A rough day. A rough week. Maybe living with ongoing challenges. How do you deal with these situations in life that the Apostle Paul might call “things that so easily beset us?” (Hebrews 12:1 KJV) Things that slow us down. Hold us back as we seek to please our Lord and serve Him faithfully.

Paul’s answer? Cast them off. Like bulky garments that would slow down a runner, Paul says toss those things and run the race. Here’s how Paul puts it:

…let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us.

Hebrews 12:1 NLT

The things you are dealing with, the challenges before you, are real. You don’t just walk away from them or ignore them. You give them to Jesus with the full confidence that He is able to guide you to the right solution and relieve you of the burden that is distracting you right now.

Henry Blackaby says this is not an easy task, yet it is crucial if you are to effectively live and serve the Lord.

“Casting our cares is a choice. It means consciously handing over our anxiety to Christ and allowing Him to carry the weight of our problems. At times this is the most difficult part of trusting God!”

Henry Blackaby, Experiencing God Day by Day

Peter was writing to a group that was under persecution. It was hard for them to know who to trust. And, no doubt, the challenges were building. Peter’s admonition was simple, but not easy:

Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you.

1 Peter 5:7 NLT

This is one of my favorite verses. I’ve shared it with people all over the world with this insight from the Lord. The first part of that verse is of no use if the second part isn’t true. You can shovel your worries and cares to someone all day long, but if they don’t care, it is a waste of time. But the power of the verse is in the eternal fact that God cares for you. Not just the “you” of the whole wide world, but YOU. The individual YOU. And since He loves and cares for YOU, you can have the confidence that when you turn your concerns over to such a loving Lord, He will be faithful to take care of them.

What does that mean? How will the Lord take care of your burdens, your problems? Often when we get out from under the weight of the load, we can better assess the situation. We can think of solutions. It is God’s Holy Spirit guiding us to His solution. Remember, He…God…cares for us and for the work to which He has called us.

By the way, Blackaby, in that same devotional, points out another important thing about casting our cares on Jesus.

“God does not differentiate between problems we should handle on our own and God-sized needs. He asks us to turn them all over to Him. One of our greatest errors is to assume we can deal with something ourselves, only to discover that we really can’t.”

So, how do we get to tomorrow? We give God our cares, and we run the race set before us… toward God’s great goal…all for His purpose and His glory.

God’s best,