All Who Are Weary: A 5-Day Study to Find Rest for Your SoulSample

If you were to write down every single thing you worry about, what would be on that list? Maybe you’re facing a huge, unsolvable problem. Or maybe a thousand daily worries weighing down your soul––how to meet that deadline, if a friend misinterpreted your text, how you’re going to do on that upcoming exam.

The Israelites in the Old Testament often worried. When God miraculously delivered them from the hand of the slave-driving Pharaoh, they soon found themselves trapped between the Red Sea and Pharaoh’s quickly approaching army. They panicked and cried out to Moses about how they’d have been better off in Egypt.

Despite the miraculous works they had already witnessed, the people could not fathom how to escape what they now faced. Behind them, an angry and humiliated Pharaoh chased them with a vast army of chariots and military officers, and in front stood an impassable body of water.

Moses responded that they shouldn’t fear, not because the dangers they were stuck between weren’t real, but because God would save them.

Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the waters parted in two. The people walked through on dry ground, and then Moses stretched out his hand again and those walls of water crashed down on the Egyptians. The Israelites watched in awe as God saved them from their enemies.

No one could deny how big Israel’s problems were––but God was bigger. In the same way, our worries can seem vast when they’re all we see. But when we take those worries and compare them to our God? No contest.

Time and again, the Israelites fixed their eyes on their worries instead of their God who always gave them what they needed. We do the same, don’t we? Sometimes we get so focused on what we can see that we lose sight of the hope we have in what is unseen. We carry this heavy burden of worry, forgetting we serve the same God who parted the Red Sea and provided manna from heaven. He’s our Creator and Sustainer, the one who calmed storms and raised the dead.

Our need to feel safe is real and good and valid, and our fears and worries alert us that something’s off. But instead of being consumed by our worries and fears, those things can nudge us to find safety in our God.