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Finding Peace when Life Is Stressful

Finding Peace when Life Is Stressful

Do you ever get stressed, worried, tense, keyed-up?

In this world, we cannot avoid moments of stress because stressful events occur. When such events do occur, our bodies have an adaptive response to provide us quick energy and activate our body’s defenses (immune system) to protect us from injury or infection.

This quick reaction to a sudden stressful event is helpful when the stress is real (as opposed to imaginary) and when the problem causing the stress is resolved in a relatively short time.

However, many people today live in an almost continual state of mental stress. They are always worried, always on edge—feeling a sense of urgency as if in crisis mode all the time. This type of unremitting stress is quite damaging to our physical and mental health. The long-term activation of the body’s stress circuitry, with its continuously keyed-up immune system, causes chronic inflammation that damages insulin receptors, contributing to adult-onset diabetes mellitus, increased risk of heart attack and stroke, mood disorders (such as depression), and Alzheimer’s dementia. Additionally, such chronic stress interferes with normal neuronal signaling, causing fatigue, malaise, concentration problems, sleep disturbance, and unhealthy alterations in appetite.

Chronic unremitting stress is unhealthy, but regardless of life’s stressors, there are practical actions you can take to enhance your resilience, reduce stress, calm the body’s systems down, and promote healthier body and mind. Here are some general principles and actions that will help better manage and reduce your stress response:

  • Healthy lifestyle — eat a plant-based or Mediterranean diet, get regular exercise, and sleep eight hours each night (for adults). Good stress management starts with a good physical health foundation, so taking care of the body’s basic physiological needs is the first place to start.
  • Healthy spirituality — develop a trust relationship with a trustworthy God of love. Many people believe in God but have views of God that actually incite fear—this is unhealthy! Neuroscience shows that only the belief in a benevolent God is healthy and reduces our fear and stress. Remember, the Bible says that “perfect love casts out all fear.” If we have views of God that do not reduce or take away our fear, but instead incite it, something is wrong with our view of God. Trusting in a God of love who is our Creator leads to our next principle.
  • Understand reality — embrace design law, learning how reality actually functions, and choose to live in harmony with the laws upon which God built life to operate. Know what your responsibilities are (and what isn’t your responsibility) and choose to fulfill them while trusting God with how things turn out. Finally, give others the freedom to have their own ideas, perspectives, beliefs, including their attitudes toward you. In other words, give people freedom not to like you as long as you are living in harmony with God’s will for your life.
  • Be truthful — don’t deny your life’s problems but address them in the largest context possible; i.e., in a trust relationship with God, allowing for possibilities beyond your current understanding.
  • Get mental rest—God prescribed one day in seven to rest the mind and spirit in a love relationship with Him. Don’t neglect this restoration time!
  • Organize life — establish routines and structure such that most of life’s responsibilities are not new problems to be solved each day but merely duties to be done routinely; e.g., Tuesday is bathroom cleaning day, Friday is laundry, Monday is vacuuming, etc. Making certain things routine will keep your life from piling up stress.
  • Set boundaries — learn how to say no in a firm from respectful manner.
  • Live a little — schedule recreation time, hobbies, and other interests for enjoyment into your regular routine.
  • Avoid toxins — alcohol, drugs, and destructive behaviors designed to alter mood transiently (pornography, impulsive shopping, gambling, excessive gaming, etc.) actually damage and destroy, increase guilt and shame, which increase stress.
  • Build healthy relationships — connect with mature people, join healthy groups, and become involved in helping others.
  • Seek professional help — a trained counselor or psychiatrist can help you manage overwhelming moments and offer specific strategies for dealing with crises.

Life is filled with stressful events. We cannot control what happens around us, but we do have control over the decisions we make in governance of ourselves. It is our responsibility to decide how we will respond to life’s many stressors. I encourage you to make healthy choices in harmony with God’s design for life and then trust God with how things turn out.

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Testimony 11

I would love to have a copy of “Healing the Mind” DVDs to have in my therapy office. I enjoy having clients check out materials to enhance their therapy experience. I have sat under Dr. Jennings’ teaching at an American Association of Christian Counselors convention and respect his work greatly.

