worry

Midterms.

Who out there feels overwhelmed by life right now? I know I do.

It is the week before spring break, and midterm season has arrived.

If you know me, you know that I have a tendency to procrastinate. However when I procrastinate, I don’t push the stress out of my mind and do something actually enjoyable like take a nap worry free. No, I stressfully watch Netflix or procrastinate in some other useless way holding on tight to my anxiety.

{Hahaha if you follow me on Instagram, you will find how I turned my procrastination into a very therapeutic way of dealing with stress this week. Thanks Christine! 😹}

The stress builds up to the point that it becomes paralyzing. I know I should be studying and doing the thousand other time sensitive things on my list…

…but I just can’t.

My stress level was reaching a really high point yesterday when God put things in perspective.

Take a deep breath, my friend.

If you are like me and stressing about midterms, stop and thank God. This is the best possible stress to have in the ENTIRE WORLD. If you are worried about midterms, this means you have both the OPPORTUNITY AND ABILITY TO LEARN. If you are worried about midterms, you are not worried about your HEALTH. If you are worried about midterms, you are not worried about being HUNGRY. If you are worried about midterms, you are not worried about your SAFETY or OVERALL WELL-BEING.

If you are not literally worried about an exam, what is the figurative “midterm” in your life right now? Pray for perspective.

If you are worried about some of the things I listed, you are being tested in a different way. I absolutely HATE that you are going through this. However, I assure you that God is with you every step of the way.

Do Not Worry

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

-Matthew 6:25-34

Praise God for the midterms of life, for always being there, and for blessing us beyond what we deserve.

{Group prayer time!}

Please pray that God gives every single person who reads this peace and the knowledge that everything is going to be okay regardless of what is happening right now.

XOXO,

Cat

{Seriously, go check out my Instagram if you want to laugh 😹 @worldofcma}

Control.

Why do we (I) always fight God for control of our lives? We are not qualified to be in control, yet we can’t just give God the reins. I think it’s because we are afraid. We are trying to minimize the likelihood of experiencing failure, hurt, and pain. The way we accomplish this is by using control as a tool to measure the amount of strength we think we have against what we think we can handle. We measure the strength we feel we have today against what we feel we can handle tomorrow… and the next day and the next. Then, we plan our route accordingly. The problem is, first of all, we don’t know what the future holds. Secondly, the amount of strength we have today is not the amount we will be equipped with tomorrow. God gives us the strength to deal with TODAY, our “daily bread”, so we can handle TODAY not tomorrow. Yet, we use today’s allotment of strength to deal with tomorrow’s problems. Scratch that – the many possible problems we imagine could happen tomorrow.

God does not have to imagine anything because He knows. He planned our whole lives before we were even born. However, He didn’t give us a planned roadmap of our lives because He knew it would be too much. He knew we couldn’t handle it. We would be paralyzed with fear and would not get through today, much less tomorrow. Each chapter of our lives has brought varying degrees of failure, hurt, and pain – the things we work so hard to avoid. However, what we fail to realize is that God has not only been there every single time, but He also has gotten us through it every single time. So, why are we so afraid? You have survived everything in your life up to this point, this moment, reading this post on some random girl’s blog. God has brought you through so much. So, why would He abandon you now?

God has a plan (and trust me, it’s a good one). So, stop measuring your own strength when His strength is immeasurable. Do what you were made to do, grab His hand tight, and let go of control.

XOXO,

Cat