary Component You Need for Spiritual Growth in God

[Tweet “Walking in peace is part of the finished work of Jesus known as Redemption.”]

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Episode Resources

You can find more information on the subject of ‘Kinds of Prayer’ by clicking on the links above.

1. #S6-003: Why It’s Important to Spend Time Talking to God [Podcast]
2. #S6-004: Five More Simple Secrets When Praying to God [Podcast]
3. #S6-005: Faith and Prayer: Important Lessons to Know [Podcast]
4. #S6-006: Why Praying in Faith Means to Believe You Receive [Podcast]
5. #S6-007: How to Build Your Life Praying Bible Prayers[Podcast]
6. #S6-008: Prayer of Agreement: the Power of Praying with People [Podcast]

About Emery

Emery committed his life to the Lord Jesus Christ over 42 years ago. He has served as both a full-time pastor and an itinerant minister. Both he and his wife Sharon of 38 years emphasize personal growth and development through the Word of God. The ministry of the Holy Spirit is both the focus and the hallmark of their mission. Read more about them here.

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Podcast Notes

1 Peter 5:6–7 (NKJV) — 6 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, 7 casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.

Is it Okay to Worry?

• The following story illustrates one of the many reasons why the believer in Jesus needs to ditch worry.

Death was walking toward a city, and a man stopped Death and asked, “What are you going to do?” Replied Death, “I’m going to kill ten thousand people.” The man said, “That’s horrible!” Death said, “That’s the way it is; that’s what I do.” As the day passed, the man warned everyone he could of Death’s plan. At the end of the day he again met Death. He said, “You said you were going to kill ten thousand people, and yet seventy thousand died.” Death explained, “I killed only ten thousand. Worry and fear killed the others.”²

• Worry is a killer.
• It opens the door to many maladies in the life of a human.
• Anxiety can make you physically sick.
• Worry has been defined as “a small trickle of fear that meanders through the mind until it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained.”³

Why You Should Pray about Worry and Strive to Get Rid of It

• The body can become very sick as a result of being anxious or worrying too much.
• Here’s why: Behaving in an apprehensive way causes the body to activate the stress response.
• The stress response causes dramatic physiological, psychological, and emotional changes in the body to enhance the body’s ability to deal with a threat: to either fight with it or flee from it – which is the reason the stress response is often referred to as the flight or flight response.
• The stress response elicits some of the most powerful physiological, psychological, and emotional changes the body can produce.
• When stress responses occur infrequently, the body can recover from these changes relatively quickly.
• But when stress responses occur too frequently and/or dramatically, the body has a more difficult time recovering, which can cause the body to remain in a state of hyper emergency readiness.
• When the body has been in a state of hyper emergency readiness for too long, it can behave erratically and more involuntarily than normal, which can cause all sorts of physiological, psychological, and emotional problems.
• These problems can also involve the many systems, organs, and glands affected by the stress response.
• So yes, being overly anxious and the stress it produces can make the body quite ill and behave in abnormal ways.⁴
• This is the physical part of what worry can do in your body.
• It’s a bad thing.

Think in Line with the Work of Jesus at Calvary

• Now think in line with the Bible.
• Jesus died for your sins, that’s the gospel in a nutshell.
• But not only did Jesus die for your sins, at the same time and place, but He also bore your sicknesses and carried your pains.
• So, you can see the problem?
• Jesus took stripes in His body by which you, as a child of God, can receive healing in your body and yet you open the door to sickness is opened via the sin of worry.
• Jesus redemption and the sin of worry do not go hand in hand, that’s why you need to pray about worry.
• Worry has to be evicted from your life.
• The will of God for your life is peace and quiet repose as you travel through the minefields of planet earth.
• It says that in the great redemption chapter know as Isaiah fifty-three.

Isaiah 53:3–5 (ESV) — 3 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. 4 Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. 5 But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.

• So, you see walking in peace is part of the finished work of Jesus known as redemption.

How to Pray about Worry: Be Careful about Nothing

Philippians 4:6–7 (KJV) — 6 Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. 7 And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

• How do you pray about worry?
• Look at the phrase in the KJV ‘be careful about nothing.’
• What does that phrase mean?
• Many, when they hear the word ‘careful’ in the King James Version of the Bible, hear something different than what the 17th-century translators of the world’s most popular version meant.
• When we hear the word ‘careful’, we hear the word ‘cautious.’
• That’s not what the KJV translators meant.
• We hear words like precise, accurate, painstaking and deliberate.
• But, it doesn’t matter what we hear.
• You can’t read your 21st-century definition of a word back into a 1st-century text.
• And, at the same time, we can’t read the 17th-century definition back into a 1st-century word either.
• The KJV was written in the 17th century.
• ‘Careful’ was their lingo for worry.

