Anxious thoughts and strongholds – The lies and how to overcome them

What is anxiety?

The Bible tells us not to be anxious. This seven letter word, what does it really mean? Some equate it to worry or fretting. Some equate it to fear. It could be something that robs you of peace; something that halts you in your tracks and prevents you from moving forward or taking the next step(s). For faith to exist, there must initially be an element of uncertainty or doubt. Anxiety could then be the feelings you have when you’re unable to control the outcome of a situation or when you struggle to exercise complete faith in God. Anxiety starts in the mind and could exist for legitimate or illegitimate reasons. Whatever it may mean to you, I believe we can at least agree that anxiety is a stronghold, a powerful attack on the human mind that is so negative that God tells us in Philipians 4:6-7: “Do not be anxious or worried about anything, but in everything [every circumstance and situation] by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, continue to make your [specific] requests known to God. And the peace of God [that peace which reassures the heart, that peace] which transcends all understanding, [that peace which] stands guard over your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus [is yours].”

Taking anxious thoughts captive

So, if being anxious or having anxious thoughts is something that God doesn’t want us to do or have, then it means that behind every anxious thought is a lie or deception. As I was studying my Bible in preparation to write this post, I was reading 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 AMP which tells us that for the children of God in this life, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal/worldly, but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds (of human reasoning and to destroy false arguments)…casting down arguments and everything that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of God. Basically, strongholds are false arguments, wrong ideas and thoughts we have formed in our minds which must taken captive and cast down e.g. fear, doubt, anxiety, trauma, depression, discouragement, self-doubt etc.

To explain this segment, my Bible column says this: “Strongholds are first established in the mind; that is why we are to take every thought captive. Behind every stronghold is also a lie – a place of personal bondage where God’s word has been subjugated to any unscriptural idea or personally confused belief that is held to be true. Behind every lie is a fear; and behind every fear is an idol. Idols are established wherever there exists a failure to trust in the provisions of God that are ours through Jesus Christ. Some of the weapons that pull down these strongholds are God’s word (Hebrews 4:12-13), the blood of the Cross (Rev 12:11), and the name of Jesus (Mark 16:17). Strongholds are pulled down, and confronted bondage is broken as these spiritual weapons of our warfare are employed (Eph 6:13-18).”

What I would like to add is that being in the mind, strongholds must first be identified. We must first acknowledge that we have certain thoughts and beliefs about certain things or situations. Sometimes we work ourselves up into distorted beliefs about ourselves or our lives or our future. Other times, we are in bondage because of our past lives or the lives our parents or grand parents lived. So why do I say that we must first see clearly our bonded state before we can make any progress? Because Jesus said so in John 8:32 – “And you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” When light/truth is shone into the dark areas of our minds, darkness flees and can only return in the absence of light. This is what Jesus warns us of in Matthew 12:43-45, that if the demon that was chased out returns to find emptiness, it will return with even greater force than before.

This means that we can all be set free from whatever mental bondage we are in, and God promises us this. But the starting point is the truth. There is only one source of truth in this life, and that is the word of God. This is where we must all start. No matter how far you’ve gone or how strong your bonds are, your first step must be to return to the word of God. Start studying it for yourself. Day by day. Familiarizing yourself with God’s written word and you’ll undoubtedly become familiar with his audible voice. Commit His words to memory because you’ll need it as you go though your daily life.

Now that you get the starting point, let’s continue. As you study and God starts to reveal to you the bonds that you’re stuck in – sins you’re living in, wrong mental beliefs, bitterness, unforgiveness, trauma, fear, doubt, anxiety etc. Whatever it is…you must clearly identify these bonds. When you go to war, you cannot fight what you cannot see. Same way we cannot on our own fix what we don’t know about. But God who made us knows what is wrong with our lives, and only He can fix us up.

Just like you would study your enemy before going to war, you must study those thoughts: Why are you here? Who sent you? What power do you have over me? Why do you keep coming back? Clearly identify the anxious thoughts, identify the strongholds in your life that are holding you back from moving forward. Whenever we find that we seem to be stagnated, stuck in a rut and maybe even frustrated, depressed, or that a negative sequence of events keeps repeating in our lives, this may be a stronghold. Write them down and study them. Don’t let them play only in your head. Take those thoughts captive. Choose to dominate and overcome them! Remember, you’re at war, a spiritual war. Identify the strongholds or anxious thoughts, write them down. Then next is how to take them captive and destroy them.

