What does the Bible say about stress?

Not only are there special trials peculiar to the Christian, but also there are the ordinary trials of life common to mankind. There are the everyday anxieties connected with our homes, our families, our health, our callings, and our circumstances. How are we made superior to these varied cares? It is evident that God would have his children to be free from all worry and anxiety. This, the word clearly tells us, can only be brought about by taking everything to God in prayer. It is not simply the great trials that we are to take to God, but the small worries. The little thing that worries might appear foolish or fanciful to others, nevertheless let us not weary ourselves with reasoning about it in our minds, but by prayer and supplication make it known to God. He knows all about the burden before we go to Him. We cannot tell Him anything that He does not know; but making it known we know that He knows. In result we are relieved from anxiety. It does not follow that we get our request, but we obtain the peace of God to garrison our hearts.

The Apostle faces the many things that in a world of change and need may give the believer occasion for care and anxiety. In the presence of these things he would have us to be care-free, for he says, be careful for nothing." Then we learn that this is only possible by taking "every thing" to God in prayer with supplication and thanksgiving. It is not simply "some things" or "difficult things" but "everything" is to be taken to Him – the small worries as well as the great trials. Whatever weighs upon the spirit at the moment, whatever fills us with dread and foreboding as we think of the morrow, all is to be poured into the ear of God.

Here the Apostle's exhortation has in view the circumstances of life. He is not unmindful that, in a world of sorrow and sickness, of want and care, there will be trials to face and burdens to be borne; but, he would not have us racking our poor hearts with them. He, himself, writes from a prison, and had suffered want, and a companion and fellow-labourer had been sick nigh to death; but in these sorrowful circumstances he had been lifted above all anxious care, and therefore can say to others, "Be careful for nothing."

We may have to face trials in our families, trials in our businesses, trials amongst the Lord's people; sorrows from sickness, sorrows from want, sorrows from the saints, that press upon us as a great burden and, as one has said, "How often a burden possesses a person's mind, and when he tries in vain to cast it off, it comes back and worries him."

Do you believe that? The character of my whole life will be governed by this, if I believe it. You may say, I have troubles in my family; the saints are going wrong, etc. Well, "Be careful for nothing; but in everything," etc. What do you want? Go and ask God about it. Instead of harassing your own mind about it, carry it to Him: and it is not said He will give you just what you ask, because this might not be for your good; but He gives you His peace. You put your cares into His heart, and He will put His peace into yours. Do all the things that trouble you disturb the peace of God? "With thanksgiving," etc. When I put my affairs in persons' hands, and ask them to see to it for me, they undertake it, and I say, Thank you, although as yet they have done nothing in it; In this state of soul the heart is free to enjoy what I see in others. There is such a tendency in us to get living in the things of the world, where we could not have the heart of Christ with us.

"Be careful for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God." His peace is better than cares. We have cares and sorrows, true, and we should have more, if we were living more as servants among the sorrows of this world. Not indifferent - Christ was never that. But there is a getting away from Christ in my own heart - a tendency to make one anxious even in caring for others. But I must go and tell God, and this carries me so above the cares that I can rejoice in Him.

What does God give to the heart that has given all its cares to Him? An answer? No (though we know He does answer): but His peace! Is God's heart taken up with circumstances? troubled by them? Is His throne shaken by the folly and the wickedness of the world; or even the failure of the saints? Never! Put your cares, then, on God, and He will put His peace into your heart - the ineffable peace of God! He who knows the end from the beginning - the peace He is in, shall keep your heart and mind through Jesus Christ. There is no indifference, carelessness, or coldness, but supplication, earnest entreaty, and all with thanksgiving.

In the previous article we considered the circumstances of those to whom Peter wrote and the anxious care which would naturally arise from those circumstances. They were directed to cast all their care upon God, who cared for them. In Matthew 6 the things that may give rise to this anxious care are much more general. They are not wants that arise only in exceptional circumstances, but everyday needs that all of us have. In particular the Lord speaks of food and drink for the sustaining of our lives, and clothing for our bodies. Perhaps most of the readers of this magazine, like the writer, have become accustomed to an abundance of these things. Some may be able to remember times when there was a shortage and the anxiety that was then felt. Many believers in the world today are in straightened circumstances and their concern about their needs, and those of their families, is understandable. Nevertheless three times in this passage the Lord instructs his hearers not to be careful, or anxious, about these matters1. It is in connection with them that He brings home the care of the Father and the provision made by Him.

It is unbelief, accompanied by loving the world or the things in the world, which produces anxiety, darkness, and doubt, as in the Gentiles who knew not God. If we know Him, and the blessedness of His kingdom, and the perfection of His righteousness, why be careful for the morrow? For the morrow, says the Lord, shall be careful for itself. Has He failed us today, or in the past? What evil has He ever done us, what good thing withheld from us? Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof. Even if the hardest trials come, do we not know that all things work together for good to those that love God, to those called according to purpose?

There you get a class, I believe very much larger than the company that the rich man was in. In this world there are a great many more oppressed by poverty, than riches. How am I going to make ends meet? is often in the heart if not expressed by the lip. Care, like a canker, eats out the very life of many a dear child of God. If such be your present condition, the Lord's words, "Take no thought," and "Your Father knows," may well comfort your heart. The Lord really says here, Do not think of tomorrow.

