Surviving Life in the Pressure Cooker

When I as a kid my mom was big into canning. Strawberries, peaches, apples, you name it... if it grew on a tree or a bush, she canned it. Now if you know anything about canning, which many these days don't, you'd know that an essential implement in the process is the pressure cooker. And we had a big one. In fact, it was so big and noisy, it used to scare me. When this beast of a stainless steel pot got up to a certain temperature, it would rattle and rock violently on the stove top from the pressure of the steam that was building up inside. The only thing that kept it from blowing was a little cap on the top that let just enough steam out to avoid certain disaster, or at least avoided cooked peaches being strewn all over the kitchen. As a kid I would steer a wide birth around this thing because I thought, "if that thing gets clogged, it's going to blow!" Thankfully it never did...and we spent many a winter enjoying the fruits of my mother's efforts in the kitchen the previous summer. I've learned a little about stress lately. I'm in the middle of a job change, transitioning from the career I've known for seven years, where I've grown somewhat comfortable, where some of my co-workers have become like second family. Now I'm going to a new environment with unknown challenges, unknown personalities, unknown culture. Needless to say I've felt interally somewhat like one of those pressure cookers my mother used long ago, except in my case I didn't have a release cap to keep it from blowing. I didn't realize just how much pressure was building till I found myself in the back of an ambulance one day last week hooked up to an EKG machine. I had called 911 on the way home from work because I felt I was having what I thought was a heart attack. I was short of breath, becoming increasingly dizzy to the point of blacking out with tingling sensations in my toes and hands. Well, after a full battery of tests, including several needle sticks and donations into a little cup, I was given the all clear. My heart was fine, everything else looked fine... The diagnosis? Hypertension brought on more than likely from...you guessed it...stress. Since that day I've been trying to do all of the right things doctors tell you to do. Reduce salt intake, get more rest, exercise daily, eat healthier. In short. Release some of that stress that has been building up in my body. I've tackled these instructions with a passion and I do feel better, even after half a week. There is one piece of instruction, however, that the doctor did not give me...but instruction that I know, more than all of these things, would do more to combat my stress than anything else. I Peter 5:7 tells us to cast our cares on God for He cares for us. At the root of stress is really the fear of the unkown. Of all people, we as Christians, should have every reason to be at peace internally. Yes, there are unknowns in life, but God is sovereign. He has called us and is working out His plan within us. The more I can trust that He cares for me and cast my burden on Him, the greater peace I can have, regardless of the situations I encounter in life. The same is true of major life changes such as my transition to a new job. If I have prayed about a decision, asked God to direct my path, requested that He open and close doors as appropriate in my life, then I need to have confidence that He will do that. In short I need to have faith in Him. The world will continue to turn the heat on. Responsibilities will always be there, bosses will always expect 110%, family problems will crop up sporadically... But regardless of the pressures we face...we can have faith that our God who cares for us will carry our burden. That faith is the best release cap of all.
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"I will meditate on Your precepts, and contemplate Your ways. I will delight myself in Your statutes; I will not forget Your word." Psalms 119:15 - 16