How to destroy a stronghold or anxious thought permanently

When you take a destructive enemy captive, you don’t do that then start playing with it or making friends with it. You must kill it permanently. In fact, we see in old testament war times how often God instructed the Israelites to completely destroy enemies of God so that they dont’t corrupt His children. Sometimes the Israelites obeyed, but quite often they didn’t, or only partially obeyed. What was the result? Those enemies rose up again, sometimes in such great force that they took the Israelites captive again and again for many years. This also applies to us. We must permanently destroy those thoughts and strongholds so that we can live permanently free, because this is what God wants for us His children.

You’re now probably wondering how to take these thoughts captive. We can take cues from Bible characters who faced anxious thoughts or worries and how they overcame them. I explore three themes below:

Anxiety from fearing the unknown or feelings of inadequacy

• We all know Moses and I’ve written about him a few times on this blog. His life had three phases. Phase 1 (40 years) was living in Pharaoh’s palace as a prince and possible heir to the throne of the most powerful kingdom on earth. Phase 2 (40 years) was living in the strange land of Midian where he got married, bore children and was tending to the flock of his father-in-law. Phase 3 (40 years) was his life’s mission – leading the people of Israel out of Egypt to the promised land. But when God appeared to Moses in the burning bush to give him his ultimate life mission, Moses was full of fear (perhaps remembering the murder that made him flee Egypt in the first place), anxiety and feelings of inadequacy. So deep-rooted were these feelings that Moses, once the Prince of almighty Egypt, tried five times to avoid being sent to rescue the Israelites. This actually got God angry but God already had everything worked out and all Moses’ concerns were addressed.
  
  So how did Moses address his anxieties? He was open about them with God. He mentioned each of his anxieties to God, and in His mercies, God showed Moses a way out of each of them, leading Moses to fulfil his ultimate life mission. Imagine if he didn’t addresss his anxieties but moved ahead with fear gripping his heart, Moses would have failed even before he started, perhaps spending the rest of his life stuck in the same place in the wilderness of Midian, never moving ahead because he never addressed his anxieties and fears.

• Another Bible character who had to be warned several times not to fear, was Joshua. Joshua was Moses’ right hand man, who had faithfully returned from spying on the land of Canaan, and had the faith to believe that the Israelites could conquer the enemy. But unfortunately, as the other Israelites lacked faith, Joshua was subjected to spending 40 years in the wilderness alongside this unbelieving lot. I can imagine that he may have felt some anger and irritation at his brethren for their unbelief. But in those 40 years, even Joshua’s character and faith in God’s promises to him was being tested. He was being trained for leadership and he had firsthand exposure to learning directly from the master leader himself, Moses.
  
  After the death of Moses, in the first nine verses of the book of Joshua, God instructs Joshua eight times to either be strong or of good courage, or to be very courageous, or to neither be afraid nor be dismayed. Joshua was going to live the life of a warrior, so it was extremely important that while he had faith in God, that he was not moved by what he saw. Therefore, God had to repeat so many times that there was absolutely no room for anxiety or fear if Joshua was to fulfil his purpose. Any fears or anxieties had to be dealt with, drowned by faith and the word of God, prayer, praise and worship of God.
  
  One of the first tests that Joshua faced was to cross the Jordan with the ark. The Jordan river was overflowing its banks, as it was harvest season, thus possibly experiencing some strong waves. But for the priests to cross the river, they had to overcome the fear of what they knew about what strong waves could do to you if you step into it. The fulfillment of the promise of God was first dependent on their obedience. Conquer your fear of waves and I will fulfil my promise. Therefore, as the feet of the priests touched the edge of the waters, the waters stopped and rose in a heap very far away and all the people crossed over on dry land. What we can see is that all they needed was just a little faith i.e. they only needed to dip their feet in the edge of the water to prove their faith before God fulfilled the rest. Sometimes God is just asking us to take a little step of faith forward. What He has in store for us does not have to be commensurate to our level of faith, but faith to move forward, to conquer our fears and anxieties we must have.

Anxiety when life does not go how you thought it would

• Another Bibe character who must have feared the unknown was Joseph. For no glaring sin of his, he was sold into slavery by his brothers, serving in Egypt, falsefully accused and ending up in prison, then the men who promised to mention him to the king forgot him in prison for another two years. But remember, Joseph had dreams of greatness – not once and certainly not twice. God had shown him glimpses of his future but his lived reality was that of a prisoner and a slave. Joseph must have been so anxious to see his dreams fulfilled, but not so anxious that he was willing to sin to bring them to pass his own way.
  
