I’m reading this in my Bible app. Consider this:
Depression is how your soul processes regret.
Anxiety is how your soul processes fear.
This reading is all about how to find peace. How to move from being paralyzed by depression and anxiety. Much about understanding the factors you are in control of, and even more importantly, the factors you are not.
So, what do I fear? Death? In a way. Irrelevance? Yes. I want to have made the world a better place for having been here. To fulfill the plan that God has for me.
I’ve been feeling anxiety when I wake up in the morning. It seems to go away pretty quickly as I start the day but it can be pretty intense. I have also backed out of some commitments when I feel the depression as well. Some of this is needing to focus on some important things when I’m busy. Some of this is good old depression. Some of this is being in the position I am at work and life. I can choose to do things or not.
This is cool but it is also dangerous as I can become lazy and complacent in the absence of accountability.
Out of this same reading plan came the discussion of perceptions of God as a God of War. The OT certainly seems to support this.
Yet, He is not. He is the God of Peace. I have felt that presence and feel it nearly every day. For me it needs to extend into more areas.
But about the reputation of God as a God of War. The war thatIS going on is a war for our souls. Perhaps in all the wars and battles and details in the OT we are confronted with symbols of our own inner battle since creation: to bridge the gap between us and God.
Jesus does this for us. Prior to Jesus we had little hope for making that connection. Jesus’ death to bear our sins released us from that chasm and we connect directly with God again. So what is the use of the OT now? Berg ape it is allegorical to our struggle not to connect but to live in obedience. The wars inside of us are wars of obedience.
Mark K.