The Non-anxious Presence of Christ in an Age of Anxiety
Age of Anxiety
The New Republic—a left-leaning news publisher I don’t endorse—published an article in 2019 entitled “Age of Anxiety” [1]. Its subtitle: “America seems to be in the midst of a full-blown panic attack.” For millennials, work-disrupting anxiety has occurred at twice the average rate in the US. For the middle-aged, there is this stress of financially supporting their grown children while caring for aging parents. For the elderly, there is fear of falling, fear of isolation, fear of dependence, and fear of degeneration. Between 1999 and 2017, suicide rates increased by 33% [2]. Barnes & Noble reported that sales of books dealing with anxiety increased by 26% from 2017 to 2018 [3]. And this was all before 2020. What are the statistics now in light of COVID-19, the 2020 presidential election, and the economic downturn? The observation may be correct: America seems to be in the midst of a full-blown panic attack.
Why is that? Is it because anxiety is peculiar to our age and culture? Is fear unusual in the human condition? Do you remember the very first words of Adam after he sinned? “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid” (Gen. 3:10). Adam had no idea what would happen next. He was afraid. Ever since the fall, we’ve lost a sense of security, certainty, and peace. Anxiety is not peculiar to America or your own personal life. Anxiety is embedded in our fallen human dilemma. Everyone struggles with some degree of fear and anxiety. The entire era of humanity post-fall may be considered the age of anxiety.
The Solution: Consuming or Communion?
What makes the problem worse is that we, as Christians, have misunderstood the solution to anxiety. Our immediate response is, “What do I do?” We treat God like consumers. We want a 3-step program, a quick-fix formula. We approach prayer and Scripture like some over-the-counter drug or formulaic recipe. Pour in a cup of prayer, mix in a tablespoon of thanksgiving, and throw it in the oven for 10 minutes. You get instant peace. But does it really work like that? As Ed Welch noted, the problem is that we’ve treated the solution to anxiety like a magic pill when anxiety is fundamentally a relational question [4].
Scripture doesn’t offer you a sequence of impersonal steps. Scripture offers you a person. The first question is not: “What do I do?” The first question is: “Who is with me?” Anxiety doesn’t search for something to do. Anxiety searches for someone to trust. In other words, what brings true, deep, and lasting peace? It’s not following a procedure. It’s fellowship with a person. Peace cannot be commodified. It is only communion in the presence of Christ that dispels anxiety.
The Lord is Near
This is precisely how Paul exhorts the church of Philippi in Philippians 4:5b-7. Before he commands the people to be anxious for nothing, he writes, “The Lord is near” (4:5b). So what does that mean, and why is it so important? To complicate things: There’s a debate on whether this refers to temporal or spatial nearness. Does this mean that Christ’s 2nd coming is near (temporal)? Or does this mean that Christ’s presence is near us now (spatial)? Commentators now agree that this is one of the rare cases where Paul is intentionally ambiguous so that it carries both temporal and spatial ideas. This little sentence is meant to serve two purposes. It connects with v. 5a, “Let your gentle spirit be known to all men.” Why? Because Christ’s return is near, and you will be vindicated on that day when you didn’t strike back but remained gentle. But it also connects with vv. 6-7, “Be anxious for nothing.” Why? Because Christ’s presence is near to you. Or as it says in Psalm 145:18, “The Lord is near to all who call upon Him.”
So then, why emphasize this? It is important because this means v. 5b is actually the main artery of vv. 6-7. If we cut out v. 5b (which many people do when they preach or memorize these verses), we actually cut the jugular of the whole passage. The command to “be anxious for nothing” and to “let your requests be made known” do not come in isolation. The command is preceded by a promise that the Lord is near. So then, what combats anxiety is not distancing ourselves from our fears. It’s not summoning up courage within ourselves. It’s not simply saying a formulaic prayer. What combats anxiety is the near presence of another.
The Non-Anxious Presence of Christ
There are at least two implications to this. First, Paul doesn’t say, “God is near,” or even, “Christ is near.” Paul says, “The Lord is near.” This is significant for the Philippians because the city of Philippi was a patriotic Roman city. They prided themselves in their loyalty to their Lord, who was Caesar. But these kinds of Lords rule by terror and tyranny. They rule by keeping their people in fear. They want their people to be anxious and paranoid. They want their people to look over their shoulders constantly. There are Lords like Joseph Stalin, who consolidated his power through, police terror, purge trials, and widespread secret executions. There are Lords like the drunken father who staggers home late at night, who reigns by verbal abuse and physical dominance. When these Lords knock on your door, blood pressure rises, hearts palpitate, and there is panic and worry.
But Paul says that when the true Lord is near, we should expect the opposite. Christ does not rule his people by terror. He does not want his people to worry. When Christ knocks on your door, you are meant to experience peace. In other words, Christ brings a non-anxious presence, and it’s his very nearness that dispels our fears. Christ is like the comforting presence of a loving father to a daughter in a thunderstorm. Christ is like the encouraging presence of a seasoned Master Sergeant to tenderfoot Marines in battle. Christ is like the calming presence of an expert doctor to a patient in medical distress. Anxiety is dissolved, not because our greatest fear has vanished or you followed a formulaic prayer. Anxiety is dissolved because someone has entered the room.
Christ Draws Near in Our Anxiety
But consider another crucial implication. Since the promise comes before the command, do you know what that means? It means the promise is true, even before you obey. Christ is near, even before you stop being anxious. In other words, he is not irritated by your anxiety. He is not frustrated with your frustration. He does not turn away when you are afraid. The opposite is true. He draws near to you in your anxiety. We think we need to first go to him when he’s the one who first comes to us.
When a young child has a horrible nightmare in the middle of the night, and she’s sobbing uncontrollably and screaming, what do loving parents do? Do they ignore her? Do they yank the door open and say, “Stop being anxious already! Pull yourself together! Go back to sleep!” No, I don’t think so. Instead, they open the door gently. They draw near to her. They hold her in their arms. And they say, “Daddy and Mommy are here... don’t be afraid... we’re here.”
And when we have nightmarish fears—financial insecurity, political and social turmoil, never being freed from a besetting sin, failure in the workplace or in ministry, our health deteriorating, our loved ones dying, being unliked by others, relationships falling apart, being alone—what will calm us? It’s knowing that our Lord Christ opens the door gently. He draws near to us. And he holds us in his arms and says, “I’m here... don’t be afraid... I’m here.” What dispels anxiety is not a series of impersonal steps. It’s believing that our Lord is near to us in the midst of our fears.
Tal Lavin, “Age of Anxiety,” The New Republic, February 26, 2019, https://newrepublic.com/article/153153/age-anxiety.
Holly Hedegaard, Sally C. Curtin, and Margaret Warner, “Suicide Mortality in the United States, 1999-2017,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, November 2018, https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db330.htm#:~:text=occurring%20after%202006.-,From%201999%20through%202017%2C%20the%20age%2Dadjusted%20suicide%20rate%20increased,1999%20to%2022.4%20in%202017..
Rachel Siegel, “‘An Anxious Nation’: Barnes & Noble Sees a Surge in Sales of Books about Stress,” The Washington Post, August 2, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2018/08/02/an-anxious-nation-barnes-noble-sees-surge-sales-books-about-stress/.
Ed Welch, “The Secret to Dealing with Fear and Anxiety,” Christian Counseling & Educational Foundation, April 19, 2011, https://www.ccef.org/secret-dealing-fear-and-anxiety/.