TRANSCRIPT
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oh we deleted our bumper video it’s gone okay so hi everyone good morning welcome my name is alex I’m one of the pastors this is my tag team preaching buddy this morning I uh bear with me for a second that was the best bear don’t groan dare you it’s a great bear pun sometimes I think I understand you people I really don’t um so what I will say is this when you put a giant bear in the front seat of a car and drive through starbucks drive-through you get some very curious looks most people seem to value it but you know it’s not for everybody and we’ll get to the bear in a little while oh that’s not me ah do we have any slides ah so the slides are on the desktop and we’ll just talk for a little while about just the bear and all those kind of things so we are in a series that we called hindsight is 2020. it was this uh opportunity for us to
look back just on some of the experiences that we went through last year and talk about how we might do some things that will change what the next year looks like next week we’re moving on to a series uh that we’re calling quite simply building stronger friendships so one of the things that we were amazed about as a sermon planning team uh that we began to look at what are the what are the relational needs of people in america in 2021 and this is a season where I love to do some kind of relationship series and sometimes we’ll talk about how we can parent better or grandparent better sometimes we’ll talk about better relationships in marriages and all those different things but actually when you look at some of the details of what’s going on in our world one of the greatest needs is friendship about 10 years ago most
people would be able to identify having at least six good friends by around the last couple of years it had dropped to two the loneliest people in the world are guys over the age of 60 who’ve lost their spouses because suddenly they find out that all of their friends were actually their wife’s friends and not really theirs and so there’s all these cultural things going on so we just thought you know what let’s take three weeks before lent uh to talk about how we first might start friendships second might build them better and and thirdly what does it look like to be friends with Jesus and moving a friendship relationship with Jesus so that’s a short three week thing we’re going to be doing and then we’ll be into lent and we’re doing a book study on the book of ruth and those of you that love to go verse by verse will be in your element because
this book is just a dream as it leads us up to easter lent is this fabulous season if you’ve never done it or maybe you’ve done it as part of a catholic church and you’re kind of not sure about doing it again lent is this season where we recognize that there’s times where it feels like God is absent and that sometimes recognizing that as it builds us up to easter makes the joy of resurrection sunday and everything we celebrate in who Jesus is and what he did just shine all the more brightly so we’d love to invite you into that journey so this is where we’ve been so far over the last three three weeks since the start of the year we’ve talked about these three principles that we might learn from our experience of 2020 to live in gratitude the first thing I noticed is that there was some stuff that maybe I hadn’t appreciated before that I needed to
learn to appreciate just being able to sit in a coffee shop with something after 2020 or sometime around april I was like oh I miss the community vibe of of that there were so many things that just stood up to just being able to drop over to a loved one’s house being able to get on a plane or in a car and drive were all things we suddenly said oh I miss those things we live maybe better in gratitude when we learn from that experience we maybe can learn to choose together and to build community where we can did you notice that there were things that we missed but when we got to the heart of it it wasn’t the thing itself it was the people behind the thing I suddenly missed going to the gym but actually what I missed was the people I used to work out with at the gym you maybe had a place that you used to go regularly and suddenly
you said I miss those people I don’t miss being in the office but I do miss relationships in the office all those type of things that allowed us to gather we said I miss those relationships are so fundamental to life and maybe we learn to choose to gather more intentionally and then last week we talked about growing on purpose we looked at how the language that the bible uses about Jesus was that Jesus grew intentionally and on purpose in wisdom and favor with God and man it was a purposeful action God works in us and that starts the work but we have to choose to participate with God and think about all the things you experienced all the negative things what we said is there are actually ways that you can take negative experiences and say I’m going to choose to learn from that and then this is the fourth one so yeah ignore that we’ll
talk about the fourth one today so this is paul for the last time he’s in this little place called philippi over there where the p is one of the x’s is where he’s stuck in prison somewhere and overall the theme of this book has been incredible in spite of all the challenges and think about it in comparison to our 2020 all of the challenges his constant refrain is this because of God’s good grace we can choose joy at all times even in the midst of trials paul says there’s joy you can find ways to be joyful this is the epistle or letter of joy mentions the word 16 times which is just for the size of the letter just an incredible amount of time and so for those of you that like to know where we’re going this week I’ll reference the passages as we come up grab your phones take a picture jot them down they’ll be on social media during the week this is our
