Christ and The Story of Anxiety
Anxiety is something many of us experience regularly. It appears in conversations, relationships, sleepless nights, and quiet moments when life feels overwhelming or uncertain. But what if anxiety is not simply something to suppress, fix, or feel ashamed of? What if it can become a place where we encounter comfort, peace, and hope even in the middle of struggle?
I want to explore anxiety not simply as a problem to solve, but as an invitation into deeper compassion, healing, and gospel presence. Because when we begin to understand the stories beneath anxiety, we become better able to offer the face and comfort of Christ to one another.
We live by stories
Human beings are shaped by stories. Not just the stories we tell aloud, but the ones we quietly inhabit every day.
Our lives are not shaped primarily by facts, but by meaning—by how we interpret what happens to us. Events do not simply occur; they are filtered through lenses. Over time, we connect the dots, explain ourselves to ourselves, and slowly develop a narrative about who we are, who God is, and what kind of world we live in.
One of the effects of sin is that it places us at the center of the story. We begin to organize our lives around self-protection, self-justification, and self-preservation. We interpret the world through fear, shame, pride, or striving.
Scripture is deeply aware of the power of story. The book of Isaiah begins with a vision—a moment of true seeing. Israel had been telling itself a story: prosperity meant God was pleased with them. Success became proof of faithfulness.
But Isaiah interrupts that narrative. He reveals that beneath the outward success was corruption, injustice, and divided worship. They believed God was delighted when, in reality, God was grieved.
The same dynamic exists within us.
Our lives are shaped by the stories we use to answer our deepest questions:
Who am I?
Is God trustworthy?
Is the world safe?
What does it mean to belong?
Am I loved?
Our experiences—especially painful ones—have often been answering those questions long before we were aware of it.
And this is where anxiety enters the picture.
The story the body carries
Anxiety is not random. It is not simply a failure of faith. More often, anxiety is a signal. It is the body living inside a story shaped by fear, self-protection, or distorted beliefs about safety, love, and God.
The experience of anxiety usually arrives physically first.
Before we consciously think anxious thoughts, the body reacts:
tightness in the chest or throat
shallow breathing
clenched muscles
nausea or a pit in the stomach
restlessness
fatigue mixed with alertness
The nervous system prepares for danger long before the conscious mind catches up.
Anxiety is deeply physiological. It is what happens when the body has learned—often very early—that certain situations, emotions, or relationships are unsafe.
Many of these patterns were formed before we had language for them. Anxiety often comes from implicit memory rather than explicit memory. The body remembers what the mind cannot fully explain.
This is why anxiety can feel confusing:
“I don’t know what’s wrong, I just feel off.”
But that confusion is not dysfunction. It is communication.
The body is telling a story.
Perhaps the story says:
“Last time I felt exposed, I was hurt.”
“Connection is dangerous.”
“If I relax, something bad will happen.”
“I must stay alert to survive.”
When we understand anxiety this way, it changes how we respond to ourselves.
Instead of treating anxiety as an enemy, we begin to approach it with curiosity and compassion.
Willpower doesn’t heal anxiety
Many of us try to reason our way out of anxiety.
We quote Scripture to ourselves. We tell ourselves to calm down. We remind ourselves that God is in control.
And while truth matters deeply, insight alone often does not resolve anxiety because the activated part of us is not primarily cognitive—it is physiological.
The nervous system does not respond first to arguments. It responds to safety.
You may know you are safe. You may know God loves you. But your body may still brace for danger because it learned long ago that danger was unavoidable.
Healing, then, must involve more than thinking differently. It must involve experiencing safety differently.
That often means:
slowing down
noticing bodily sensations without immediately trying to fix them
increasing our capacity to remain present
learning to stay with difficult emotions instead of escaping them
experiencing safe relationships where we are not judged, abandoned, or shamed
Over time, these experiences begin to reshape the story the body carries.
Not through force.
Not through self-condemnation.
But through repeated experiences of safety, presence, and love.
