I am a naturally anxious person.

Some people who tend to struggle with anxiety are able to pinpoint the exact moment from their childhood or young adult life when something happened to them that hijacked their nervous system and made everything haywire. I don’t have that moment pinned down (maybe I just haven’t done the work yet in my life) but for as long as I can remember, I have dealt with anxiety and generally feel anxious.

Recently, I preached a message on Gideon to our church taking a look at how Gideon arrives at the conclusion of God being Yahweh-Shalom (Judges 6:24) meaning that “The Lord is Peace”. It’s a very powerful story and an extremely raw and human look at the struggle between God and humanity that so many of us feel on a day to day basis.

With my own personal wrestle with anxiety, and while preparing for this sermon, I arrived at a very powerful conclusion that the story of Gideon revealed to me…

Anxiety stems from our experience not matching what we believe.

In the message, and since then in my own life, I have referred to this as the anxiety gap.

When we face a gap between an expectation that we have about our lives and how we think they should go and the reality of how life is going on a day to day basis, anxiety shows up.

When your expectation is that your career will always satisfy you and get you out of bed in the morning, but you find yourself settling into a job for 30 years to put food on the table, anxiety can show up. When your expectation is that college will be amazing and you’ll meet your lifelong group of friends but the reality is that you’re more alone than ever before and your dorm feels empty every single day, anxiety can live there. When you had the expectation rooted in a false belief that life was always easy to those who went to church every week and were nice to other people but now you’re facing a season of life that is undoubtedly the hardest one you’ve ever walked through, anxiety can grow in that.

When we face these gaps, anxiety has a chance to show up and swallow us whole.

And as I’m sitting here, I’m currently 26, been married for a little over 5 years, work full time on staff at a church, and have two kids now, I wish I could say that I have a complete hold on my anxiety and it is a thing of the past, but that would be a lie.

I still fight the anxiety gap.

Daily.

And I am simply learning (and relearning) tools, strategies, and Scriptures to help me close this gap as fast as possible. For me to fix my theology and expectations about God first and foremost, so that my lived reality drives me to obedience and worship rather than anxiety and worry. I wish I had a perfect answer for you on exactly how to do this and how to never again feel anxious… but I can’t.

I want to simply offer two things as I land the plane on this article.

First, start to notice the anxiety gap. Look at the places in your life where you are feeling the most anxious, and try to tie them back to an expectation or a belief about life that isn’t lining up with what you’re feeling on a day to day basis. This is an amazing place to start. Awareness is a huge part of the battle and an amazing tool to add to your toolbelt.

And second, a verse to close us out. One that is particularly helpful for me…

 “7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.”

1 Peter 5:7

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​Bring all of your anxieties to Him. Why? Because He truly cares for you. Rest in that.