K.B., LA, USA

 

Testimony 44

We were given a gift of the DVD set, “God and Your Brain,” and we just finished watching it. The truths in this are so powerful and truly an answer to a prayer. We’re seeing hope where once we thought God wasn’t answering our prayers to be free of certain mindsets. He answered with these DVDs and we are hungry for more. Thank you!

Daniel T., Easley, SC, USA

 

Testimony 53

I was so blessed by a friend who gave me your book, “The God Shaped Brain,” while I was sitting in church asking God to please help me learn more about Him and help me not to be so confused and scared. That was about 2 years ago. Your books have helped me to love God even more. I’m not confused or scared anymore! I have listened to all of your bible study classes and feel like I know the wonderful people that attend every week. Thank you for all that you’re doing in spreading the true message about God and His law of love. God bless you and your whole class.

Elssy P., Modesto, CA, USA

 

Testimony 57

You have helped make sense of thirty two years of confusion. The material you freely provide reorganized so much of my life into such a beautiful pattern that has always been hinted at from within, but misguided with my training and what I was experiencing externally. My filipno parents, who were converted from Catholicism to SDA, were sincere and did their best to raise me the right way and I have deep respect for them. However, being immigrants and not understanding the language made for a difficult transition as I was growing up, which also applied to my spiritual growth as I learned the patterns of religion. I have been listening to as many bible study classes and reading blog posts as my time in a work truck will allow, searching for the practical applications of where spirituality and reality meet, and I thank you for helping me find that. You have helped me reach a point in which I can truly say that I love God, that I believe He loves me, and, like David, I delight in His law. God bless.

Emmanuel V., Calgary, AB Canada

Testimony 42

I am just writing to say that I have been so blessed by the teachings of Come And Reason Minitries recently. I watched last week’s bible study lesson on Youtube and am thankful that the error in the printed lesson guide you use was pointed out and this week’s study was of equal benefit, if not more so. My understanding of God’s nature has been very confused of late and I am so grateful for clarity in this matter. I have never really fully understood previously how a good God can cause bad things to happen and now I realise that He doesn’t, it’s a natural consequence of sin. May the almighty Father and His Son, our Saviour Jesus Christ, continue to bless your ministry.

Laura P., United Kingdom

 

Testimony 58

I have been watching your videos in The Power of Love seminar and I must say these have liberated me and have improved my relationship with the Lord. I am no longer terrified of him as I was before following your teachings.

Thando N., South Africa

 

Testimony 50

After coming into contact with Come And Reason Ministries, I can finally say that many of my unanswered questions have fallen into place. I discovered that my view of God’s Law was “imposed laws and rules” with “imposed punishments” and that this was the major culprit of my many unanswered questions. Thanks be to God for using you and those around you to help us who have struggled with this “infection” of thought. I have now rejected the “imposed law” concept to fully embrace “Design Law”… to look thru “Design Law,” instead of “imposed law,” is a relief.

Viliami L., Australia

 

Testimony 72

I am blown away by the truth that you present. God’s Design Law makes so much sense! You have validated my impression that, if God is love, He would not kill those who don’t want to know him. If God gives us choice, then how can He destroy us if our choice is not to follow him. Thank you for opening my eyes and heart to the pure love of God seen through Jesus. The love I now have for Jesus is deeper and free from condemnation. My heart has been opened to love others as Jesus loves me. May God continue to bless your God-given insight into His word and your ministry. The truth has set me free!

H. Miller, Centereach, NY

Testimony 37

Hearing Dr. Jennings’ presentations in person came at a pivotal moment in my spiritual journey that began about nine months ago, when the fault lines inherent in my belief system began to crack under questions that most reasonable people end up asking about God and His nature. These were questions I couldn’t find answers to, and they shook my faith. I was unable let it go any longer and be satisfied. My Christian experience became distant. I was afraid; the fear in me rose like thorns, pushing me away from Jesus. And then someone heard my questions and introduced me to this ministry, and my life has totally changed.

