Heart to Heart | Episode 005 | Finding Peace in Times of Anxiety

It's another heart-to-heart, this time in my home. We are your Bible study friends. Welcome to the Heart Dive Podcast. Well, I would welcome you all to my home, but you've been here for a couple of days. But I welcome everybody else to my house. And we were getting ready to film Lesson 100 for everyone. And we just came to this place of like, why are we feeling so anxious about this? we're riddled with anxiety. We talk about anxiety with our head and our heart and those kind of places. And I was wrestling with rest versus productivity. And so it became a mind and a heart issue. And there was a stronghold, which we'll get back to that one, that was inside of me creating a grievance that I didn't know existed. All I knew was the symptom, and the symptom was anxiety. We get stuck in our feelings a lot of the time, right? And then that just manifests into everything we do. I mean, from how the condition of our home to how we're dealing with everything. Parenting, wifing. Working. Everything. Facebooking. Facebooking. arguments, you know, discord, grievances. And what ended up when, as I was studying, I was like, okay, I can't move forward. I just, it's like an elephant sitting on my chest. And what it revealed was anxiety is like a warning light in our life. Ooh, that check engine light. Yeah. And so, yeah, it's a symptom. It's a symptom. And y'all kept asking me, as we're sitting here wrestling, I was like, we're studying 1 Samuel. Bible study. We were just sitting and doing Bible studies. Calm, relaxing music and just having our coffee and enjoying fellowship while studying. Yeah, and then it was like... He checked our hearts. We're not going to get anything done. We're not going to get anything done. And y'all were like, why are you so upset? And I go, and you made me remove the layers. and get down through the anxiety. And this is real and raw. And I said, I'm afraid to go home and tell my husband I didn't work. That all I had was fellowship, which isn't a bad thing. That's the wrestling between rest and the productivity. And when you got to that. I just lost it. Yes. But look at the beauty that ended. like it was almost like God was like, be still and no, just be still a moment, take a deep breath. And, and we did. And we all were, you know, and we should have had the cameras on. Yes, exactly. We shouldn't have because we were a mess. Hot mess. It was, it was so beautiful when we, when we were able to peel back the layers of the onion, so to speak. and recognize the lie and replace it with truth. Figure out what those strongholds are. And I thank God that we have such wisdom that is poured into our lives through God's word, through pastors, through friends like Susie. That's an exercise we do with a friend at retreats. But the thing is, a lot of people can't get past the feelings. And then they just keep on rolling. And then it just keeps on piling in. It just snowballs. I mean, anxiety is nothing new. God addressed it all the time. Paul addressed it, right? Like, do not be anxious about anything. He says, be anxious for nothing. That means no thing. Nothing. Not a single thing you're supposed to be anxious about. And what is the first thing that we did? When you were like, what did I say? We got to pray. And that's exactly what Paul tells us to do. Do not be anxious, but in everything, by prayer and supplication. And with thanksgiving, like being grateful for where you're at, make your requests known to God. All right, Philippians 4, 6 through 7. I know y'all writing it down. So read that again, because I think I gave you the message version. Well, and the expanded version. And the expanded Ganoia. Yes. Which was right. And that's another beautiful thing, is that sometimes we may not know it verbatim, but God is writing it on our heart. And just knowing His Word is one thing, but writing it out, like living it out. Living it out. In that moment, you prayed over me. You didn't just sit there and try to give me advice. you and say, Holly, you know, the Bible says don't be anxious. Or just be like, it's okay. Yeah, it's okay. Let you hear what you want to hear. Yeah. Yeah. And so it says in Philippians four, six through seven, do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your request to God and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding will guard your heart and your minds in jesus christ yeah and that for me was a huge piece of like it was my heart and mind battling yeah my heart wanted to be present with y'all my mind was productive productive productive move move do checklist please please get it done get it done build the if you're driving down the interstate with your car and it goes ding ding ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. And you don't stop and get those engine lights checked. The symptoms. You don't find the symptoms. What's going to happen to your car? I mean, I've been there. You were just there three days ago. Three days ago. Literally three days ago, guys. My Jeep. I have an old Jeep. I love my Jeep. Your Jeep's amazing. I love my Jeep. And I called them, and it was going, bing, bing, bing, bing. And the blinker was going off, and the windshield