Stress Buster Series

Stress buster!

John 14:27 Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.

People working and living under severe challenging surroundings, find such Biblical promises as empty platitudes! What happens when you work the whole day without rest in a restaurant or hospital and then you are mercilessly asked to continue the shift and do the night-duty as well? Ah, peace! We got to work out a solution, though! Listen to me please!

• I never knew I would face such intense pressure and stress after a decade of ministry, I imagined I could work it out and figure it out, but I found the pressure mounting up with every passing day – how do I live without stress?

• We live in an uncertain world where jobs and security is concerned. How do I live without stress?

• We have crazy names of diseases and fear of infection lurking in the air? How do I stay cool?

Friend, replaying the problems over and over again in your mind is not going to give you any peace whatsoever – it would give you pain, fear and angst. Talking it over and discussing it is just going to make it worse. You have people calling, sending sms messages and incessant emails reminding you of your outstanding payments and credit card dues – this can just totally drain you.

As a mother of two grown up children, leading a church, writing spiritual articles and running a school as well, I am sure you do wonder how Bala tackles these things? Let me tell you, there were situations when I felt clueless and helpless! I am no superwoman to say that I never felt insecure, there were times when I just closed my eyes and asked God to give me some rest and sound sleep so that I could have peace for some hours. Believe me, I did that. Let me give you a recent situation where we felt tremendous pressure and stress when it came to arranging a translator for our midnight service at our church for the New Year service. Until the last moment nothing worked out. I loudly spoke to the Lord: ‘You brought me to this new city, made us plant a church in a remote area where we do not know the language and now we are stranded without knowledge of the language, now don’t forsake us, please help us…’ No answer, though. Distraught, tired and depleted with the other arrangements of our ministry, we just continued with our work.

The work of the Lord is unpredictable! Husband and wife from our church helped us in the translation of the sermon from ‘English to telugu’ in both the night and morning New Year service and the church were gloriously blessed. Amen.

If you are felling edgy and scary, this message should pick you up! God would certainly show up!

a) How I handle situations? Write it down and pray: Solution for stress is no rocket science, we have to take it to God in prayer – point-by-point. I write it out, right from rent to electricity bill and fees for children and I plead at His feet. It has worked for me.

b) Avoid last minute stress, hence jot down priorities: Prepare a ‘to-do’ list for office work. Start from the ‘most urgent’ ones to begin with and most important, do not trust your memory – I repeat, write it down. Wake up early to complete work, without last minute running around.

c) Pray, Plan & prepare: If you travel a lot for ministry or work, keep a ‘check list’ of travel items required: passport, required currency, mobile charger, mobile, travel kits, etc., – keep them ready before hand. Preplan, pray and prepare to avoid stress! Last minute crisis can sap energy.