I can tell you that this new, “present truth” message is far grander and life-changing than when I shifted from being an agnostic and then a nominal Christian. It has radically altered my worldview, because it reveals a God that makes sense. It is a revolution. I believe that Dr. Jennings’ message is the final message that must go to the world. If any message could be called “righteousness by faith,” as abused as that term is by the right and the left, this is that message, because Jennings’ biblical message identifies a God who is different, whose character isn’t an impossible contradiction.

I walk this path now without fear. I see people differently, and the Holy Spirit burns in my heart. Many call Dr. Jennings’ message false and compromising, but it isn’t false, because I’ve seen the fruits within my mind and body. It is not compromising, because in this message is the only road to holiness that makes any sense. No longer do I behold a pagan god who is always angry and suspicious. Instead, I behold a God who is freeing and loving, always working for our good, and giving me every reason to love my enemy even to my own death, just as Jesus pleads with us. God is good.

Anthony L., CA, USA

 

Testimony 10

I personally download and listen to each of Come And Reason Ministries Bible study class lessons and PDF study notes to use when teaching my class. Really appreciate the class especially when Dr. Jennings is teaching. Thank God there are persons like him doing His work and traveling to share His beliefs.

B. L.M., North Plains, OR, USA

 

Testimony 25

I just want to say thank you so much for your conversations via YouTube. I regularly tune in to your lectures, “Let’s Talk” sessions, and many others. Through these I’ve found greater depth and meaning to God’s word. Thanks for all that you do and please continue. I’m currently working in the middle of Silicon Valley at Stanford University. I feel like God really has me in the right place right now and I’m sensing that your teachings might be part of it.

B. F., Silicon Valley, CA, USA

 

Testimony 5

We listen to your bible studies lessons in our class in Montana. You actually were the main reason I decided to get a laptop, so I can go to your site and listen, read, learn, and print the class notes. I am so grateful to learn the correct view of God and his character. Now, to just have others have an interest in knowing, so I can share it with them. Good thoughts your way.

R. N., MT, USA

 

Testimony 64

I’ve been reading the bible and walking with Jesus since I was around 16. I’m 42 now. I’ve mostly been alone in my walk although I went to several churches in different denominations. For the past 3 years God has been showing me His character of agape. It’s been a blessing and changed how I view God and my walk with Jesus. About a year ago I came across the power of love and the principles of design law. These teachings changed how I read scripture and have been such a beautiful blessing. I’m very excited and grateful for these truths. We share these truths of agape, design law and the reality of the principles of the two trees in the garden of Eden with people on Facebook and YouTube. People all over are learning to trust God and His agape design law which makes life possible. Thank you for everything you shared with me. May God continue to bless your ministry and lives.

Bradley M., Hinsdale, NY, USA

 

Testimony 23

I would just like to add my voice to the many people who, I believe, must have contacted you to express their appreciation for the “Healing the Mind” DVDs. I’ve been listening to your Bible study class discussions for many years and I’ve been personally blessed by your research and teaching about the character of God.

L. G., Oakland, MI, USA

 

Testimony 49

I came into the church at 21, but that is as far as it went. I was so confused about what love is. I couldn’t find it in the bible, because I am not a person that can read between the lines. I have no logic. I have read many, many books; trying to figure out the crux of the matter. They were helpful, but something was still missing. I have become very frustrated to the point of crying out to God, “Where can I go?”  I needed some basics.

I found two books, written by Timothy Jennings, MD, to be very helpful. God showed me that I had lived my whole life in fear. I didn’t even see it. Now, I do. God is so good.  I discovered the “The Remedy”  Dr. Jennings new book, “The God-Shaped Heart!” Oh, I was so excited, I purchased them right away.

I can get rid of most of my books, because “The Remedy” brings the Love of God out so clearly, even I can’t miss it. Now, I want to sit and read my Bible. Wow, what a revelation! It is just simply Awesome! I am so grateful to Jehovah Almighty for hearing my prayer for more understanding! I am so encouraged!

Jackie S.