journey for today and this is what paul would tell us rejoice in the lord always I will say it again rejoice let your gentleness be evident to all the lord is near do not be anxious about anything but in every situation by prayer and petition with thanksgiving present your requests to God and the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in christ Jesus and we’ll carry on a little bit further later let’s pray and we’ll get into all the wonderful things this says Jesus as a community here at home wherever we are we see some stuff in this verse that already begins to speak to us I’m sure in so many ways we find ourselves to be anxious people especially when we don’t keep our eyes on you for those of us that don’t know you you invite us into relationship for those of us on a journey that feel distracted you
invite us to turn our eyes back to you God would you speak to us through these words that you breathed on you made this book alive may make us alive in new ways thank you Jesus amen so let’s start there rejoice in the lord always I will say it again rejoice paul in the midst of everything that’s going on says no you can rejoice in every situation and he’s in a bad situation he says rejoice it’s this little word charity which simply means be glad because of grace maybe you can remember back to week one we talked about this word eucharisto which meant be thankful for all good grace it talked about being able to say that God’s grace has worked well even in the situation it was a declaration that God knows what he’s doing it’s okay and in this situation paul will go a little bit further and he’ll say no be glad because of grace find a way to
see God’s grace working in your life now if you’re not following Jesus at the moment that’s fine we’re so glad that you’re here we’re so glad you’re listening or watching online there are things that you can be glad for and you need someone to thank I would suggest this is a picture I took of sunset out on pelican lake laura’s grandfather owns a place up on pelican lake in minnesota and they get the most startling sunsets and so I sat with my girls late at night on the boat in the summer and just looked out at this sunset and it was this moment for me of being thankful of just enjoying the good simple things that God had given me that week we ate some wonderful food we spent time with people we loved my kids learnt to fish and I watched the joy as they caught their first little fish and the heartbreaking decision they had to make when they decide
did that fish get to live or was that fish going to be food and all of the dilemmas that kids go through there and I was thankful thankful that there were times where they threw the fish back thankful that there were times where we got to eat and they decided that the fish could be food but this is what’s called common grace everybody gets it everybody gets something that is good you may not get all of those things that I just talked about but there are things in your life that are common grace and we get to be glad and this this verse takes it a little bit further because the first one talks about an inner thankfulness of gratitude this one talks about a declaration where you say almost out loud no God’s grace is good I am glad for the grace that I have been given and that of course goes deeper for those of you that are choosing to follow
Jesus right now because there’s this recognition that this God works in your life that he has done things for you and in you he has made your life what it is everything good in my life when I look at it it comes back to Jesus I met laura I met my wife because of my relationship with Jesus and that brought me the wonderful joy of my kids I ended up here because of my relationship with Jesus all of those different things come out of that and so I get to go the next step and I’m glad not just for common grace but for what theologians call particular grace God has done something for me particularly and I am glad and I rejoice because of that and that is where paul starts and then he moves on to say something else which doesn’t seem to fit within the rest of the the little passage we’re looking at so we won’t spend a ton of time on it he says
that your gentleness be evident to all the lord is near the this early church lived with this constant expectation that Jesus was coming back soon maybe something we struggle with today it’s been 2 000 years and yet there’s passages that talk about well a thousand years and a day to God there’s not much difference it’s not like it’s been a long time from this heavenly perspective but for them they lived with this any moment Jesus could come back and the world will be as it should and so be ready and for a christian that meant gentleness one of the spiritual fruits or fruits of the spirit just show the world that you can live like Jesus because he’s coming soon all of the things that are held against you this was a group of people remember we talked about in week one and two that’s been persecuted that’s being attacked and paul says
you don’t need to fight back you can rest you can be at peace everyone will see one day when Jesus comes back you were right you did make the right decision you don’t have to argue your own case and then the next verse and this is where we’re going to spend a chunk of our time today do not be anxious about anything do not be anxious about anything and yet we know don’t we the anxiety in our world is huge statistically anxiety has increased across the board for everybody over the last 10 years if you’re in the category of 18 to 25 anxiety has doubled now before we get too far into it there’s definitely a difference between anxious feelings and a clinical anxiety so there are ways that if you have clinical anxiety there can be medication doctors can help you can go into counseling and all those different things this isn’t to make you