“The body slowly learns,
this feeling can rise and fall without destroying me
I do not have to brace constantly
I can remain present
I am not alone”
This is one of the practical implications of the gospel itself. Again and again in Scripture, when fear is present, God offers His presence.
Anxiety Is protection, not failure
One of the most freeing realizations for me has been this:
Anxiety is not my enemy.
It is my body trying to protect me with the tools it learned during painful experiences.
Those patterns made sense once. They helped us survive. But many of them were never updated.
As children, many of us experienced our anxiety as betrayal. We felt frustrated by our sensitivity, fear, or hypervigilance. We believed something was wrong with us spiritually or emotionally.
But anxiety is often evidence that:
our bodies adapted to unsafe environments
those adaptations protected us
God is now inviting us into a slower re-narration of safety and love
Healing begins when we stop fighting ourselves.
Healing Begins with Curiosity
One insight that has transformed my understanding of anxiety is this:
Anxiety intensifies when we try to get rid of it.
The first step is not control. It is curiosity.
Instead of asking:
“How do I stop feeling this?”
We can begin asking:
“What is my body trying to protect me from right now?”
That shift matters profoundly.
Curiosity lowers threat. Compassion communicates safety.
In many ways, this reflects the posture of God throughout Scripture:
“Adam, where are you?”
“Why are you hiding?”
God does not approach us first with condemnation, but with invitation.
As I began inviting God into the places where responsibility became crushing and childhood felt unsafe, grief surfaced. I began mourning losses I had never fully acknowledged.
And in those places, the gospel became deeply personal.
Not merely forgiveness of sin, but the presence of Christ entering wounded places with compassion, tenderness, and care.
The body heals through safety
Because anxiety is physiological, healing often begins with slowing down.
When the nervous system is overwhelmed, it cannot easily receive truth.
This is why practices that ground the body can become deeply meaningful:
slower breathing
longer exhales
noticing sensations
feeling your feet on the floor
orienting to the present moment
paying attention to the body without judgment
These practices are not about escaping reality. They are about creating the conditions where the body can experience safety enough to receive something new.
Healing also involves learning to listen to bodily sensations as meaningful communication rather than symptoms to suppress.
A tight chest may say:
“I’m afraid of failing.”
Restlessness may say:
“I’m waiting for something bad to happen.”
Over time, naming sensations with compassion helps integrate the story rather than fragment it further.
And perhaps most importantly: anxiety does not heal in isolation.
The nervous system recalibrates through safe relationships.
Healing happens in the presence of people who:
remain present
listen without judgment
offer gentleness instead of fixing
create space for grief, sadness, fear, and vulnerability
“Safety is not the absence of fear.
It is fear held without abandonment.”
The Church as a place of witness
This has profound implications for ministry.
What would it look like for our churches to become places where people are not rushed toward simplistic answers, but gently invited to explore the deeper stories beneath their suffering?
What if we became communities marked by curiosity instead of judgment?
For years, I have led a small group where women gather to write and share stories connected to rejection, shame, abandonment, grief, and fear. The goal is not self-focus or emotional indulgence. The goal is witness.
To sit with one another’s suffering.
To bring the face of Christ into hidden places.
To allow compassion to enter stories that were once carried alone.
And over time, I have watched this transform people.
When individuals receive the comfort of Christ within their own stories, they begin listening differently to others. They become gentler. More curious. More compassionate.
Church culture changes when people learn how to hold suffering with tenderness.
Christ Enters the Story
At the heart of the gospel is this truth:
God does not stand outside our fear waiting for us to escape it.He enters it.
Christ steps into anxious stories, wounded bodies, fractured histories, and hidden grief. He does not shame us for needing comfort. He becomes our comfort.
And this is what we are invited to offer one another:
not quick answers,
not spiritual performance,
but presence.
The presence of Christ with us.
And the presence of Christ through us.
Perhaps anxiety is not only something to overcome.
Perhaps it can also become a doorway
into honesty,
into compassion,
into healing,
and ultimately,
into a deeper experience of the gospel itself.
If you are interested in hearing more about Story Groups in New England, please don’ hestitate to reach out! I would love to get you connected to one.