Greek Definitions for Careful

• The Greek definition for this word is what we must look at because that is the way a person of the first century would have heard the word.
• And, that’s who Paul was writing to in the first place.
• The Greek word for ‘careful’ means to brood or to think moodily or anxiously about something.
• BDAG has it as to be apprehensive, have anxiety, be anxious, be (unduly) concerned⁵
• LSJ, the world’s most comprehensive and authoritative dictionary of ancient Greek, shows the definition as care for, be anxious about, or to meditate upon.⁶

The Right Way to Look at the Word Careful

• So, if you had two people during the 17th century holding a conversation with one another, and say just for example’s sake, you got to eavesdrop on it, here is what you might hear.
  • ‘My child was so sick last night and I’m just so careful about it.’
• People, in our day, wouldn’t say it that way.
• They would say “I’m so worried about my child being sick.’
• In fact, several translations read to this effect, for example, the Amplified says the following.

Philippians 4:6–7 (AMP) — 6 Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything, but in every circumstance and in everything, by prayer and petition (definite requests), with thanksgiving, continue to make your wants known to God. 7 And God’s peace [shall be yours, that tranquil state of a soul assured of its salvation through Christ, and so fearing nothing from God and being content with its earthly lot of whatever sort that is, that peace] which transcends all understanding shall garrison and mount guard over your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

• So, you can see the will of God plain and simple in this verse: peace, tranquil state of the soul, fearing nothing, and being content.
• That’s God’s will.
• Excuse the vernacular here but, ‘He don’t want you worried about nothing.’
• I know that’s not great English; I said it that way for effect.

The Godhead in Agreement

• The NT was written by Holy men as they were moved upon by the Holy Spirit.
• The Holy Spirit says what Jesus says and Jesus said, ‘My doctrine is not mine but His that sent me.’

John 7:16 (NKJV) — 16 Jesus answered them and said, “My doctrine is not Mine, but His who sent Me.

• So the Godhead is saying to you and to me that we should not worry or be anxious.
• John Wesley stated at one point in his life.

I could no more worry than I could curse or swear.[ 8. Michael P. Green, 1500 Illustrations for Biblical Preaching (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2000), 407.]

Go God’s Way with the Word

• So, if you choose to go a different way than the way of the Lord, what is that called, what’s the name for it?
• Isn’t that called sin?
• So, worry is a sin just like adultery and fornication.
• Some have a hard time conceptualizing this because that because they have a different definition of sin.
• When most folks think of sin, they think of lying, stealing, and murder.
• Yes, those are sins for sure and well-known sins.
• True and genuine Christians shudder in horror at the thought of committing any of these sins.
• Adultery is such a common thing today.
• People living together is such a common thing today that we think it’s always been that way.
• And because it’s so familiar in the world, we think that makes it right.
• It’s not right, it’s sin.
• The same goes for worry.
• Just because worry was socially acceptable in your circles doesn’t make it any less a sin in Bible circles.

Some Other Reasons, Why You Should Pray about Worry

• Besides the physical opening of doors to sickness, worry shows a lack of trust in God.
• It is an indicator like the oil dipstick in your car.
• Worry is a sign that the level of your faith needs filling or needs to be topped off.
• If you pray about something, you are supposed to turn that something over to Jesus, no strings attached.
• You do this by faith.
• The same is true when you pray about worry.
• That’s what Peter meant when he said ‘Cast your care on the Lord.’
• The word ‘cast’ used here in the Greek is a verb and it means to put on or to hurl.
• That is to place or put something on something else with great energy; conceived of as throwing on forcefully.
• The word describes the intensity one should use to pray about worry.
• Treat worry like the hot coal it is.
• Cast all your anxiety over on the Lord.
• Once Jesus has it, He is going to use His ability to solve it.
• You know His ability is way beyond yours.
• Throw your problem then into the vast ocean of God’s ability.
• If you understand that prayer is not a ‘hope so’ proposition and that faith is a ‘confidence’ proposition, you will have a much easier time praying about worry.
• When you pray, you don’t think that you might get the answer, you know that we are going to get the answer.
• If you know that we are going to get the answer, then why would you worry about the outcome?