feel bad but every single one of us at times would own to be anxious to be worried to being concerned there’s that feeling that takes place where we sort of feel discombobulated is maybe a great word the the greek word that poor uses is this word norma nate it means quite literally to be pulled apart in different directions it’s this feeling of I don’t feel whole I don’t feel complete right now I feel like everything inside me is is disordered and I I just can’t sit comfortably I wanted to try and recreate some of that feeling a little bit for you so I created I found some of these images online the images that are supposed to sort of give you that slightly anxious feeling this is one of eggs slowly rolling off a conveyor belt and you get to experience that feeling of what happens when they crack the eggs will be broken that’s no good
they’re not supposed to break how about this one there’s a balloon over a bunch of pins and it’s slowly it’s going to descend at some point the helium will run out and it will slowly start to land and then pop it’s gone the bowling ball about to roll over all the packaging stuff and just the the pop pop pop pop pop and then this one is my favorite this one is the one that got to me this was the one I was like ah I don’t like the look of this I like clean clothes and there’s the fountain pen with the ink and it’s just suspended just waiting to fall and that perfectly white shirt will suddenly not be perfectly white anymore and it shouldn’t be that way should it it should stay clean and white forever look at that beautifully starched color and everything’s clearly a person that knows how to dress well and so these feelings give us a little taste of what we’re talking
about when we’re talking about anxiety it’s a feeling of being uh out of place torn apart I don’t feel like I can sit comfortably in this situation right now paul talks about anxiousness and this is a big topic as I said amongst sort of sociological conversations and how our brain work amongst psychiatrists and it all comes down to these two incredible words the sympathetic and the parasympathetic and I love it when the bible matches up with scientific scientific things that people are discovering and talking about now because it just says that God knew what he was talking about all the time you have these two nervous systems that work in you all the time one is the sympathetic system one is the parasympathetic system you might know them by two other phrases the first is fight or flight and the second is rest and digest when you have that
moment of tension your body goes into what’s called fight or flight you either stand up to the problem or you run away from it but something reacts but what has to happen for that to happen is this all of those other important systems they shut down they stop working your digestion digestion literally stops working when you’re in anxiety when you go into the sympathetic nervous system it stops functioning multiple systems just shut down so you can run as fast as you possibly can or fight as hard as you possibly can so this is where our friend here comes into play this is red bow bear I over thought him a little bit I nearly put clothes on him and stuff like this because you know I just whatever but I I decided I was overthinking that he’s just a bear he used to have a red bow hence the name red bow bear but he lost it but we
didn’t change his name we felt that was cruel so this is the kids bear and and when we’re talking about sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems that movement from parasympathetic rest and digest all is well is the same movement that would have been made if you were around two thousand four thousand years ago and in the midst of looking for food out trundles mr red bull bear suddenly your system panics suddenly you desire lose all desire for food you are no longer hungry your body is no longer functioning in the normal ways suddenly everything in you says this I either run or I fight now here’s here’s the thing you are made to function in the sympathetic system for a short period of time but you cannot function there for the long term that’s not what it’s made for it’s made for crisis it’s made for
emergencies it’s made but we’ve got to solve this problem now so if you are constantly living in the presence of the bear and by that I mean like constantly living under anxiety multiple other things that are supposed to work they just don’t work in the way that they’re supposed to we cannot function in anxiety on a natural level that’s just not possible and paul knows this so his comment is be anxious for nothing and yet here’s the truth for our lives and for the philippians the philippian story is loaded with reasons for anxiety we talked early on paul is in jail he might die he might be killed for his faith maybe he’ll get out but he probably won’t he’s not seen these people he loves for years and he’s worried about their spiritual health this church in philippi they are persecuted they are not like there’s a political leader that’s going to start persecuting
persecuting christians in just a couple of years from now and the tensions are already rising there are multiple reasons in philippians to be anxious and I would suggest that’s probably true for us as well we probably can find multiple reasons that we could be anxious maybe it’s what the future holds maybe it’s our personal lives maybe it’s relationships maybe it’s work life all of these different things we can summon them up I’m sure maybe it’s just what’s happening in other nations all around the world maybe it’s coronavirus all these different things are reasons for anxiety we have them just as this church in philippi did and yet paul I think would say the same to us be anxious for nothing be anxious for nothing here’s a question for you why are we so anxious I’ve given you a few different reasons but I talked briefly about anxiety rising across