wipers. I was like, oh, I don't know what's going on. Anyway, you talk about anxiety. I'm driving down the road with my right blinker on trying to take a left. This is a true story. And I immediately go to a guy who always works on my Jeep for me. I've known him since I was a little girl. What did we do yesterday? We went immediately into prayer. We went immediately into the Word. And I was looking up as we were talking and looking through anxiety. Like, there's an amazing, you guys are familiar with the Bible tool. It's an app. You know, I mean, there's scripture after scripture after scripture. Say it again, because I'm going to say, what was that? It's called the Bible Tools. Bible Tools. It's BibleTools.com, and it's also an app. But worry and anxiety, it even gives you a prayer to pray. We have lots of questions about how to pray. You guys, we'll get there. Because I could go down a whole rabbit hole for that. But it gives you a whole prayer. But it's about going into the Word. And that's what we did. And it took our entire day, kind of got shifted, but it was so beautiful. It was beautiful. Because here's another lie, strongholds, which let's talk about what a stronghold is. Well, it's funny because prior to watching Pastor Jabin at City Light, Las Vegas, this past Sunday, talk about this in his sermon. I only thought of a stronghold as the stronghold of the enemy on us. So anytime I think of a stronghold, I'm like, oh, that's a stronghold. We got to break that down. But he really, I mean, the definition of a stronghold. The sermon is on YouTube, right? It was recorded. I mean, I would encourage anybody. It was so good. It was so good. City Light Vegas. Yeah. City Light Las Vegas. Y'all, I love me some object lessons. So pastor, when he pulled those bricks out and he was using the bricks and it helps you visually see. So our strongholds are built brick by brick. Because a stronghold is a fortress, a castle. That is the actual definition of stronghold or it's related to the word somehow. And how are those built? They are built brick by brick by brick. Well, he, yes, it's 2 Corinthians 10, verses 3 through 5. For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God. And we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. So he gave us the definition of a stronghold, right? And then he also gave us the how to demolish it. And I found that interesting that the strongholds of the world and our experiences, and he said this, is what actually shapes our thoughts. Like that's kind of the filter, right? So he showed these bricks and he's like looking through the brick, the little holes in the bricks, and he's like, that is what actually shapes your thoughts of whatever is happening And it usually through an experience through a lie that had been spoken to you through what else I actually wrote down one of the things that he said I got to put my eyeballs on. We do not see things as they are. We see things as we are. And that was, again, perspective. He mentioned that. And this happens to us even in this podcast. Someone will be like, you said blah, blah, blah, blah, and I'm offended. I'm like, I didn't say that. When did I say that? And when I go back to watch what I said, I'm like, that is not what I said. But they heard it that way because of a stronghold that was in their mind or in their heart. And then they're filtering what I said through that. And that's how the triggering happens. Their lived experience. Their lived experience. So a stronghold definition is a castle, fortress, anything that a person relies on, the reason someone uses to fortify their opinion. So you have built up a castle or a fortress, your own stronghold, your tower of protection in your mind and heart, but God. Yes, but God. And he said that our stronghold is our default setting. Yeah. But if you make the kingdom your stronghold, then that can be your new default setting. And so circling all the way back to yesterday and our anxiety and our elephant that was on our chest, our perceptions of what we should be doing, what we were doing or not doing, or our checklists that we weren't getting done. It was a stronghold from past comments, experiences, let downs, failures, and lies, right? Like you were believing a lie that your husband's going to be disappointed with you. He probably not. He's like, what's up, babe? And so there's these layers, right? That we keep talking about. So the first lie was the lie in my own mind and heart, the lie here inside of me. It's an internal stronghold that I have that then revealed that I need to go home and talk to my husband. So then it became a relational stronghold that I need to sit down and actually have clear communication and talk about. And I can do this openly because my husband and I do talk through things. And we're very open and honest because our testimony is huge. It is a great tool for evangelism. But then it led us to have these deeper conversations of communal strongholds. And it all leads to what? Arguments and lofty opinions. So I just wanted to help people see it can be internal, then relational, and then corporate. These strongholds, this anxiety can be rooted in so many different things. So the anxiety, again, beep, beep, warning