  The Bible tells us in Psalms 105:18 that “until the time that God’s word came to pass, the word of the Lord tested him”. Ultimately, what did we learn about Joseph just before he died that helped him survive those years? Perspective! He said in Genesis 50:20 that: “But as for you, you meant it for evil against me, but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive”. His anxious thoughts may have been: Woe is me! What has become of me? Who cursed me? Is God a liar? What have I done to deserve this? Is it the witches? Whatever his thoughts may have been, Joseph fought the good fight daily, holding those thoughts captive. He finished the race and kept the faith.

• Another worthy example we know of is David. Again, somewhat similar to Joseph, in his mid-to-late teens, he was annointed to be king of Israel. What followed next however was the life of a fugitive. David’s character was tested multiple times to see whether He would obey God or find ways to bring the dream to pass in his own (sinful) way. As you can imagine, on those many lonely nights in the wilderness on the run, David had many anxious thoughts, some of which he shared with us in the Psalms. Psalms 94:19: “In the multitude of my anxieties within me, your comforts delight my soul”. Psalms 139:23-24: “Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my anxieties; and see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting”. What I’m learning from these is that similar to Joseph, David also had anxious thoughts. But they also both had the right perspective despite their situations. This perspective was grounded in their faith in God, which was critical as they waited on God to fulfil His promises to them in His own time.

Anxiety in the face of death

• Study the life of Jesus and how he overcame the “troubles and deep distress” that He had when He knew that death was around the corner. He didn’t allow this fear to abide inside His head alone but He shared it. With whom? His friends, his three closest godly friends who He called to join Him in prayers. The Bible says that Jesus was in agony and He prayed deeply to God repeatedly. God didn’t take away the challenges ahead; but while Jesus prayed, Luke tells us that God sent an angel to give Jesus the strength to overcome the trials ahead. (Luke 22:40-46; Matthew 26:36-46; Mark 14:32-42).

• Another character who faced anxiety in the face of death was Elijah. His experience with anxiety is such a powerful story that we can all relate with. First is that even God’s children get depressed. Second is that anxiety can grip our hearts so quickly and lead us to make extremely irrational or wrong decisions. Third is that even after great experiences with God, we must constantly be on the watch because the devil is always looking for ways to trip us up and make our fears or enemies look bigger or more powerful than they really are.
  
  Elijah had just brought down fire from heaven, destroyed all the prophets of Baal, prayed for God to bring back rain after a few years of famine, and was empowered by the Spirit of God to run faster than the chariot of King Ahab. But immediately Jezebel threatened to take his life the next day, i.e. threatened, not that she sent people to kill him immediately, Elijah fled! Imagine that! He went a day’s journey into the wilderness and prayed that he may die. But there and then, God in His tender mercies sent an angel to give his mighty servant food and drink before setting him on his next mission.

In summary: Like Moses, take your specific anxieties/fears to God who knows a way out of every one of them. Like Joshua, do not give any room for fear/discouragement to thrive in your life because this may rob you completely of what God has in stock for you. Your blessings are on the other side of your fears, so just exercise even a little faith and move forward. Like Joseph and David, let God develop in you the right perspective on life by studying His word and living a life of praise through the storms. Like Jesus, share your anxious thoughts with your closest godly friends, invite them to pray for/with you and you also go with those specific anxious thoughts to God. While God may not remove the trials ahead of you, He can at least send His angels to strengthen you to overcome. And finally, like Elijah, know that God acknowledges that you may be anxious or have fears or feelings of depression. God is ready to comfort His children even in those circumstances but note that you’re not meant to dwell there forever. Pick yourself up and keep it moving, just like God subsequently instructed Elijah to do after spending some time in that state.

I hope you’ve learnt a few lessons from these experiences but there’s so many more in the Bible that you will learn of as you study for yourself. I leave you with my favorite Bible verse for when I’m faced with anxiety: 2 Timothy 1:7 – “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind”.

Similar to David in Psalms 124:7-8, we can escape the snare/trap of the fowler/hunter because our help is in the name of the Lord! I pray that you believe that this is true and for these words to guide you as you conquer the anxieties/strongholds in your life, and live the life of peace and freedom that God has planned for you. God bless you!