the board why is that taking place and what’s what’s maybe the cause and to sort of get to the bottom of this I’d love us to take a look at a couple of different stories from the old testament and just see how people react so the first story comes from exodus chapter 16. it’s going to cover verses 11 27 it’s on the list it’ll be on social media but let’s get into this text because it’s fascinating the lord said to moses I have heard the grumbling of the israelites tell them at twilight you will eat meat and in the morning you will be filled with bread then you will know that I am the lord your God this group of people have escaped a land called egypt they’re in the middle of the desert there is no natural food source and so we’re told in this story that God provides for them supernaturally he’s going to give them this type of bread in the morning it’s
called manna and then quail will land in the evening they’ll get both bread and they’ll get meat that evening quail came and covered the camp and in the morning there was a layer of jew around the camp when the jew was gone thin flakes like frost on the ground appeared on the desert floor when the israelites saw it they said to each other what is it for they did know not know what it was moses said to them it is the bread the lord has given you to eat this is what the lord has commanded everyone is to gather as much as they need take an oma for each person you have in your tent the israelites did as they were told some gathered much some gathered little and when they measured it by the oma the one who gathered much did not have too much and the one who gathered little did not have too little everyone had gathered just as
much as they needed the the message from God to this group of people is I will take care of you supernaturally I will do what is necessary you don’t have the natural food that you need I will provide and then he does but look what happens a little further in the story then moses said to them no one is to keep any of it until the morning you must trust that the next morning the food supply will be back in the same way it was the day before however some of them paid no attention to moses they kept part of it until morning but it was full of maggots and began to smell so moses was angry with them each morning everyone gathered as much as they needed and when the sun grew hot it melted away on the sixth day they gathered twice as much two overs for each person and the leaders of the community came and reported this to moses he
said to them this is what the lord commanded tomorrow is to be a day of sabbath rest a holy sabbath to the lord so bake what you want to bake boil what you want to boil save whatever is left and keep it until the morning so they saved it until morning as moses commanded and it did not stink or get maggots in it first time when they kept it the next day and they didn’t trust went bad this time when they’re told that the next day is a day of rest they can trust God he’s going to provide enough for that day when there is no manner there is no quail when they keep it it’s fine eat it today moses said because today is a sabbath to the lord you will not find any of it on the ground today six days you are to gather it but on the seventh day the sabbath there will not be any nevertheless some of the people went out on the seventh day to gather it but
they found none it’s not there there is no provision on the seventh day this is predating this this moment where God will give these people ten commandments and one of them will be to keep the sabbath and to keep it holy and to rest but in this principle for for these people in this desert there is this constant refrain you work six days you take a day off we live in a world that tells us we have to do more and more and more there’s constantly another ask there’s an anxious another anxiousness that says I won’t be provided for there won’t be enough there’s always another day to work and these people reflect us so well there’s always the extra thing that has to be done there is no rest and the question is why what causes this anxiety this struggle that there won’t be provision let’s take a look at a story back from just before this story
took place this is when these people are still in egypt and it’s in exodus chapter 5 verse 6 to 12. that same day pharaoh gave this order to the slave drivers and overseers in charge of the people you are no longer to supply the people with straw for making bricks these people were slaves their job was to make bricks for the egyptians to keep building you are no longer to supply the people with straw for making bricks let them go and gather their own straw but require them to make the same number of bricks as before don’t reduce the quota they are lazy that is why they are crying out let us go and sacrifice to our guard make the work harder for the people so they are key they keep working and pay no attention to lies then the slave drivers and the overseers went out and said to the people this is what pharaoh says I will not give you
any more straw go and get your own straw wherever you can find it but your work will not be reduced at all so the people scattered all over egypt to gather stubble to use to use for straw this people are taught by hard experience that they have to keep producing there’s more and more to be done and there’s less and less resources to produce it with so they have to work harder and harder to get to the same level as before doesn’t that sound like what society tells us today when we think about anxiety rates in 19 to 25 specifically spiking up it’s based around this fear of what does my future look like will there be enough resources for me will I match up to the expectations will I keep up with all of my friends that are going to go out and achieve stuff will I measure up will I be successful there’s this constant drive towards what the future
looks like and when you don’t know that your future is in God’s hands what that tells you is when there’s a seventh day available you work when the space available you do the extra bit just keep going and one day you might be able to stop and rest but that is not this day just keep on going can you see why that drives anxiety higher and higher there is no ability in that scenario to trust that God will provide in that scenario we constantly live in the presence of this bear we constantly live in this this idea of sympathetic nervous system we constantly live under this illusion that we cannot rest and digest we are in fight or flight there is no peace of course there’s anxiety what I realize about me is this I have a desire to make myself the center of everything the world revolves around me at my worst point I want to know that I’m going to be
