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Living Without Worry by Timothy Lane

Every single person in the world worries about something.  The car, the kids, their spouse, all of these people and things give us cause for worry.  Yet, worry at its essence is crippling.  Timothy Lane seeks to dismantle the need to hold onto worry by looking at how peace should function in our everyday lives.  His new book, Living Without Worry: How to replace anxiety with peace is a foray into the need for peace when the overwhelming hand of worry strikes our hearts.

For Tim, worry is fundamentally a function of idolatry.  He writes, “Worry is a sign that you have made something other than God your functional God (28).”  These things such as job, spouse, reputation, kids, and moral record can all at one time or another become an idol.  Tim sees these idols as becoming something we love too much (over-love) and so we fret and worry about them.  How do we get past these over-loves?  By putting God first, recognizing that Jesus calls us back to the right priorities, can we deal with anxiety and worry rightly. 

First, getting rid of your past sins is not always the easiest thing to do.  Tim calls us back to Jesus, who took all the sins we’ve ever committed in the past and upon his body paid for them.  Not only this, but our angst about past sin should drive us to the cross, because there is no amount of obedience that makes us acceptable to God, only that obedience that comes from another, namely Jesus.  Tim also doesn’t walk over suffering as if God doesn’t really care.  He offers some tried and true applications about suffering; to talk to God about your suffering, to live in community so that others might bear your burden in prayer for you.  The worry about our suffering is alleviated somewhat when the burden of life is lifted off of us and handled by Jesus and his body, the church.

Tim confidently and constantly points readers back to the Word of God for comfort when worrying, whether it be the Psalms of the New Testament, for he knows that there is great encouragement and challenge here in its pages.

I appreciated this book very much as a fellow worrier. 


Thanks to the good book company and Cross Focused Reviews for this book in exchange for an honest review. 

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