Tuesday, February 25, 2014

stop COPING!

I have always been interested in words...individual words.  I think that our American-English is hard for others to learn because of all the roots in our semantics.  We sway back and forth from Latin and Old English to French and Greek, and 'meaning' often changes with dialects, as well.

I especially enjoy discovering new meanings.  It's odd sometimes; you think you know exactly what a particular word means, or at least in common usage, but then when you take the time to really study it, the subsequent definition might be quite different.

For instance, I have really been thinking about the word c-o-p-e, cope, lately.  As it turns out, I wasn't too far off.  I thought it meant to, loosely speaking, "to get-along with your problems."  And it does, more or less.  Turns out, coping is "dealing with and attempting to overcome problems."  To cope is to "contend or strive, especially on even terms."  It also means to "tolerate stress."

There is certainly no shortage of stress these days.  Stress is to subject (yourself) to physical or mental pressure, tension, or strain.  And there you have it!  By the very definition of stress, it would seem that we can actually choose whether or not we want to participate in the pressure, tension, and strain that accompanies/defines it.  And the answer is: YES!  We definitely have the ability to choose.

In fact, we have been equipped with everything we need to fight against it, to resist, stress.  We don't have to "tolerate" it in our lives.  Jesus paid the price for us to have absolute peace in every circumstance that we come up against.  "Let NOT your hearts be troubled," He said.  (John 14:1)  When facing the opportunity to be completely stressed out, the Lord God said to Joshua, "I will be with you, I will not fail you or forsake you. Be strong and of GOOD COURAGE."  (Joshua 1: 5,6)  I don't think that either Joshua or Jesus ever considered that there was any other option.  They simply were not prepared to "tolerate stress."

Like them, and all others who have gone before us, it was never intended that we should simply, cope.  We were created for victory.  We were designed to meet all challenges head-on with the full armour of God, always ready to do battle against the enemy of our souls.

In any situation that you might be facing today, look for the chance to be victorious.  Don't waste time fretting over something that you cannot do anything about right now.  Take it to the Lord in prayer, and leave it there.  He already has the answer!  Give Him room to work!  In other words, stay out of His way...don't bring "negative" to His door.

Instead, follow the guidelines set before us in Matthew 6: 25-34.  "Don't worry," He says, "be happy." 
Don't worry and fret and get stressed out; just believe.  Believe that He loves you and cares for you, and is working out everything to your advantage...because He is, He surely is, and that is what He does best!

Make a decision today to stop coping with stress.  Give it up completely, and let the peace of God have its perfect work, instead!