Gotta Serve Somebody How What You Serve Impacts Your Anxiety

Who is on the throne of your life? What is keeping you anxious? Perhaps something needs to change.

Back in the eighties, Bob Dylan came out with the song ‘Gotta Serve Somebody.’

In the song, Bob goes through many life scenarios of who or what you might serve.

You may be an ambassador to England or France
You may like to gamble, you might like to dance
You may be the heavyweight champion of the world
You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls

But you’re gonna have to serve somebody
Yes indeed, you’re gonna have to serve somebody
Well, it may be the Devil or it may be the Lord
But you’re gonna have to serve somebody

We all serve someone or something.

Even the most self-absorbed narcissist serves someone or something. They serve a self created, warped mirror, perception of themselves. They polish the mirror and expect everyone else to see the glory of their ‘perfection’.

What is keeping you anxious?

I serve someone, and it’s not always the Lord.

That someone or something might be ‘The opinion of …’

The name could also be ‘The security I have of having this or that’ – my bank balance, my clothes, the status of the car I drive, the approval of others, the safety of the control I have over my life.

I know someone who serves someone called ‘My Social Media image’.

They serve this God through self-revealing selfies.

The question is, how much fear rises in you if this (name the object of servitude) was to be taken away, if this were destroyed, if this was toppled off the throne.

How much fear rises at the thought of losing it?

Here are some examples.

People’s opinions about you. You make sure you say the right thing because if you dont then they might think less of you. Aren’t you, deep down, a people-pleaser? Living in servitude to others’ opinions.
Your stuff. Your security is in what you own. In all honesty, though, it owns you. It controls you. You gather more and more, but actually it gathers you in more and more.
Your cherished but faulty beliefs. Your mother always said this. Your father always did that. But now, with some mature thinking, you realise that some of those beliefs have trapped you into a way of thinking that actually doesn’t work for you.

What is on the throne?

Does the thought of losing it trigger a fear response?

If I do … then people might not like me
If I let go of this item, then I might not have enough in the future
If I let go of this belief, then I might lose the security of a supposedly known way

What am I serving?

I think of the young lady (young because she is younger than me) and her obsession with image. It owns her, but she is on a swing.

Swing made of popsicle sticks ice cream sticks with stone in seat

She pushes herself out into the future and sees potential illness, age creeping up, wrinkles, and body shape changes.

Comparisionitis

Comparisionitis kicks in and the anxiety of how people see her pumps up the fear response.

This eventually causes a tiredness to creep in, and in her exhaustion, in her private moments where no one else can see her, she swings back into the depressed fatigue of trying to get everything right.

The next she day she wakes up and presents herself again to her mobile phone.

OK, you may not have beauty on the throne and serve it with every beauty cream you can find.

But it might be

Money
Food
Alchohol
Fame
Sex
Respect
Control
Pocessions
Friendships
Perfectionism

We swing out, hold ourselves out into the future, and everything gets very fearful and anxiety generating.

The swing goes back and looks at our failures. We burden ourselves with regret.

So we try harder, smarter, with more determination and cunning.

We have to be in control to feel safe.

Back and forth.

Recently I had a picture in my mind of Christ on the throne.

I shift whatever is grabbing my worried focus and my depressing backwards gaze and ask for Christ in this moment and at the place.

A centering of myself on what is true and holy, and good.

I bow my knee and surrender my yesterday, my today and my tomorrow into his hands.

He knows my past way better than I do. He knows all the details and ‘removes all my transgressions from me, as far as the east is from the west’.

Do you love me more than these?

This morning I was listening to a story of relationship restoration.

Peter, a follower of Jesus, had failed Jesus.

On the throne of his life was his own personal wellbeing. He had denied knowing Jesus at the moment Jesus needed him the most.

Then they seized him and led him away, bringing him into the high priest’s house, and Peter was following at a distance.

And when they had kindled a fire in the middle of the courtyard and sat down together, Peter sat down among them.

Then a servant girl, seeing him as he sat in the light and looking closely at him, said, “This man also was with him.” But he denied it, saying, “Woman, I do not know him.”

And a little later someone else saw him and said, “You also are one of them.” But Peter said, “Man, I am not.”

And after an interval of about an hour still another insisted, saying, “Certainly this man also was with him, for he too is a Galilean.”

But Peter said, “Man, I do not know what you are talking about.” And immediately, while he was still speaking, the rooster crowed.

And the Lord turned and looked at Peter. And Peter remembered the saying of the Lord, how he had said to him, “Before the rooster crows today, you will deny me three times.”

And he went out and wept bitterly. Luke 22:54-62

How would it feel if in your darkest moment your best friend denied knowing you? That you declared that you were a complete stranger to them?

Peter did this three times. Peter’s swing had swung out into the future to a potential threat to his life. He took the straightforward route. He lied.

In preference to truth and potential consequences, we lie.

So Jesus, in the fullness of grace, asked Peter three times if he loved him.

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Feed my lambs.”

He said to him a second time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Tend my sheep.” John 21:14-16

This time Peter affirmed his loyalty, his friendship, his love.

Restoration of relationship

But Jesus said there would be a cost to this commitment. To this having Christ on the throne. The cost would be Peter’s crucifixion.

Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.”

(This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.) And after saying this he said to him, “Follow me.” John 21:18-19

The cost of having Christ on the throne could be the crucifixion of everything else we consider important.

All the VAIN THINGS that CHARM me most, I sacrifice them to his blood. Isaac Watts

The Charm

What are the vain things that charm you the most?

A charm has a magnetic, enchanting, or even disarming quality to itself.

It allures you away from what was always meant to be in first place in your life.

Put first things first and we get second things thrown in:
put second things first and we lose both first and second things. C.S. Lewis

Quotes to consider

When I survey the wondrous cross
on which the Prince of glory died,
my richest gain I count but loss,
and pour contempt on all my pride.

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast
save in the death of Christ, my God!
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them through his blood.

See, from his head, his hands, his feet,
sorrow and love flow mingled down.
Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,
or thorns compose so rich a crown?

Were the whole realm of nature mine,
that were a present far too small.
Love so amazing, so divine,
demands my soul, my life, my all. Issac Watts

When you next over-react in anxiety, rejection or anger, try to distinguish between present reality and the echoes of past experiences. D. Riddell

I think that is God’s plan – to meet me where I am, in all my ugliness, not where I pretend to be or wish I were; to meet me in my weakness and shame and fear and to give me hope that God loves me, that He can change me, and that He can use me. Dr. Larry Crabb, Real Church

The people who are going to be most controlled by their fears are the ones who don’t admit them and deal with them. Richard Rohr -Job and the Mystery of Suffering

The past describes what happened. It does not decide what will happen. Rob Bell

My life has been full of terrible misfortunes, most of which never happened. Michel de Montaigne