Raising Your Gaze

Finding Up When Anxiety Weighs You Down – Louie Giglio | Passion City Church

Passion City Church recently did a series on anxiety. During one of the lessons, the Pastor explained how the world has us in ‘text neck.’ We spend so much time looking down that we are missing out on what’s right in front of us.

Being downcast — a reflection of what anxiety and depression do — pulls us down. When you’re looking down, all you see is the situation and problem. The more you look down, the heavier the weight is on you.

When in reality, there is surprising joy in raising our gaze.

Psalm 42:5 says, ‘Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him.’ Why are you downcast when you can put your hope in God?

There’s an article called ‘Look up. The Surprising Joy in Raising Our Gaze.’ Looking up at the sky reduces stress, but since we no longer look up, we are missing out. “The world has us in text neck, when all the wonder is up here.”

We lift our heads by remembering the narrative we are in.

Anxiety and depression try to “define our whole existence by the paragraph or page or chapter that you are in right now. And the enemy wants to define your entire story by that chapter.”

But God reminds us we are in a greater narrative.

“Memory is one of the most powerful rehabilitative forces in our lives.”

Each of us is in our own story, with good and bad chapters. In the tough chapters, the dark clouds, and the seasons of lows, God is reminding us these chapters and moments are part of the story, but they aren’t the entire story.

“Look up and recognize that this chapter isn’t great, but the story is great.” Remind yourself that where you’re going, there’s no anxiety or depression.

Why stay downcast when you can look up and put your hope in God?

When you lift your gaze, you will see something happen.