light, beep beep. What warning light do you see in your life right now? Yeah. Identify the stronghold. Yeah. Take a moment to sit and just be still and identify what your strongholds are. And it's going to be, it's going to, it could be one, it could be multiple. It could change from season to season and day to day, you know, and, and just take a moment to identify that. Why can't we give ourselves grace? We can give everybody else grace, but we don't give it to ourselves. And I said, one of the strongholds that I used to carry, not so much anymore, but it's that I'm not worthy of it. I've done this. I've done that. I'm not worthy to receive grace. So I got to keep hustling. I got to keep pushing forward. I got to keep pleasing people because I've let so many people down. I've hurt so many people. So now I need to try to find a way to make it up to them. And the Lord really had to work in my life to be like, yeah, maybe, you know what? You're not. I always say that. I'm like, we, you know, the world preaches, you are worthy. You are. And I'm like, no, I am not. But only by the grace of God that he showers upon me, do I become worthy now? You know? And, and so it's like recognizing where that grace comes from. It's not going to be from anybody else. I can't even give it to myself. I have to allow myself to understand where it comes from and it drops from heaven, you know? And so it's, yeah, it's receiving the grace of God and being like, okay, what do you want me to do with that? Right. And flipping the script, flipping the script in your mind to be able to identify where it's coming from. It's that heartbeat of God, that grace. Every single thought, because it starts with thought. That's why it says in that scripture, take captive every thought. I mean, that's really what they're identifying here is like, it's going to start here. so you have to identify like what is the thought and where what is the source of that thought because every thought has a source you know so that's that's the thing it's like okay where did that thought come from and like trying to a lot of our what we found within our conversation is it went back way to the 1980s at the beginning exactly yeah so like and when you can identify that, that's how you find that healing. Because you can now replace the lie with the truth. Yeah. And so one question is, is this a new anxiety or an old one that just found a new address? For me, it was a new one, which I hadn't recognized. And it's because of I have been a mother and a wife for the last 15 years, and then now I step into ministry. And so the anxiety in my head is to be a good steward of ministry, I need to be productive. I can't pause. I can't rest. I can't slow down. Ministry means productivity. Well, I mean, look how many pastors burn out because I think many spiritual leaders deal with that. Yeah, I got to hustle. I got to hustle. So a lie in my head is what I ended up writing down just a while ago was rest. And I never thought I'd say this. I love rest. I love my nap. I love my naps. I love my sleep. I am the queen of flexibility. Okay? Y'all know that. I'm like, yeah, let's go. Rest started to feel like a sin. It felt sinful. I don't deserve to slow down. I don't deserve to put my feet up. That's a lie. That is a lie. But then you have to ask yourself, okay, why are we feeling that, right? Like where did that come from? Where did it come from? So, yeah. I mean, how do you reconcile that? I had to get to the root. So anxiety is the warning sign. Again, I'm going to tell you over and over. So the root of it is sin. There is a sin issue at the end. That's the problem, okay? So let's talk about what sin it is. And according to Paul, okay, because he was talking to the Corinthians and the Galatians and the Thessalonians, he would keep coming back to them. And because there was discord, so the verse that y'all really, really like that we just said, Philippians, do not be anxious about anything. He is addressing this right after he's telling two women to stop fighting. And he's saying, don't be anxious about anything. There is a doctrinal issue, and it comes to pride, fear, or control. And we see that every day. You see it on social media. We see it even in our Facebook group among Christians. and good intentions to want to defend the truth you believe, right? Or the doctrine you believe or whatever it is. But because there's pride, a desire to control. What was the other one? Fear. Fear of man, not fear of God. Yeah. And it's funny because you said it came right after Paul was telling two people not to fight. This just happened to us recently. We went to our Facebook group and said, hey guys, this is supposed to be a place of love and grace and kindness. And please think about the things you say. whether it's you posting it or then or coming in and commenting and it did it not feel like we had 10 times the amount of arguments after that or or not arguments but like tension of of more you know and so i don't know i don't know if that like stirred up something in this well i think it revealed it's kind of like pulling the band-aid off and the onions and you know seeing the different layers in what Paul addresses again in the Corinthians, again