Calming My Anxious Heart

When we moved to Birmingham, we began going to a church called Church of the Highlands. I wrote about our first experience visiting there a few weeks ago. This is a huge church with 8 campuses, so small groups are a main focus of the church; in fact, over 1,000 small groups will begin to meet this fall beginning September 5! I am so excited about trying out a small group for the first time!

My friend Jamie joined a small group last spring. Her group was a bible study for women, and they read a book called Calm My Anxious Heart. Jamie, who had gone through some trying times before she read the book told me how much this book had changed her life and how it made her realize the importance of being content with today and the time you have and focusing on the gifts in life rather than being anxious all the time about what you don't have. I've admitted time and time again how anxiety has always been a part of my life, but seeing how the book had helped her, I asked to borrow it and began reading it last week. One chapter in, and I was so happy I had found this book!

In chapter 1, the author Linda Dillow talks about a missionary named Ella who lived happily in Africa for fifty-two years under desolate living conditions with no electricity or air conditioning during days when the temperature soared to over 120 degrees. Meanwhile, Linda's neighbor Meredith, the whiny socialite in the suburbs with two beautiful kids and a husband living in a large home with air conditioning, electricity, and the internet is the most negative person Linda has come to know. She spends the chapter comparing Meredith and Ella and the ironies of their lives and how it would seem obvious that Meredith should be content while Ella had more than enough justification for being negative with her life! Unfortunately, reading about Meredith reminded me of myself and a lot of women I know. All of us are so lucky to be alive and have what the luxuries we have, but we always find something to complain about! At least I do!

At the end of chapter 1, Linda uncovers Ella's prescription for contentment in her life - a set of commandments for contentment found in Ella's diary:

**Never allow yourself to complain about anything-not even the weather.

**Never picture yourself in any other circumstances or someplace else.

**Never compare your lot with another's.

**Never allow yourself to wish this or that had been otherwise.

**Never dwell on tomorrow-remember that tomorrow is God's, not ours.

I love Ella's prescription for contentment, especially her last commandment. I hope I can learn from Ella and make a daily pledge that today is all I have, I am blessed to be alive today, so I need to give it all I have. Worrying about tomorrow is useless and wasteful...tomorrow is God's anyway!