recovering worry wart.

Hi friends! Jessi here! After six weeks of rough pregnancy sickness and then the flu moving rapidly through our house this week, I'm behind on work/life/EVERYTHING. I've asked a few of my sponsors to post for the next few days while I catch up. Enjoy, enjoy! 

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Hi, I'm Monique and I blog over at The Lemonade Diaries. I am wife, momma to two wonderful kiddos {a spunky 9 year old boy and one year old little princess} and I'm a recovering worry-wart.

I know from the picture above this may be hard to believe, but it's true. You see when I was taking that picture, believe it or not I was worrying...worrying that you might see the cirlces under my eyes due to lack of sleep {I had just given birth to my little princess one before}, or that my face might look too fat, or that perhaps, gasp, I might look my age {the big 3-0}. 

For as long as I can I remember I have always been a worry-wart. I want to say that it's in my blood, that I got the "worry gene" from my mom and she got it from her mom, so on and so on. But to be honest, although I may have grown up amongst worriers, I still made the choice to worry.

Yes, I said "I made the choice to worry." You see, being a daughter of the King, I have all the tools I need to not worry, but instead I choose to worry. I choose to let the what if's of life to consume me to the point of worry. And most times, it's the little silly things I worry about like: what if people think I'm fat, what if I say the wrong thing, what if I trip and fall on my face...and the list can go on and on. It is then that I hear his still voice telling me to "cast all my cares on Him because He cares for me" {1 Peter 5:7} Sometimes I find it hard to believe, that will all things going on in the world that God cares for little ol' me! But He does! And not just me, but you too! He wants to know what worries you because He loves you. And not just the little worries, but the BIG worries too!

Over the last year, our financial situation changed. I went from working part-time, to just one day a week. And while the income adjustment has been significant, it has been manageable because we have been living off the savings I had set aside for a situation as this. But now that our savings is all most gone, I have been worrying about the future. Worrying if we will have money to pay the bills or buy food? And it was during one very difficult day, when everything seemed to be going wrong, and the kids were doing everything, but listening that I happened to come cross these verses: 

 “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?  Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?   Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?

 “So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin;   and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.  Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

“Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’  For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.  But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.  Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

Matthew 6:25-34 {NKJ}

I must admit, after reading those verses I felt a little foolish. All my worrying for nothing. Why was I doubting God and His goodness? If He takes care of the birds, then He can surely take care of me and my family. But I think the last verse, is the verse that says it all, "do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about it's own things."

And so, like I said in the beginning, I am a recovering worry-wart. I must admit still worry a little bit here and there, but when I feel the "worries" coming on, I recall to rememberance the verses above and I am at ease. And just in case I forget, I put a little reminder on my planner.

To hear more about me and my crazy life, head over to my blog: the lemonade diaries.

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