Cast your care upon the Lord

The Bible very clearly tells us not to worry.

Jesus said: Take no thought for tomorrow; 

for tomorow shall take thought for the things of itself. 

Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. (Matt. 6:34)

Peter wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. 

Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God that in due time, He may exalt you. Casting the whole of your care - all your anxieties, all your worries, all your concerns, once and for all - on Him; for He cares for you affectionately and cares about you watchfully. (AMP-1 Peter 5:6,7) 

True humility, when we humble ourselves under the hand of God is we cast all our care upon our wonderful Heavenly Father Who takes care of us. Pride is taking the burdens and problems of life upon ourselves believing we are self-sufficient and can manage without God's help.

Worry is SIN. Worry has become an OK sin for believers. We are correctly shocked when someone swears, speaks evil about another person or is selfish, but we accept worry as a sign of caring but it is a sin. In the world worrying is accepted as being caring and responsible but the Bible clearly tells us to roll all our cares and anxieties upon the Lord. 

A great secret of life is: "Cast (roll) your burden on the LORD and He will sustain you; He will never allow the righteous to be moved (shaken), made to slip or fail" (Psalm 55:22)

In facing needs and problems we have a choice of worrying or praying. 

'Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything, but in every circumstance and in everything by prayer and petition (definite requests) with thanksgiving continue to make your needs known to God.' (Phil. 4:6) 

Another translation: Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. 

Another translation reads: Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything.

When we pray we give thanks that He has heard our request and is working on the answer. This eliminates any need to worry. When we pray and leave the problem with God we can keep our eyes on the One Who is the Source of life and peace rather than on the problem which breeds more anxiety. 

"You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You because he trusts in you" (Is 26:3). We should be mentally pre-occupied with the Word of God NOT with our worries. (Prov 4:20-23) It's possible to have control of our minds and we should FIX them on the LORD, then His grace will flow uninterrupted into our lives.

Casting all your care upon the LORD...Be well balanced - temperate, SOBER minded [clear minded] at all times for that enemy of yours, the devil, roams around like a lion roaring, seeking someone he may devour. (1 Peter 5:8).

God's will is that we live a carefree life - because we turn our problems over to Him. When we carry the burdens of life, they weigh heavily on our mind and body. Worry warps our thinking. We become drunk with worry, our understanding becomes darkened and the devil enters our innermost counsel and we make the wrong decisions. Peter tells us to be SOBER minded. Drunk people can't make rational decisions, neither can we make the correct decisions when drunk with worry. Our minds were never created to carry the load and pressure of worry.

An unbeliever has good reason to worry but for a believer worry is a SIN, and like all sin it kills (both quality and quantity of life)- (Rom 6:23). Worry is a form of fear and fear is a lack of trust in the Lord. In our minds the problem becomes bigger than God and we magnify the problem rather than magnifying God. This unbelief in God's care for us blocks the full manifestion of God's answer and provision in our lives. 

To overcome this unbelief we should meditate on the fact that we have a wonderful Heavenly Father. (Matt 6:25-34).

(1) Who cares for us. 

(2) Who has seen all our needs. 

(3) Who provides for us 

(4) Who hears and answers our prayers. 

(5) Who is working all things together for our good because He promised He would (Rom 8:28). 

(6) Who is a promise-keeping God.

When we yield our minds to worry we deny God's love and provision for us. When we worry we are holding on to the problems. When we worry we are carrying the burden. We think 'If I don't worry about it - who will? How will the problem be solved if I don't worry about it?' The answer to these questions is: God will carry the burden and He will solve the problem but while we worry and carry the burden He is not released to solve it. When we find our thoughts going round and round - we're in the worry-mode. God cannot get His answer through to us because we cannot hear Him.

STEPS OUT OF WORRY

Step 1 Decide to BELIEVE the Bible that God really does love YOU.

Step 2 CONFESS IT. Your heart hears and believes what your mouth is saying. (Rom 10:17). The Bible tells us that we believe in our heart resulting in righteousness (justification) and confess with our mouth RESULTING IN SALVATION (deliverance, and the provision of whatever we need) (Rom 10:9,10) 

Say: Lord I have decided to believe that You love me 

- that You're working this for my good 

-that You never take your eyes off me and that You have the perfect answer. You are greater than any difficulty I can ever face. 

Your Word tells me that the Greater One lives in me (1 John 4:4).

Step 3. REFUSE to worry. This is your faith in God's love in action.

The Bible tells us how to overcome worry. 

"Casting the whole of your care (all your anxieties, all your worries, all your concerns, once and for all) on Him - because He cares for you affectionately and cares about you watchfully" (1 Peter 5:7). The word 'casting' means the act of throwing a fishing net. It is a definite, determined action that we learn to do skilfully by PRACTICE. We need to practice casting our care upon the LORD. We can do it because God tells us to do it. By casting our care upon the Lord and refusing to touch the problem in any way with worry - thoughts we are bringing our mind under the control of our spirit. When we cast our care upon the Lord we give Him free access to that problem. If we will practice casting our cares upon the Lord our problems will be solved in the most wonderful ways - far better than all our striving could accomplish.

When Peter, the fisherman, said 'cast your cares on the Lord' he used the fisherman's word for casting a net into the sea. A fisherman's net represents a problem-it looks ugly and it can easily entangle us. If we cast (throw) our net (our problems and cares) upon the Lord then He will transform it and fill it with His blessings (fish). We will see that He has used that problem (the net) to bring great blessing and provision to our life. He works the problem for our good as we cast it on the Lord (the sea) - the Source of all answers and blessings (the fish) - looking to Him and trusting Him to provide for us. Thus the problem situation is returned to us transformed as a container of blessing because we trusted God in it.

The old sticky fly paper was hung in the kitchen to catch flies. It was really quite effective but difficult to take down because frequently it would stick to your hand. You'd try to remove it with the other hand only to find it stuck to that hand, and so on, until eventually you managed to stick it to another object - then you were free of it. It is just like that when casting your worries upon the Lord! So often we pray, tell the Lord our problems and get up carrying the problem with us! However if you persist, you'll roll that care upon Him and be totally free of it and then contrary evidence will not bother you at all. You'll eat and sleep well and be joyful because you'll know that the Lord is working it out. If you have the problem by worrying then the Lord doesn't have it. If He doesn't have it, He isn't able to solve it.

Worry can strike in the night BUT Philippians.4:6 tells us: 

Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything. 

Get down by the bedside - read this verse to the Lord.

Say: Lord, You tell me right here not to fret or have any anxiety about anything so I'm not going to do it. 

Lord, You said that 'In everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving I should let my requests be made known to You.' 

So I'm bringing this problem to You and turning it over to You 

Now I'm going to thank You for the answer and go to bed. 

Now LORD You have it, I don't. 

Thank You that You're working on it while I'm asleep. 

It is possible for us to live in the revelation that our loving Heavenly Father never ever takes His eyes off us and He has the answer to every need and every problem and He is greater than any difficulty.

IF WE WANT TO LIVE WELL, WE MUST DECLARE WAR ON WORRY. It is a sneaky, deadly enemy. Worry is like an invisible prison but by faith we can walk out free as a bird. We must overcome it (as believers we can overcome it) or it will overcome us. Decide to DECLARE WAR ON WORRY and TRUST IN OUR LOVING HEAVENLY FATHER.