30 Days of Praying for Children and Familiesಮಾದರಿ

Anxiety is something we each experience, often daily.

Parents and carers may experience anxiety when they’re overstretched with the demands of caring for their family, while children and young people in care may struggle to feel safe and at peace.

We all have a nervous system that is constantly scanning the environment – a subconscious process checking constantly “Are we safe?”

This process (called Neuroception) is what shapes our sense of calm or threat and can sometimes go into overdrive, making us feel unsafe, even when there is no real danger. This may make us feel overwhelmed with anxiety.

God knows about our brains, and knew long before we had psychologists and therapists to tell us about them.

If this verse simply said, “Don’t be anxious”, and finished there, what help would that bring? No, scripture doesn’t pretend danger doesn’t exist, and it doesn’t force us to feel safe when we don’t feel it.

Instead, these verses encourage us to bring our anxious thoughts, our worries and stresses, to the one who brings a sense of safety. God is the only one who can bring true peace.

Prayer

Take a moment now to still your heart before the Lord.

Pay attention to your breath, and start to slow it down, inhaling deeply, then pausing before exhaling,

As you inhale, imagine you’re breathing in God’s peace.

As you exhale, imagine that you are breathing out your anxieties.

Now hold in your mind a friend or someone in your community who is overwhelmed and facing challenging circumstances at the moment.

As you hold them in your heart and mind, breathe in God’s peace for them and breathe out their anxieties, asking that he would fill them with his peace.