Do You Care Too Much?

Cast your burden on the Lord, and he will sustain you. Psalms 55:22

Care, even when addressed to legitimate matters, if it is carried to excess, has in it the nature of sin. Again and again Jesus exhorted His followers to avoid anxious care. The apostles reiterated the call; and it is one that cannot be neglected without involving transgression: For the very essence of anxious care is imagining that we are wiser than God and putting ourselves in His place as if we could do for Him what He has undertaken to do for us. We attempt to think of things that we imagine Him forgetting; we work to take upon ourselves a heavy burden, as if He were unable or unwilling to take it for us.

Now this disobedience to His plain precept, this unbelief in His Word, this presumption that intrudes upon His province, is all sinful. But more than this, anxious care often leads to acts of sin. If we cannot calmly leave our affairs in God's hand but attempt to carry our own burden, we will be tempted to use wrong means to help ourselves. This sin leads to a forsaking of God as our counselor and resorting instead to human wisdom. This is going to the broken well instead of to the fountain, a sin of which Israel was guilty in the past.

Anxiety makes us doubt God's loving-kindness, and so our love to Him grows cold; we feel mistrust, and in this we grieve the Spirit of God, so that our prayers are hindered, our consistent example spoiled, and our life one of self-seeking. Such lack of confidence in God leads us to wander far from Him; but if through simple faith in His promise we cast each burden as it comes upon Him and are "not . . . anxious about anything"¹ because He undertakes to care for us, it will keep us close to Him and strengthen us against temptation. "You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you."²

¹Philippians 4:6

²Isaiah 26:1

Opened my morning devotional a few days ago to this...Do You Care Too Much?  How weird, I thought.  How can you care too much?  Oh...easily!  Not only do I take the lead in fixing "things" in my life but in others lives as well and in doing so I rarely even ask God what He wants.  If I do ask, His answers never come quickly enough or the way I want them or expect them and I find myself anxious.  That is the impetus for striking out on my own and doing it myself.  I  think I do this every day.  And why?  I really had to look at my intentions...do I do the things I do for others and care and worry about them because I am so godly and feel called to respond to their needs...or....do I do it because I either like the accolades or is it that I do not trust God to finish what He has started?  Well, I think it is both at different times depending on which way the winds blew that day.  This just proves that I need to get more grounded in the Word and desires of God rather than my desires.  I need to be more single minded in God's will and direction for me and how I handle myself and others.  I do not need to play God and dole out blessings to others as I see fit.  Oh, how wretched they would be anyway since I have no power apart from Him.  Only He can do those things as He sees fit.  I am reminded of 1 Samuel 3:18 "It is the Lord, let Him do what seems good to Him".  I know we are all called to be in service to our brothers and sisters in Christ as well as our fellow man, but we are not to take on the will of God for them or ourselves and do as we think should be done.  I am starting to remember so many times that I may have stepped in and taken the lesson from someone by doing for them what God set forth for them to do themselves.  I must go forward much more prayerfully and carefully as I listen to each desire of God's will for not only me but the person I may be assisting.  I do not want them to lose the lesson or myself.  Discernment and obedience is key here..

Gracious Father~

I come boldly to your throne of grace and thank You for my life. I pray that You will continue the work in me that You have so lovingly started.  I am learning to suffer well and be thankful in my affliction knowing You are softening the sharp corners of my soul.  Lord, help me to desire your severe mercy in my life.  Let me shine Your light through service to others in a way that glorifies You and never takes Your lessons away from them.  They are blessings you bestow on them and they are not for my glory but Yours, Oh Father!  I thank you for allowing me to be a part of a Community Group that loves and honors You and keeps me accountable for my daily living.  Please Father, give me that serving heart so I can become a vital part of this group for Your glory. Thank you for giving me a desire to know You and worship You with my life. Father God, please continue to drive me to the cross with whatever means you see necessary.  I praise Your name and thank You for the sacrifice of Your Beloved Son even to the cross to give me hope and an eternal future. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.

Amen