Every person has experienced anxiety at some point in their life while responding to some challenging situations or events. However, some situations such as imminent conflict, attack, failure, and rejection among others may cause prolonged anxiety. Prolonged anxiety or inability to deal with stressful situations may have negative impacts such as depression or stress/anxiety related diseases. Thus, this paper discusses death and war attacks as the causes of anxiety and how the Scripture addresses personal anxiety resulting from death and war attacks.
The thought of death is scary and raises a lot of anxiety especially when one thinks about the imminent causes of death. Ryan Jaslow’s post on death argues that anxiety is one of the factors that cause early deaths or premature deaths (Laslow, 2012). As Jaslow cites sleeplessness as an element of anxiety, I become worriedwhen I recall the many sleepless nights I have had. As a matter of fact, the thought triggered more anxiety but eventually, I overcame.
Secondly, it is common knowledge that when countries especially the leading world economy country such as the US is involved in the war, the entire world is likely to suffer. Therefore, thinking about the recent North Korea’s threat to US and Trump’s likely retaliation, anyone would have a reason to worry (Hjelmgaard, 2017). Such kind of conflict would not only affect the warring nations but the entire world.
The scripture addresses how to overcome anxiety especially the one resulting from fear of death and war. For instance, 2 Timothy 1:7 says that God has not given people the spirit of fear but the spirit of love, power, and sober mind (Gilpin, 2005). 1 Peter 5:7 encourages those with anxiety to cast them to God for He cares for them. Other verses dealing with anxiety during war or death include Proverbs 12:25, and Matthew 6:34 among others (Gilpin, 2005). While there are different ways of dealing with anxiety, Christians address anxiety differently from non-Christians. Thus, while the former may deal with anxiety through praying and fasting and reading the scripture, the latter may result to drug and substances abuse, violence, withdrawing from social events, or even committing self-harm.
In conclusion, death and war attacks are some of the causes of personal anxiety because their effects have direct impacts on an individual. It is also important to note that people differ in the manner in which they respond to anxiety. Thus, this paper explains how the scripture addresses anxiety as well as how Christians and non-Christians deal with anxiety.
- Gilpin, M. B. (2005). Our Vulnerability And Resiliency As Christian Helping Professionals.
- North American Association of Christians in Social Work (NACSW).
- Hjelmgaard, K. (2017). North Korea threatens ‘unimaginable’ strike on the United States. USA Today
- Laslow, R. (2012). Sleep Quality Improves for Adults as they Age, Study Suggests.