successful that I’m going to achieve that people will look at me and think well of me and all of those different things that itself in itself is a cause for anxiety it means that what happens to me is the biggest deal in the world and and somewhere this this poor line thing and this faith thing it asks us to step away from that it asks us to do something else with the center of our lives or the center of the universe it tells us we can’t live in the center this is frederick beatner talking about faith faith is not so much believing this or that thing about God as it is hearing a voice that says come unto me we hear the voice and we step towards it without really knowing much about the voice or ourselves faith is standing in the darkness and taking the hand offered to you maybe you’ve been waiting to follow Jesus until you know every single thing about him and
you’ve got everything figured out figured out and that is really how it works the decision to follow Jesus is to step out and take hold of a hand that says you can trust me I’ve been here before I have walked this journey you can come with me we may know some of the details we may have some things that are important that we kind of have figured out but it’s very rarely about figuring it all out mentally faith at its core is this hard decision to step towards this God that we don’t really know yet but who says I know you intimately I know everything about you I know what you need we’re invited to step towards him but to do that involves taking ourselves out of the center this is Jesus view of anxiety therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow for tomorrow will be anxious for itself sufficient for the day is its own trouble do you see how that
connects with this story of egypt this people that can’t trust that tomorrow will take care of itself or at least that God will take care of tomorrow do you see how it connects with what paul tells us but in every situation by prayer and petition with thanksgiving present your requests to God now I’d love us to pause and acknowledge the tension there because what I don’t want you to hear is just pray about it and everything will be fine there is some truth to the power of others tons of truth to the power of prayer prayer does things but when you hear that especially if you’re not on a Jesus journey right now that can just sound slightly naive and slightly disconnecting I remember on a journey to the philippines I’d never been abroad before I was 19 years old in a team of 30 year olds and I remember this ferry journey as I’d already
traveled for two whole days and then there’s me and 150 filipinos in this like bunk bed situation on this ferry for 10 hours as we made our way to mindanao and and I just was exhausted just done in everything was so new and I remember getting there and them telling us we won’t be able to leave you in the place that you were supposed to stay you were supposed to stay in this village but there’s been an uprising in the southern part of the island they’re invading the northern part of the island they’re kidnapping americans and british tourists or missionaries and we need to put you somewhere safer so they moved us to the city and I remember lying there the first night and all I could hear was bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang and I can hear it’s gunfire I’m terrified there’s people coming and they’re coming for us and so I
turn around to the 30 year olds that I was traveling with at 19 years old and I said what do we do and their answer was just pray about it and I remember for me at 19 with someone who was developing my own faith but was still figuring out my thought was you flipping christians you have one answer to everything don’t you there must be something practical that we can do that will help in this situation but to just do nothing seems ridiculous so if you feel that desk disconnect I have been there now to conclude the story because I’ve told this story before and forgot to tell the ending we finally fell asleep the noise stopped and when we walked out the next morning we found out what the noise was uh the lady that was cooking for the conference we were attending had killed a cow and she was using a machete to chop it up on a table right
outside our window so what sounded like gunfire was just actually good butchering so just the story ended up fine but the truth is as well that while it can seem naive I can tell you story after story about prayer doing the most startling things and many of these people in the room would tell you the same thing we see these ways that when things are committed to God in prayer the supernatural happens someone once said that about the idea of prayer and coincidence that when I pray coincidences happen and when I don’t they don’t there’s something about our ability to come to God and give him these things and say you take care of him that does work will he solve all of your anxiety in an instant maybe not will it mean that you never have those moments where you slip into sympathetic nervous system and you’re not sure what to do
maybe not but there are ways that when we bring things to God in prayer our attitude changes and we’ll look at that a little bit more the famous psalm 23 that many of you will know that talks about guard as this wonderful shepherd has this curious verse in the middle of it I’ve given you the version in the message it says you serve me a six-course dinner right in front of my enemies you might know it as you prepare a table for me in the presence of my enemies think for just a second about all we talked about about sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems and how the two operate when you think about sympathetic as as being the stopping of your digestion system when you think about anxiety is the reason that you’re very rarely hungry when you’re struggling with anxiety God invites you in the midst of that to sin and trust
