a thinking man

I'm a thinking man. You didn't know that, did you? Yeah, it's true. Unfortunately, I don't think before I speak often enough. I make up for that for thinking way too much before I sleep. The thinking I do before I go to sleep is often about the things that worry me. When either Sarah or Jakob doesn't feel well, I tend to lay awake for a while thinking about what's wrong with them. Then I sleep very lightly and react to their tossing and turning. When I was laid off last year, I spent a lot of nights thinking about my severance (sort of) running out before I found a job, whether I should be a youth pastor, children's pastor, or lead pastor - I decided youth or children's, and God blessed me with both, because He's crazy awesome - I wondered about going into the military as a chaplain, wondered why God would bless us with a child and then allow me to lose my job, worrying about the delivery, worrying about losing Sarah and/or Jakob during the pregnancy and delivery, etc. I thought a lot about a lot of things, and it always left me with a stomach ache.

I would put a lot of time in thinking and worrying - usually at least 30-60 minutes a night. When I came to my senses, I would start to pray about the things that had me worried. I usually only prayed for a few minutes, though. I would start out every prayer asking God to relieve me of my worry, to give me peace, and to give me the faith to trust in Him. It didn't take long. Every night, I would feel Him removing my chains of worry. I only regret that I put them back on every night like a pair of pajamas. Luckily for me, God was waiting there with the key to my freedom every night. As soon as I would give my worries to Him, He would give me peace, and I would sleep. And since I was laid off, I would not only sleep, but I would sleep in.

Philippians 4:4-7

"Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

For more posts on peace, head over to the Peace Blog Carnival at Bridget Chumbley's blog.

This song doesn't necessarily relate to my post, but it does mention having peace through God. Despite my affinity for heavy metal and hard rock, I do love a little R&B here and there. I guess that's from growing up with Take 6 in my tape player.