in Galatians and Thessalonians, it would always come down to perhaps someone is trying to either create discord, not saying people are doing it on purpose, but in the Bible, when Paul was addressing, people would come in and start dividing people on doctrine. They would have what's called theological drift. And so here's a big example in this world, Calvinism, right? Some people believe in the elect. Like, there's only a certain number of people who are going to heaven. And you have no free will. And other people look, well, God says there's free will. I not getting into that today Women in ministry Women in ministry Flat Earth Once saved always saved Yeah once saved always saved I mean you will always have people on both sides of the fence no matter what when it not an explicit statement in the Bible Yeah. So theological drift. He would have to address that. And he'd be like, okay, love, humility, and obedience. You need to go back to loving one another. You need to humble yourself and not always want to be right. And you need to obey God, not whoever's showing up today with a feather in their hat and saying, I'm the next big wig and I'm the next pastor. I'm the next, you know, title or authority leader. And he's like, stop fighting over who you're following. The only one you need to be following is God. And I'm getting fiery, but I don't mean to get fiery because he's like, please just stop the discord. And so there's always something there. There's a tension. Which comes back to grace. Where does the grace come in? Where do you find that grace? Not only for yourself, but for your sisters and your brothers and the people around you. Take a deep breath and just know. And going back to that Philippians verse, I think that it says, then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. and I'm like, okay, there's gotta be a link between the peace and the grace, right? Like if you don't have peace in your heart, you're gonna have a real hard time giving grace to somebody. There's anxiety going on in your heart, there's not that peace. So I think it would be fair to say that if there is discord or if there is like a biting or defensive or whatever it is, there's a lack of peace in the heart. And then there's a lack of grace because of it. as well. Interesting you said biting, because as we move into kind of like looking at sin as the root, Galatians 5.15 says, if you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other. Yeah. What causes fights and quarrels among you, don't they come from your desires that battle within you? James 4.1-2. So if you're biting each other, he says, where's that quarreling coming from, it's coming from within you already. So you're a stronghold. You're a stronghold. You're biting yourself. You're devouring yourself. Because I said that to y'all finally, I go, I want this to go away. Why won't it just go away? And y'all were like, well, it may go away this way. It may go away that way. It gets easier, but it just makes us human. Sometimes that's just really what it is. It's, we're broken. Yeah. All broken vessels. Yeah. What can we offer to someone that is out there wrestling the same thing that we've wrestled? What did we find yesterday? What are some, what's something that we found? Solutions aside. I mean, the first number one solution was going to the word. Prayer. Prayer. Word. Truth. Yeah. yeah finding that stronghold yeah identifying the lie replacing it with truth i mean that's something we sat there and did i mean we were like pull out your notebook exactly that's what i was yeah we stopped we took it to hard work yes we we lit we said what's the lie in our heart about ourselves what lie do we believe about ourself um i'm not worthy i don't deserve this I'm not supposed to be here. Whatever it may be, I'm not worthy of the marriage or whatever it might be. Okay, now what's the lie in the marriage or what's the lie in ministry? What is the lie as a parent, as a wife, a mom, a dad, a friend? What is the lie at, you know, in your church? What is the lie? And on and on and on. And so Paul said, never really just names the problem. He would always give a path forward. And it was always the same path forward. So now that we've established this lie, right, we know what it is, and you have to replace it, which was something that the pastor said. He's like, you don't just destroy it. You don't just break it down. You built the strong holds brick by brick. So you have to take it down and replace it with a new brick. So you have to rebuilt it back, going back to God. God has become my stronghold. Replace it. Replace the lie. Replace the enemy's little nagging in your ear with that one step forward, that one brick forward that says, I am loved by God. I am seen by God. I am His beloved. I am worthy. I can do hard things because God has become my fortress, my stronghold, my refuge. And you cling and you stand in the castle of the kingdom of Christ. So that was an identification of anxiety that wells up from within. But I think another thing that we have to look at is anxiety that comes from circumstances in the world. And we just have to be honest about it. I mean, evil always existed. This is nothing new. It's just we're much more