A game plan for defeating worry
Part 2 of an
interview with Barb Roose,
Author of Winning the Worry Battle
Have you ever tried to fight worry
with faith and felt you were losing the battle? Have comments like “God’s got
this!” or “Just pray about it” only left you feeling more burdened? We know we
shouldn’t worry, but the reality is that we all do at times. Whether it’s
personal worries about loved ones and daily circumstances or broader concerns
about what’s happening in the world, we long for something more than platitudes
that will help us put real feet to our faith and win the worry battle.
Many Christians do not have a full
understanding of what it means to fight the good fight of faith. They try to
live by faith but in the face of everyday trials and failures, they find
themselves disillusioned and discouraged, wondering if they have done something
wrong or if living by faith only works for others. The problem for most is
simply a lack of understanding regarding what faith is and how it works.
In Winning the Worry Battle (Abingdon
Press), inspired by the Book of Joshua, Barb Roose reviews three tools a
person can develop to Fight In Faith: 1) embracing God's promises, 2) courage
and commitment under pressure and 3) practicing radical obedience while waiting
for God to deliver your victory.
Q: Tell us more about the three
fighting friends a person should take with them into the battle with worry.
Our
three fighting friends are powerful tools God gives us: peace, courage, and strength.
In the book, I talk about how these tools help us change the channel from our
worried thoughts to fixing our minds on God’s promises. These three fighting
friends are active warriors we rely upon when we’re not praying.
Peace
is the fighting friend that quiets your mind and assures you of security. It
whispers, God is here. You aren’t alone,
even when circumstances around you scream otherwise. When you have peace, your
mind isn’t panicking, your heart isn’t racing, and your stomach isn’t
threatening to erupt. Instead, your mind is calm, your heartbeat is slow and
steady, and your stomach is settled.
Courage is the fighting friend that
keeps you from running away from your struggles—even when you really, really
want to escape or ignore your troubles. Courage keeps you pushing forward in
commitment instead of falling back in the face of fear or worry.
Our final fighting friend is strength.
It enables us to keep holding on and hanging on. This fighting friend is
different from our human strength, which has its limits. Our human strength
isn’t enough to win over worry. We need spiritual strength. Instead of trying
to move your mountain of problems on your own, you step back and out of God’s
way and let him do the heavy lifting. Spiritual strength requires you to give
up your “I can do it” or “I can handle it” mindset and tap into
“God’s got this” mindset instead.
The
key to our fighting friends is training them because our fighting friends are
only as effective as we develop them. In the book, we talk about training our
fighting friends and introduce a number of tools to help us train our fighting
friends because they are what help us get into position for God to give us
victory ever day of our lives over worry.
Q: What are the different ways worry
can manifest itself in women?
·
Silent
Sufferer: keeps all of her fears and worries to herself
·
Busy
Body: overworks to control worry
·
Control
Freak: manipulates to reduce fear and worry
·
Mother
Hen:
nags others to feel calmer
It’s
difficult to admit this, I was definitely 88% control freak and 12% Mother Hen.
I stayed worried about making sure that every stayed happy and safe, including
me. In fact, I even bought a house without telling my husband because I worried
that our current house wouldn’t be good enough for our family in the future. Thank
goodness God brought me along way BEFORE the advent of texting, or else I would
have nagged my kids to death via text message with constant inquires about “Did
you forget . . .” “Do you have . . .” and “What about . . . ?” As moms, we have
to check ourselves to make sure that those constant contacts with our kids
aren’t about trying to satisfy our worry.
Q: There are verses about worry
throughout the New Testament. Why did you focus your Biblical study of worry on
the book of Joshua?
I
love adventure, and Joshua has always been a biblical figure that has defined
courage for me. In fact, many years ago, Joshua inspired me to go skydiving.
Yet,
as I learned about Joshua, I noticed that God kept repeating the phrases, “be
strong and courageous” as well as “don’t be afraid or discouraged.” I began
asking why God would keep repeating those phrases to Joshua. While Joshua doesn’t
have much dialogue God’s words give us some clues into his mental and emotional
state. It seems Joshua might have had to battle some type of worry and anxiety
just like we do.
Q: How do we learn to view uncertainty
from God’s perspective rather than our own?
I
felt such freedom when I realized God protects me with what He doesn’t give me
as much as He blesses me with what He does give me. God doesn’t struggle with
our uncertainty. He’s totally comfortable leaving open-ended timelines,
unresolved issues, and “which path should I choose?” quandaries. At times, I’ve
gotten frustrated with God because I wanted Him to settle some of the big
uncertainties in my life because I hated living in the tension of the unknown.
Yet, God’s taught me two things about uncertainty:
1. I can’t know
everything that God knows.
2. I don’t want to
know everything that God knows.
Part
of why I loved studying the book of Joshua was the Israelites dealt with one
unknown situation after another. Yet, their faith and foundation weren’t in
having the detailed answers; rather they had to keep pressing and pushing forward,
trusting a detailed God who would give them the answers as they needed them.
That’s the powerful lesson I keep learning each day.
Q: Explain what you mean by “the fear
of our fear is actually our worry.”
Think
about a specific fear, such as spiders. I hate spiders! When we can picture
what we are afraid of, we don’t look at that fear in a vacuum. Instead, we
imagine different storylines for how our fear might hurt us. I call these
extension fears our “what if” worries. Questions such as “What if the spider
bites me?” or “What if I’m trapped in a room with a spider?” Our original fear
was a spider, but the “what if’s” are the worries that branch off of our
original fear. Those worries are like the legs of a spider that extend from our
original fear. I actually call this eight-legged worry.
This
also explains why the Bible has so many verses about “do not fear.” God knows
that one fear could branch out and develop lots of other fears associated with
it.
Q: What other resources are available
to go along Winning the Worry Battle?
I
have also written the six-week Joshua:
Winning the Worry Battle Bible study that is releasing at the same time as
the book. There is a participant workbook, leader guide, leader kit, and DVD
that provide an in-depth study on the book of Joshua.
Joshua
is a culmination of events that began in Genesis and followed the Israelites
for 450 years through the desert. Bible scholars will love the study because
you’ll get to see stunning examples of how events in Genesis through Numbers
are tied up in Joshua. There are also tools and self-evaluation devices to help
participants gauge how they are making progress in their worry battle.
Both
the book and Bible study contain lots of practical tools, such as CALM
Technique, 1+1 Prayer Technique, God-Morning/God-Night Technique,
Carefrontation Sandwich, and much more!
Visit Barb Roose’s online home at barbroose.com. Readers can also keep up with her on Facebook (BarbaraRoose), Twitter (barbroose), and Instagram (barbroose).
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