In this connection there is a charming word in the end of the sixth chapter of Matthew. Did you ever notice it? "Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof" (Matt. 6:34). How oftentimes, beloved friends, have we troubled and worried ourselves about what was going to be on the morrow, and, when it came, we found how beautifully the Lord stepped in. We found that His care, and His love, had anticipated all our need, and more than met it. "Your Father knows that ye have need of these things." Oh, they are lovely words. To me, these three words, "Your Father knows," are exquisite. Ah, beloved, to get them deeply engraved in the soul! To remember that your Father knows, is to put the heart at peace. Further, we might never have to face tomorrow, because, before tomorrow comes, the Lord may have come, and we may have gone home to our Father's house on high.

And what does anxiety and care accomplish after all? "But which of you by being careful can add to his growth one cubit? And why are you careful about clothing?" etc. (Verses 27-33). We are then utterly helpless in ourselves. Alas! how often we look in our anxiety, in sickness and in health to something in ourselves and to men and man's help and not to Him in whose hands we are so secure and leave it all with Him, committing our way unto the Lord. And all this is applicable to even the smallest matters of the daily life. Seeking then first of all the kingdom of God and His righteousness -- that is, the things which are above -- the promise is given, all things shall be added unto you.

And there is another characteristic about anxiety. It looks unbelievingly ahead. Unbelief draws dark pictures of despair and occupies the mind with a day which may never come. How different it ought to be and will be if we but follow His word, "Be not careful then as to the morrow, for the morrow will be careful for itself: sufficient for the day is its own evil."

Now let us look at the third class here, that is, the thorns. In the thorns I see the effect of mixed motives. I believe the first is indifference, the second is shallowness, and the third mixed motives. "And some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no fruit." The Lord explained it in this way; "These are they which are sown among thorns, such as hear the word" — now mark — "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 is a double action in the thorns; there is the light-excluding power of the thorns, and there is the terrible grip which the thorn growing up has over the plant, so that it chokes it; it has neither light nor fruit. The light is excluded from the plant by the power of the thorn, and it is choked before it can produce fruit under the enormous tenacity and grip of the thorn upon it. Now mark what the Lord calls thorns when he takes this out of parable and puts it into reality for us. It is a very strong word that is used in the original for "cares," the very strongest word that can be used; it means corroding, perplexing, withering care, care that, so to speak, would cut a man in two! 1 believe that is really the thought of it; the cares of this world." I want to press that earnestly upon our hearts to-night; because you know we should all accept the other part of it, we should all say, "I know something about the deceitfulness of riches," though we might like to have them for all that, and I quite believe there is a danger of the "lusts of other things" coming in; but I am quite sure many of us tonight might speak humbly before God about cares, for we know what it is to pass through terrible anxiety about cares till God in His infinite grace freed us from them. But there is nothing that has so destructive an effect upon a Christian as care, and for this reason, because we think in a kind of way, and reason to ourselves, that we have a right, and that it is correct and proper for us to have cares. Now where have we learned that it is right and proper for us to have cares? Oh, the terrible pressure of anxiety and fretting and trouble and difficulty that too often settles down upon us, "the cares of this world" do indeed corrode. Have we not a Father in heaven whose heart delights that we should roll our burden upon Him? Is there not a bosom and a heart where if you put your head you can lose your care? Does not He invite us in the love of His heart really to cast the thing upon Him, really to roll it upon Him? As the apostle says, "Casting all your care upon him." Why? In order to get free from it? No, but because "He careth for you." "Be careful for nothing," that is the same word. Do you say how? "In everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God; and the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts." It is these cares that wear people out, these anxieties that press upon us. And more than that, often it is not so much cares about the present, but cares about the future. How do you know that you will have that future? What right have we to talk about to-morrow? Look here, beloved friends, we oftentimes put before our minds a to-morrow with some sort of perplexing worry we have to meet, when today or to-night we might be with the Lord. It is not to-morrow and the burdens that we imagine, but it is to-day. How do you know to-morrow will ever come. Alas it is not only to-morrow, but we hear people constantly say, "I do not know what I shall do next year." Why should we trouble ourselves as to next year? Rather let us hearken to what the scriptures bring before us, "Now we beseech you brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and by our gathering together unto him." This is the proximate, immediate hope before us. We have to do with Him to-day, and He may be here before to-night. A person said not long since to me, "I did not think of that." The Lord help us to think of it, how it disposes of all anticipations. May we not well dread about ourselves, and fear as to how far the truth and doctrines we assert are practical with us? For instance, this very truth of the Lord's coming, that precious, blessed present living hope for our hearts. What is the value of our assertion of it in words, if by it we are not delivered out of this wretched, miserable, corroding care with regard to the future? If it were in our hearts in power I believe it would thus work. I say I may not be here, yet if I am here, and if the trouble is there, thank God, there is One whose heart is sufficient, whose tenderness is unbounded, whose power is unlimited, and whose grace knows no end and no let; and is He going to desert me? I believe in my soul it is a simple question of our knowing Him, and knowing His heart, so that we can trust Him. To know Him is to trust Him.