aware of it. And maybe there is more evil in the world as we get closer to the end times. But I mean, how do we find peace in the times of evil, in the face of evil? And so much stuff that we're seeing revealed and exposed today. We're seeing today in community in the world is all this evil is popping up and using screens. We're able to see it readily and quickly and visually and burning it into our brains. If you're visual like me, you don't forget it. I mean, these are things we probably are not meant to see. Right. And it's also other people's perspectives on them. yeah and then you got ai to come into it and they're making all kinds of lies about it and everything that's on the internet must be true right because it came from yeah i know right it's got it or or i'm at the point where like everything on the internet is a lie everything is a lie and so i want to throw this out there because there is a lot of scrolling and have you ever found and i'm i know our listeners have as you're scrolling your anxiety that elephant starts approaching. And then so then, you know, going back to your question, what do we do? Me personally, I walk away. I shut it down. I turn it off. I'm like, I can't. Okay, did you do that with your car? Like, is that something you did? Like, engine light? Did you stop? And like, what's going on? I actually, yes, in the parking lot of a shopping center. A friend of mine and I, you know, and I'm dressed not in my work clothes, but in these work clothes. and I've got boots on. Guys, again, my Jeep is, I am short. My Jeep is high. So I am in the middle of the parking lot climbing up on my Jeep bumper to see what's going on. And then I couldn't figure it out. So what did I do? I took it to my mechanic. In this particular situation, when we start feeling the anxiety of social media, I shut it down. Turn it off. I turn it off. Turn it off. But I don't, my mechanic is here. It's in the word. People are addicted. That's a dopamine hit. Even negative anxiety, people get addicted to that feeling. We need to make this our dopamine hit. We get addicted to typing, I'm going to defend, defend, defend. That goes back to the control. I need to show that I'm right. That's that one. Or fear that, oh, well, I need to save this person. Or they're going the wrong path. I need to get in there. and then pride. All those things are coming in and revealing their ugly little head in some form or fashion. But I like what y'all said about you turn it off, you went to a mechanic, you step away, you're looking for a solution and you're trying to get to the root problem of whatever it is. And the strong hold of the enemy is he wants you to feel offended. He wants you to feel wrong, undervalued, afraid, scared, unloved. And so we end up having these things we're kind of addicted to. Negativity, because it breeds excitement. Attention. Attention. Or in marriages, he came out with a lot of experience. He was very bold. He addressed lots of real human issues And he said a lie that we say to ourself is if someone not taking care of our need I deserve this gambling this alcohol this drug or this nice new shiny boat or motorcycle and have reasoned in our mind that it's okay to do this. And what Paul says is that we need to love with truth and not for gain. He says, you've got to point yourself back to Christ and point them back to Christ and refuse to let any of the secondary issues to distract you or deter you away from what is. And that's hard. And for just being honest, it is hard. And to tell, especially maybe either a new Christian or maybe a non-Christian, you're not going to go telling And then you just need to read the Word. But how do we point them to the truth of God's Word without telling them to go read the Word? Because most people are not going to go do that. I mean, we had to read the Word two years in a row for people to start reading the Word consistently. And I'm not saying we did that. It was just a discipline that the Lord placed on our hearts. And look what it's doing. But how life-changing is it? And so it's like there's the evidence that it works. But how do you get someone who isn't there yet? How do you point them to that without sounding like you're preaching? Well, that's the fruit of the Spirit. They'll say, hey, I saw this on the internet. I saw this. And these people are fighting. And you have peace of God. I don't understand how you have that. Where did it come from? Where did it come from? And then it opens the door to amazing conversation. Oh, hopefully they ask. It's interesting though, because sometimes people will call that, and the only reason why I say this is because I've seen it in the comments, you're oblivious and you're unwilling to be aware of what is actually taking place in the world. I'm like, no, I'm aware. I'm just not allowing it to rule my heart and mind. I'm allowing the peace of God to rule my heart and mind in Christ Jesus. So it's like, that's really what it comes down to, is just using that authority that we have to be able to do that. Making that choice. And it's so freeing. And it's so, it's like, oh my gosh. I want everybody to feel that. I know. That's what we always say. I just wish you could feel it. Well, anxiety, one