Choosing Action Over Anxiety

Our anxious hand-wringing can prevent us from reaching out to serve hurting people.

Jesus said, seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness…his way of doing and being right.

—Matthew 6:33, AMP

Anxious hand-wringing is a feature of our times—especially in an election cycle.

One hand wrings out political nervousness, sure that the world is falling apart. The other squeezes out fear that the Church is hopelessly divided and in inevitable decay. But there are unintended consequences to excessive hand-wringing: our hands are not free to offer healing touches to our pain-filled world.

It’s easy to empathize with those looking around at their circumstances, fretting and yearning for something different. Even so, I wonder: Is there a way our hands can rest easy, or reach out naturally to serve hurting people? To do so, we must learn from Jesus’ life and adopt his Kingdom perspective. 

Jesus Understands Our World.

Jesus lived and ministered in a setting of social unrest and political and economic instability. The best thinkers and philosophers of his day could not agree on what comprised the good life, or what made someone a truly good person. In response, lots of people threw up their hands in resignation and got on with fulfilling their various desires. 

In Jesus' day, like ours, politics often boiled down to abuse of power. Religious pluralism and confusion about “god,” which “god” and whether there is a “god” troubled families and strained friendships. Israel was divided into factions, each insisting they correctly understood God and his purposes. In turn, these factions practiced an ancient form of canceling the others.  

But Jesus stayed poised in the midst of all that. He never sought more power, nor was he intimidated by worldly (social, political or economic) power. He saw it for what it was: a drop in the ocean of God’s omnipotence. 

The devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.”

—Matthew 4:8-9

In his life on earth, Jesus was not looking for means to an end. The means and the end were already defined and set in place by his Father. This settled, confident, graceful worldview shines through in the Sermon on the Mount and Jesus’ peace-filled interactions with those who mistreated him and tried to shut down his movement.

For Jesus, the stakes were never so high that he had to step out of relationship with and obedience to his Father’s vision and purpose for humanity and, crucially, the ethical and moral values that undergird them. Big social challenges and manifestations of sin and evil never caused Jesus to resort to ungodly tactics. Jesus never fought fire with fire. He was not fighting at all. His self-identity was that the Son of Man came to serve (Mark 10:45). When the stakes were the highest, Jesus entrusted himself to his Father:

My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.

—Matthew 26:39

The Kingdom of God Is Never at Risk.

What was the state of Jesus’ inner being—his deepest commitments and truest beliefs—that facilitated such cheerful trust and dramatic fidelity? What posture of heart and will animated his hands to lift Peter from the water, to touch lepers, to put mud on the eyes of the blind, to bless, break and serve the bread of life, to offer his hands to be pierced in indescribable selfless love?

Jesus’ hands were animated by an inner reality, namely to fulfill his calling to heal and bring peace. Jesus knew he, the world and his Father’s kingdom were never at risk. He did not deny the leadership malpractice of political and social powerbrokers, but he knew that such leaders were not ultimate or definitive. Jesus lived in the proverbial wisdom that:

Humanity makes many plans, but the LORD 's purpose will prevail.

—Proverbs 19:21

Jesus operated out of an understanding that:

The God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed, nor will it be left to another people. It will crush all [other] kingdoms and bring them to an end, but it will itself endure forever.

—Daniel 2:44

The kingdom of God is simply the expression of God’s being—the times and places in which his will is done. Obviously, this eternal Being can never be at risk at any moment of human trouble. Jesus situated his life and ministry in his Father.

We Are in the Hands of God.

Wars, elections and economic cycles, though difficult and painful for us to live through, will never unsettle God. He has strong, steady hands that reach out to us in our troubled times, inviting us to respond as Jesus did:

Lord, I put my life in your hands. I trust in you, my God, and I will not be disappointed. My enemies will not laugh at me. No one who trusts in you will be disappointed. But disappointment will come to those who try to deceive others. They will get nothing. LORD, help me learn your ways. Show me how you want me to live. Guide me and teach me your truths. You are my God, my Savior. You are the one I have been waiting for.

—Psalm 25:1-5, ERV