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Rightly Ordered . . . Anxiety?
Anxiety has a purpose.
I’ve saved my 2-year-old daughter from drowning a thousand times this summer. She believes she can swim, but she can’t. Her lack of anxiety isn’t an asset but a liability. Every time we go swimming as a family, she jumps in and flails around until I grab her with both hands. She always emerges from the water with a joyous grin. Ignorance is bliss. She’s free to not be anxious because I’m anxious.
Anxiety gets a bad rap nowadays. It’s assumed to be an inherently negative term. The Koine Greek word is merimna, which can be rendered as “anxiety,” “worry,” “care,” or “undue concern.” It describes vigilance rooted in regard; it can be negative, positive, or neutral.
One of my friends who is a licensed therapist regularly has people come into his office because they “have anxiety.” Step one, he says, is to get more specific in their self-assessment: he helps them discern whether their anxiety is ordered or disordered. The existence of anxiety disorders, like generalized anxiety disorder or panic disorder, proves there can, in fact, be ordered anxiety.
Clinically disordered anxiety is brutal to live with, and it often takes a whole team of pastors, psychiatrists, and friends to help bear one’s burden (Gal. 6:2). This article isn’t meant to be a discussion about mental illness or its treatment, but I’d like to consider what ordered anxiety might look and feel like in the life of a follower of Jesus.
Anxious for Godly Reasons
The apostle Paul uses the term merimna and its derivatives nine times, and most of the time the term is decidedly positive. See, for example, what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 7:32–34:
I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord. But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife, and his interests are divided. And the unmarried or betrothed woman is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit. But the married woman is anxious about worldly things, how to please her husband.
What does anxiety do? Here, anxiety is the regard a husband and wife have for one another that energizes them to please one another. Also, to be anxious about the “things of the Lord” has to do with pursuing holiness in body and spirit. So when Paul says “free from anxieties,” he demonstrates how competing anxieties inhibit one’s freedom to act single-mindedly. The unmarried person is single-minded with regard to the work of ministry, but the married person’s interests are rightly divided—it’s good and right that they’re concerned about pleasing their spouse.
The existence of anxiety disorders proves there can, in fact, be ordered anxiety.
In Philippians, Paul uses the term twice. Once, Paul describes Timothy as a great pastor. He says, “I have no one like him, who will be genuinely anxious for your welfare” (Phil. 2:20). This usage is similar to what we find in 1 Corinthians 12:25, where Paul tells the church to walk in unity so “the members may have the same anxiety for one another.” Here, anxiety is synonymous with care or concern. The second usage in Philippians is famous: “Be not anxious for anything” (4:6).
How do these two uses of the word “anxiety” work together? Does Paul want us to care about nothing? To, like the Buddhists, extinguish the flames of passion in the pursuit of Nirvana? No. Paul is saying, “Do not sit idly in or be paralyzed by your anxiety, but bring it to the Lord with thanksgiving and prayer.”
The Philippians 4:6 use of anxiety is similar to what Jesus is getting at in Luke 12:25: “And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?” Only God can add hours to your life, so worrying about your lifespan wastes emotional energy. Let this anxiety drive you to prayer and cling to the Author of Life.
Pastoral Anxiety for the Local Church
Anxiety isn’t without cost to the one who carries it. Paul describes his burden: “There is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches” (2 Cor. 11:28). Does Paul not trust the Lord to care for the church? Does Paul not believe the promise that “the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matt. 16:18)? Does Paul not understand that the sovereign Lord never sleeps?
Paul soberly understands that local churches are fragile. Churches shut their doors every day. Elder teams split and fracture. Division ravages local assemblies of saints. Pastors make shipwreck of their faith and abandon the gospel once for all delivered to the saints all the time. The kingdom is unshakable, but local churches are shakable. Paul isn’t anxious about the church; he’s anxious for all the individual churches.
Paul isn’t anxious about the church; he’s anxious for all the individual churches.
About 10 years ago, I had a mentor figure disqualify himself from ministry. It haunted me. After a few months, he showed himself repentant. I took him out to lunch and said, “I’m concerned that I’ll end up like you. Where did you begin to go wrong?” He laughed and said, “Well, that’s an aggressive question I wasn’t prepared to answer.” He then said, “I stopped believing that it could happen to me. The fact that you’re concerned about the possibility that it might happen to you is a good sign. So, stay anxious, I guess?”
This is congruent with Pauline teaching: “Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this” (1 Tim. 4:16). If we stop believing we might go astray morally or doctrinally, we’ll stop keeping a close watch on ourselves.
Nonanxious Leadership Isn’t Always Healthy
There’s value in the pursuit of a nonanxious presence that comes through having a differentiated sense of self. When I know who I am in Christ, I don’t need others’ approval. I can live and lead with conviction, and I can resist the Messiah complex of overresponsibility. However, the low-grade narcissism that tempts pastors can use the idea of differentiation to mask that we might not care and might not love. A calloused heart will inevitably present itself as nonanxious.
Perhaps we aren’t anxious because we trust the Lord; perhaps we aren’t anxious because we don’t care. Perhaps we aren’t anxious because we’re experienced and time-tested; perhaps we aren’t anxious because we’re haughty and prideful. Perhaps we aren’t anxious because we trust the Lord will build his church; perhaps we aren’t anxious because we’re naive about the fragility of institutions.
Rather than avoid or suppress our anxieties, we should run hard toward a loving, attached life that produces ordered anxiety. Then we’ll find we need the Lord’s help and will lean on him as, perhaps, we haven’t in a long time. Having a total lack of anxiety like a toddler in swimming pool is a liability, not an asset.
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