of the things, is control. what can we really control when it comes to that evil that's so beyond and that a magnitude that's beyond anything we can comprehend and if we think about what can we actually do great yeah right yeah like prayer that's that's the best best control yeah there is control we got is to start interceding and you know i've i have for years when i get that anxious feeling no matter what it's about, I will give myself a moment and I'll say, okay, can I control this? Can I actually really control this? No. What can I do? Give myself a minute, be still, and pray. Because I will not allow it to control me or for it to get in the way of my happiness and my peace and my, you know, that connection and that feeling. And there's a reason why scripture tells us to guard your peace, right? I mean, how many times did it, there were examples after examples, even in the Old Testament, and he guarded his peace. Like that's an action. You have to work at that. Every day. You gotta be a soldier at the gates of your mind, of your heart, what you're taking in, what you're allowing to feed. I saw something today that said, starve your distractions and feed your discipline. And it was a worldly reel, but it spoke to me in this sense. It's like, yeah, because I said it multiple times as we were going through jewelry. I'm like, this is my distraction. I've been shopping a little too much at 4 a.m. instead of just doing what I used to do, which is diligently study and just sit there in the Word with no distractions. And I recognize that. Like that was something that I have to deal with. And so I've got to starve now that distraction. And I thought about it today because I was studying down here in the living room with you guys. My phone was somewhere else. And I'm like, that's how I do it. I need to put my phone away, starve the distraction, and feed the discipline. And so when you do that, moving back into that arena, do you feel the peace of God? Oh, absolutely. Oh, gosh. And it's such, we felt the peace of God yesterday. I mean, we had a plan. And God said, nuh-uh. Guess who makes the plans? Exactly. He orders the steps. And we did. And then when we got to the root and we talked about it, and we, you know, it was like, ah. Yeah. It felt like such a great release. It really was. And so pointing to fellowship and community and vulnerability when you have confession and prayer and petition. And so that means that we have put into practice what we're reading. Yeah. And that is our closing verse. It is Philippians 4.9. whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, Paul, not us, or seen in me, put it into practice and the God of peace will be with you. So it's not the piece of productivity, right? It's not going to be the piece of being a pastor. It's not the piece of making more money. Yeah. Or a finished checklist. It's not the piece of getting another Bible study out. It's not the piece of getting another PDF out. I want the peace of God. I want the peace of God now. I want the peace of God anytime a storm wants to show up in my life. It could be a mental issue, my own heart. It can be a marital issue It could be corporate I don't ever want my peace to be robbed By the enemy who is lurking at my door Because he would love nothing Than to stop all this Goodbye We done Yeah, that's what he does He sits and he waits to devour And destroy Yeah So we got to take that back take back what the enemy trying to steal take back your peace take back your peace God is waiting yes and know that it's going to be it's going to be work every day but it's so worth it yeah it is it's so worth it like I just can't it's just it's a constant flipping of the script in your head taking the thoughts captive not allowing the enemy brush him off your shoulder get them out of your ear flick them off flick them off turn the phone down put the phone down you know those cartoons make so much more sense right actually you're not wrong right now right here yeah exactly so speaking of our peace speaking of petitioning and putting it into practice may we pray some peace into your life right now as we close this out Heavenly Father thank you for this opportunity for anyone who's listening right now, I am praying for you to bless them with peace beyond understanding. To lay upon them something that perhaps has been right out of their grasp. Have whatever it is, whatever grievance, whatever warning light that is in their life right now that has caused anxiety. That they will unlayer the different whatever it is that's in their life right now, whatever it is that's causing discord, whatever it is that's causing division and destroying their peace in their life, Lord, I ask that you will remove it right now. In Jesus' name, you will move mighty. You will move the mountains that is keeping them from getting closer to you. Your word, Lord, is sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing bone and marrow. show up in their life, that mighty soldier defending them, being the fortress of refuge, their new stronghold, breaking down brick by brick whatever lies the enemy has placed into them and rebuild it with the truths that are alive in your word. We ask all of this in Jesus' name. Amen.