him what he essentially says is this in the presence of this bear I’m going to put him here at the table I brought him a knife and fork and everything and little cups and stuff like that it tells us that in the presence of the bear in the presence of everything that would drive you to anxiety you can sit and enjoy fine dining you can sit and enjoy a meal you don’t have to allow your system to drive you into fight or flight because this God allows you to sit and enjoy fine dining even in those moments where you may feel anxious that is the incredible joy of psalm 23 and and I love that paul this guy is so on one hand spiritual and so on another hand practical because he tells us to just commit things to God whatever you are anxious about by prayer and supplication let God know what you need and then on the other hand he gives you this very
practical wisdom finally brothers and sisters whatever is true whatever is noble whatever is right whatever is pure whatever is lovely whatever is admirable if anything is excellent or praiseworthy think about such things and one hand God says pray and on another hand he says choose to intentionally focus on what is good choose to take your eyes off all of the things that are negative and choose to think about these good things as we think about anxiety one of the things to be aware of is this on a practical note when you slip into that sympathetic nervous system when you go into fight or flight when you feel that sense of being pulled apart it happens like a light switch that’s how the system works something happens and it just flicks on and you’re there and so know what flicks the switch know what sends you into that state but
you can’t always avoid all of those things that’s just not possible unfortunately the change back to parasympathetic that doesn’t happen like a flick switch that happens like a dimmer switch it’s a slow process of slowly moving it back and allowing your body to come and return to its normal way of processing things so on a practical level here’s some advice know what turns that dimmer know what allows you to rest yes prayer definitely commit those things to God but on a practical level know what it is that you can do that return that that will allow you to turn that dimmer and slowly return yourself to normal here’s some ideas for you music around 70 beats per minute it’s the natural rhythm of your heart when you go into fight or flight your heartbeat increases music at 70 beats per minute actually allows your heart rate to return to
where it’s supposed to be being outside in natural beauty looking at the mountains experiencing the freshness of the air all of those things help prayer yes we talked about that it allows your body to to just relax this focus on God and bringing of things to him deep breaths that allow your heart rate to regulate a warm bath drinking cold water these are all practical things that just allow your system to reset I love that this bible offers us both the spiritual yes commit your things to God let him take care of it know that tomorrow will take care of itself but also choose to think about what is good choose to think about what is lovely know your body well enough to know that on a practical level you can turn that dimmer switch you have more control over anxiety than you realize you have more control than you realize as we think about
our fourth principle I had these different ideas as we talked about different things before the first idea that I came to was give yourself a break anxiety is the enemy of rest you cannot rest in anxiety I loved about the pandemic early on that suddenly I would see families talking about sitting down to meals and suddenly there was no traffic on the roads in the evening did I want it to last forever no but there was some beauty in that moment of okay everything is a little different right now give yourself a break give yourself rest was another option I came up with but I didn’t feel at the end those got to the heart of what I think we need to focus on or what we need to take from 2020. this is where I landed give God the center give God the center that’s what Jesus language about anxiety comes down to that’s what paul’s language about
anxiety comes down to when we take God out of the center when we place ourselves there we constantly find ourselves flexing between sympathetic and parasympathetic we constantly find ourselves struggling in the presence of despair and God’s word to us is give me the center and you can enjoy fine dining even in the presence of the bear I’m going to invite aaron and the team up on stage and we’re going to pray and close God thank you that you’re present with us we recognize that we are in a world that’s anxious for those here that struggle with clinical anxiety we pray that they would know no guilt over that they would know wise counsel that they would know good physicians good psychiatrists that can help them on that journey that they can be the right medication when it’s required or necessary that there can be all those
things in place but we recognize a world where so many of us feel anxious about our futures anxious about what is next anxious about whether you will provide for our needs thank you that you invite us to come to you in prayer you come to refle will you invite us to come and give our needs to you and then you ask us to trust that you will take care of them in the midst of trusting and believing thank you that you give us all these practical things that work on our bodies that allow us to rest that allow us to turn the dimmer switch thank you for the invitation that even in the presence of the bear we can enjoy fine dining with you a six-course meal thank you Jesus amen
