Stress Relief: What to do With Your Cares

Living stress-free does not mean you never have to face intense seasons of life, where issues rise up that you have to deal with. The truth is, there are many stressors that come into your life that you cannot avoid.

These unavoidable stressors come in the form of “cares.” They are the responsibilities and burdens we cannot escape. Whenever you see this word cares in the Bible, it often refers to the unavoidable responsibilities and pressures of life.

Many of these cares are unexpected.

You find yourself in a marriage where your spouse is going through an illness. You find yourself spending a lot of time and energy helping.
You lost a job and are now in a time of figuring out how to pay the bills and find new employment.
You have a child with special needs.
You are under a list of unending relationship burdens that you face.
Business responsibilities keep growing.

What to do With Your Cares

We all have cares we have to deal with. They are unavoidable. The problem is that cares can turn into deep stressors that allow the fear factor to keep pressure, anxiety and worry working in constant loops. Cares can be a gateway into the world of fear if we don’t process these cares with wisdom.

In my previous article, I mentioned the need to humble ourselves under the hand of God. As we commit ourselves to this posture, there is a second action that will help us live in supernatural stress relief.

casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. 1 Peter 5:7 (NKJV)

Many readers can make the mistake of reading this statement as though it’s a new sentence. But it is actually connected to a previous thought that is combined into this one sentence. Casting your cares is tied to humbling yourself under the mighty hand of God.

Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. 1 Peter 5:6-7 (NKJV)

The word is not “cast,” but “casting,” putting the action in direct connection to humbling yourself.

You Don’t Have to Carry That

The Scripture is saying, “While you are humbling yourself before God, take those cares and give them over to God. You have full jurisdiction to take all your cares and lift them up to Him. Place the full trust and responsibility in His hands. You don’t have to carry the weight of this stuff.”

God is saying, “If you will focus on walking humbly before Me, focusing on My pace of life for you and the plans I am working in your life, you have full permission to take all the cares that you have zero control over and cast them unto My lap.”

The Struggle We Face

The first mistake we make in this equation is that we come into agreement with a lie that says “the pressure is all on you. The results are all on your shoulders.”

Even deeper, many of believe, “I am doing this all on my own. The pressure is all on me and I have no help. I do all of life all by myself.”

So what begins as a care has now turn into a full blown stress and anxiety ladened battleground.

Meanwhile, your Father in heaven is saying, “I got you in this. Will you let me be your Father and take the pressure of this?”

What Does “Casting Your Cares” Mean?

But what does it mean to cast it on Him? Casting the cares upon God means that you are released of the pressure regarding the issue. You still have to do what you need to do, but the pressure is off, because you have humbled yourself and you realize that the results are not in your control.

One of the greatest manifestations of our fears is the way we attempt to control life. We control people, relationships and outcomes in any way we can. Why? Because it’s our way of attempting to preserve certainty and safety.

God says, “When you humble yourself before me, you have to let go of control.”

And therein lies the battleground in most people’s lives.

Letting Go of Control

Casting your cares . . . that means it will need to be a continual action, not just a one time event. The moment you cast your cares upon God, you will be tempted to take them back; sometimes seconds later.

Why? Because we are so bombarded with taking matters in our own hands, keeping the pressure on our shoulders and maintaining this mythical sense of control. We are not in control of a whole lot, but we like to do all we can to fill a sense of control.

But it leaves you stressed out, burned out and overwhelmed all the time. You may hate it, but it’s so easy to fall into the same survival patterns.

Getting to the Why

This action at first sounds too good to be true. To many of you, it sounds like irresponsible living, mainly because you have lived your whole life carrying all the cares of your life on your shoulders. You have no reference for what it means for someone to have your back. So casting your cares upon God sounds like “pie in the sky” living.

But when you get to the “why” you see where the power to cast your cares comes from.

for He cares for you. 1 Peter 5:7 (NKJV)

Casting your cares upon God is directly tied to your revelation of His loving care for you.

This is where the problem lies. We have little reference in our hearts of connecting to God’s eternal love for us. So when the pressure rises, we take on all the stress. We don’t know what it’s like to be covered by a loving Father.

You Matter to Your Father

But your Father in heaven is saying, “You matter to me. The issues that you are struggling with matter to me.”

Can you imagine what it would be like if our hearts truly received this? As you lay your head to bed at night, you can look at all the things you face and hand each of them over to God, knowing that He is saying, “I will take care of this.”

“You focus on living humbly before me. In the meantime, I got all this.”

But so many don’t have a revelation of their value in God’s eyes. Unworthiness clouds their view of the Father. They think, “God, aren’t you more concerned about starving people in other countries. Shouldn’t you be focusing on world issues? What do my trivial concerns mean to you.”

It matters to Him, because you matter to Him.

Connecting to His Care for You

But a large number of believers feel distant from God’s love. Therefore, they struggle with connecting to His loving care over all the issues of their life. Many have not had an experience of a loving earthly father who’s got your back, will be there for you and will take care of you. Therefore, the lens of Father God’s care is distorted.

So we end up falling into a big bowl of stress. Our cares pull us into anxiety, obsessive thinking and constant worry. We live by “I gotta call. I gotta buy. I gotta do. I gotta I gotta I gotta I gotta. STRESS, STRESS, STRESS, STRESS, STRESS, STRESS.” Even though we don’t have to, it’s all we’ve ever known.

And God is speaking to you right now to enter into His world when it comes to stress, cares and pressures. The invitation before you is to experience God’s loving care by taking all your stressors and cares and throwing them at His feet.

You will actually learn about God’s faithful love in real time. Your trust muscles will get developed and your heart will experience supernatural stress relief. Even past disappointments can heal as you learn to trust today.

My focus needs to be on what God is doing in me today as I humble myself before Him. As I do that, I dump the whole truck of worries and cares on Him.

It’s not irresponsible living. It’s the greatest way in the world to live!

For me, it’s the only way to live.

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