Expelling Anxiety with Encouragement and Community

“Anxiety in a man’s heart weighs it down, but a good (encouraging) word makes it glad.” (Proverbs 12: 25, AMP)

I remember my first anxiety attack. I was in my freshman year at high school, and it was a few days before we picked classes for sophomore year. I had come home from school with the long course catalog and was sitting on the couch with it in my lap. My mind started racing, overwhelmed by all the choices of classes I had in front of me. I’ve always been the kind of person who gets panicky when I feel overwhelmed by a big-picture process. 

Compared to the vast amount of choices, it felt like my schedule wouldn’t fit them all. Suddenly, I felt like the choices I made would have a great impact on the rest of my life; like somehow if I made the wrong choice of classes, my whole path would be altered. I felt ill-prepared to make a decision so soon. I hadn’t thought about the course of the rest of my life at fifteen years old. 

At some point, my mom had entered the room and must have read the panic on my face as I stared at that stupid course catalog. She sat down next to me and asked me what was wrong. As it all poured out of me, she must have seen something there– shaky voice, off-kilter breathing, raw emotion coupled with whatever it was I could verbalize– she stopped me and talked me through some deep breaths. She explained that what I was feeling was anxiety and reminded me that God already knew the path of my life. She reminded me that God hadn’t forgotten about me thus far, and nor would He start now. She reminded me that my life was still very much in front of me with any possibility available to me and that I should just choose classes that interested me and filled any criteria needed for a 10th grader. 

Then she prayed with me and sat with me until my thoughts slowed down.

When I read Proverbs 12:25, part of me wonders whether Solomon knew a thing or two about anxiety. With a whole kingdom resting on his shoulders, and children he was very clearly trying to spiritually and practically teach in their adolescence, did he sometimes lose his sure, God-enhanced grip on wisdom? After all, he was still human. 

Maybe and maybe not. Maybe he struggled with other things altogether, but he still dropped a very helpful lesson on anxiety, and even depression, in this little couplet of scripture. After all, he does say that anxiety weighs a man’s heart down– and we can take that to mean that anxiety bears a weight all its own over us, or acknowledge the very real connection that anxiety and depression have. 

Worry is a weight. It eats at us for as long as we dwell on it, and for those prone to anxiousness, it can be near impossible to snap oneself out of a downward spiral all by ourselves. Of course, the Bible gives us ways to do that, mainly through prayer (Philippians 4:6-7, 1 Peter 5:7) and walking by faith in a Christian lifestyle (Isaiah 41:10, Matthew 6:25-34).

But Solomon shows us an external way anxiety can be dealt with: kind, encouraging words to make the heart glad. Over the past few weeks, we’ve been diving deep in the ways that words and communication can negatively affect our Christian life and where we need to be constantly taking stock to confront our sin in that department. But here, we see the vitally positive influence of good, Godly speech in helping others out of their anxious or depressive mental states. 

Of course, there are going to be cases of people who clinically struggle with anxiety, and I don’t pretend to minimize the very real mental battles that some face. In those instances, there is no shame in seeking out the Christian mental health counseling that God has given us in this day and age– it doesn’t bear on our faith in God to use those tools He has made possible for us.

But practically speaking, we as the body of Christ have the ability to reach out to others and be an encouragement that helps to snuff out the anxiety and depression in them. In reading God’s Word and walking with Him by faith, we gain the wisdom and the understanding to shine Christ’s encouragement that blots out fear.

I remember back when I was a youth leader, a song we sang that said, “All of hell will fear our praise.” That’s a bold but true statement. The powers of hell tremble at the name of Jesus. They cannot stand against it. Yes, we have modern medicine that is a help to us when we struggle in a clinical sense, but we also have a God that is Jehovah Shalom; the Lord is Peace.

Which begs the question: When we have so much access to a God who loves His people, why is it not more an endeavor in our daily lives to lift each other up? Of course, we can’t speak into a situation we don’t know about in someone else’s life, but doesn’t that then give us more of a responsibility to be in community with God’s people? We should know the people who occupy the same pew as us at church. We should know the people we meet with in our weekly small groups and Bible studies. We should check on the people God has given us to walk beside on this path of righteousness.

As God’s people, we have the unique and deliberate mission to minister to each other. If we are washing ourselves and our families in the Word, if we are living a lifestyle of worship to our King, if we are prayerfully navigating life and living in attentive community with brothers and sisters in Christ– we should be encouraging one another. Even if it’s just holding someone in prayer and texting them so they know you are. Even if it’s writing a note for someone and leaving it on their seat in church, or inviting someone to coffee and asking them how they are. 

Our God works through us to minister to others. If we live our lives constantly in our own lane, our Christian walk will seriously lack the enrichment of being in community with other believers. 

The wisdom we gain through God’s word has some serious tools in dealing with anxiety within our hearts– in casting off the heaviness worry bears on our hearts. But scripture also includes reminders that we have a great ability in being a help to others in changing their hearts by nudging them to look to God and cast their cares upon Him. To be in prayer constantly over things best left in His hands and for His work. 

“For you, O Lord, have made me glad by your work; at the works of your hands I sing for joy.” (Psalm 92:5, ESV)