For the past 8 weeks or so, I’ve been meeting with a group of wonderful girls and we are reading Calm My Anxious Heart together. This book is awesome! If you have ever stressed over something, dealt with anxiety, or have felt overwhelmed… this book is for YOU! Every woman can totally benefit from it.
Cheryl, hosts the book study at her house each week. We’ve all taken turns bringing dinner, so we eat, chat about our week, and review a chapter together. In addition to hosting our book study, Cheryl also has a little craft for us to do or a verse for us to take home to help us remember what we’ve learned from the book. There are questions for each chapter, so you can really take what you’ve read and apply it to your life. Its a nice change of pace from the rest of my week.
This past week, the chapter was about worry. Who doesn’t worry?!? We all have this in common – especially us moms and wives. Worry is our middle name. We talked about ways to give our worries to God. One suggestion from the book is with an “anxiety bag”. You simply write your worries down on a piece of paper and drop them in the bag. We decorated our own anxiety bags to take home as reminders not to hang on to our worries – and to give them to God.
I wasn’t feeling very crafty the night we decorated these, but my bag has meaning. I wrote sayings and verses on mine to help remind me to let go of my worries…
“Life is like a rocking chair, it will give you something to do but it won’t get you anywhere.”
“The beginning of anxiety is the end of faith. The beginning of true faith is the end of anxiety.”
“… don’t be anxious about anything”
“Give all of your anxieties to God…”
“Pray, plan, and prepare for tomorrow…”
“Through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, tell your requests to God.”
1 Peter 5:6-7
Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.
That’s all we can do, right? We never gain anything by worrying. It is amazing to me how all the messages from this book come just at the right time for you to really apply them to your life in some way.
How have you been able to give up your anxieties and worries?