When Praying Following Bible Order Is Vital

• The order of Philippians 4:6 is don’t worry first and then pray.
• Many Christians fail to receive because they get this order mixed up.
• You have to obey the Bible just like He said it.
• God said do not be worried about anything.
• This verse could easily be translated in nothing be anxious’ instead of ‘be anxious for nothing.’
• ‘Nothing’ means nothing which means that there is no situation where a little bit of worry is acceptable.
• In no situation should you allow the luxury of worry.
• Christians are failing to receive from God because they are at times out of order when it comes to scripture.
• The more you follow God’s order, the better things work.
• We must have enough sense to believe the Word just exactly the way it’s written.
• Again, notice the order: deal with worry first, you do that by praying about worry in the form of casting your care over upon the Lord, then pray the prayer of faith for your needs then pray the prayer of thanksgiving and the result of all of that is you’ll have the peace of God.

Worry and Peace Are Like Oil and Water

• You can’t have worry and the peace of God at the same time.
• You can have whichever you want, whichever you choose.
• Now, I didn’t say that this was easy, but you have to do it.
• Whatever the Lord told us to do, we can do.
• If that were not true then the Lord would be unfair in asking us to do something that we don’t have the ability to do.
• So, the Lord is saying that you can and should get rid of worry first putting you in a position to pray about your needs.
• Yes, you can pray about worry first.
• That prayer has a name: the Prayer of Commitment.
• The Prayer of Commitment is where you commit what’s making you anxious over on the Lord.
• You do as the Lord has instructed, you cast your care, your anxiety, the thing that’s got you worried and concerned over and upon the Lord.
• Remember that this is a violent throwing of worry over upon the Lord.
• You are serious and full of determination to get rid of anxiety.
• God is intense about you getting rid of worry and you agree with Him in your intensity.
• Do you remember this verse of scripture in the gospel of Matthew?

Matthew 11:12 (ESV) — 12 From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force.

Praying about Worry Is an Established Bible Fact

• The Word of God says the following.

2 Corinthians 13:1 (KJV) — 1 This is the third time I am coming to you. In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established.

• We already have two witnesses.
• We have 1 Peter 5:7 and we have Philippians 4:6.
• So recapping, God said cast your worries and anxieties over on Him.
• If you cast your worries on Him that means that you don’t have them anymore.
• But there’s more to praying about worry.

Why Soberness and Watchfulness?

1 Peter 5:7–8 (KJV) — 7 Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you. 8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:

• Look at verse eight, it says, ‘Be sober and be watchful.’
• Why do have to be sober and watchful?
• One reason is that if you aren’t, worry will try to come back on you.
• The word sober is another one of those words that you can’t read your 21st-century definition into.
• The Greek word ‘sober’ means to be free from every form of mental and spiritual ‘drunkenness’, fr. excess, passion, rashness, and confusion.
• It means to full of self-control and balance⁷
• The word ‘watchful’ means to be alert or to be awake.
• Once you are sober and watchful, what comes next?

Resist Worry Like You Resist Satan

1 Peter 5:9 (KJV) — 9 Whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.

• Sober and watchful people resist the devil steadfast in their faith.
• How do you resist the devil?
• The same way that Jesus did it by quoting the Word to him.
• So when that mental picture of failure comes to you and it causes that tightening and consternation, that feeling of anxiety within you then you know what to do.
• You have to speak to it and say to it, ‘No, in the name of Jesus, I cast the care of that situation over on the Lord, He’s taking care of it.
• If He is taking care of it, there is no sense in losing sleep over it.
• There is no sense in both of you staying up at night.
• You must do that steadfastly.
• Steadfastly means that means keep doing it.
• You keep reminding the Lord that you no longer have that anxiety, that you have thrown that worry over on the Lord.
• If you keep doing this, after a while, you will notice that the fear will not grab your heart anymore.
• The thought, the temptation to worry will come to you but it won’t grab you as it did before.
• Now, there are more witnesses on the subject of worry.
• Look at Jesus Parable of the Sower in Mark 4:3–20.
• Look at verse nineteen.

What Jesus Says

Mark 4:19 (KJV) — 19 And the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful.

• There’s that word ‘care’ again.
• It’s the same Greek word we’ve been looking at.
• Look at the effect that worry has in this Jesus parable.
• Jesus says that worry chokes off the Word.
• It causes the Word to become unreal in your life.
• So here you are pouring the Word of God in you and you don’t realize the fact that your worrying is a leak in your vessel that is causing you to lose what you are pouring in.
• Jesus said you are unfruitful if you all worry to choke off the Word.
• It doesn’t matter how much you have poured in, how long you have been saved, you are not going to get the power of God working in that situation you are worrying about.
• That’s why you need to pray about worry.
• And, you pray about worry by casting your care on the Lord.

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