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Spirit of Stress

What if stress is a spirit? I walked around for so many years thinking I controlled my stress. I thought that I was a bad person because I got stressed out. When I thought about my stress, if I was honest with myself, I would remember events that hurt me throughout the day or week which triggered a reaction of stress inside me.

Last week I was driving away from a church in Omaha. My dad works there but I went to have coffee with another staff member... I walked into this office area at the church and as I did I started to feel the stress come on me. We left for starbucks and so I didn't think a lot more of it until driving away from the church later. I was on I-680 driving towards my parents pad in Millard when suddenly my mind started racing with all the things I had to get done that day. The list went on and on of everything that was piling up back at the office in Lincoln.

Now all this seems completely normal to me and probably seems fairly normal to you all. We go through our day and try to do something good like skip class to be with a friend or go clean up pee off Stiggie's bathroom floor (just kidding). Here was my problem or my biggest enlightenment into the situation: NOTHING, and I mean NOTHING, had to get done by the end of the day. Kerry was not waiting for me in Lincoln to finish some project and I did a lot of work last week. This was the first time I ever had any ease separating the voice, or what I am calling the spirit of stress, from what is reality.

Does a spirit of stress plague your life? I say this not because you would be a bad person if the spirit plagued your life... So last night I was at Hill elementary doing School Day Video stuff. While I was there I saw a lot of kids with their parents-- some were crazy some were clam. At one point during the night there were two kids about 10 feet away from me that had no parent with them. The older brother was about 9 and the younger was around 5. The little kid was getting kinda beat up by his old brother. Would you go over to the little 5 year old and say, "Are you ready to be nicer and less annoying if you big brother stops beating you up?" No, because there is no doubt in my mind that the little kid will at least have a much better experience being his little annoying self if his older bro gives him some breathing room.

I want to give you some breathing room. Moreover, I think Jesus wants to give you some breathing room. These spirits that plague our lives were not given license to do so just space. We probably gave them the space or gave up the ground because we weren't fighting. And we don't start fighting for you today because you messed up, we start fighting today because regardless of what ground you gave up Jesus has given us power to tack back what was lost. He gave us His authority over the powers of darkness. Not to get us through life more quickly or easily, but to give us space to be ourselves. Then, when we have space to be ourselves, the Holy Spirit can work to change us more fluidly and naturally.

If you feel something on you this week can we pray for you Sunday? Maybe we can give you a little space to be yourself...

peace,
Simon

posted by Simon Yost @ 10:36 AM