Jesus Friends Seva: Be Not Afraid

Anxiety takes over when we fail to rest completely in God.

Today’s musical pairing is “Spiegel im Spiegel” by Arvo Pärt. Note that all the songs for this series have been gathered into a Spotify playlist here.

“The Lord is my light and my salvation—whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life—of whom shall I be afraid?”
Psalm 27:1

“Then Jesus said to his disciples: ‘There I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. Consider the ravens: they do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to your life? Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?’”
Luke 12:11-26

Day 9. 926,095 confirmed cases, 46,413 deaths globally.

Calling these anxious times is like calling love an emotion: true, obvious, and understating the experience.

Soon we will crest a million confirmed cases and fifty thousand deaths. Tens of thousands of deaths seem certain in the United States in the month to come. Even when the contagion slows in one place, it will accelerate in another. What will happen when the pandemic devours cities with fewer resources than ours? How many will die in Kolkata and Karachi, Cairo and Lagos, Mexico City and São Paulo?

Our hearts are tense. Our thoughts are restless. We find it difficult to concentrate. We read the streams of online content constantly and desperately. We devour the news and the news devours us. So many of us have lost friends and loved ones already. Others await the day.

We tend to think of anxiety as a physiological and psychological ...