Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God
so that at the proper time he may exalt you,
casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.
1 Peter 5:6-7 (ESV)
If you are a believer, then you know the importance of reading and memorizing Scripture. Verses that the Holy Spirit can bring to mind just when we need a certain truth. There are certain verses that seem to come up over and over. I Peter 5:7 is one of those verses; when we are worried or burdened, often someone will say "cast your cares on God". We know that we should give everything to God, trusting Him, but practically how does that work? How do we wrap our minds around this concept.
Back in February 2021 I wrote a post titled Context: 4 types and how they've helped me in studying Scripture Context is understanding where and how a verse fits into the overall message of the Bible. Recently, when studying the verses above I was reminded of how important context really is.
So much time is spent on verse 7, casting our cares, and we can forget to look at verse 6. Verse 6 reminds us that we are to humble ourselves under God's mighty hand, trusting His perfect timing. This is the key to understanding how we can truly cast our cares on Him. Let's do a quick word study on the key words in these verses to understand how we can practically, daily, moment by moment, cast our cares on God. The definitions are taken from the biblehub.com lexicon.
Seven keys to understanding how to cast our cares on God:
1) "Humble yourselves" - tapinoó, to make or bring low. It is recognizing ones dependence on God, being fully dependent on the Lord. To submit oneself in a lowly spirit to the power and will of God.
To cast our cares we must
first understand our position
and utter dependence on
God and his power and will.
Without God, we can do nothing.
2) "under the mighty hand of God" - krataios, strong, powerful, mighty. It is seeing the power of God, God's supreme mastery.
To cast our cares we must
believe that God's strength &
power are supreme. That God
has mastery over everything.
3) "so that at the proper time" - kairos, fitting time or season, divinely ordained moment, a fixed definite time.
To cast our cares we must
trust that God has a fixed,
definite, perfect time planned
for everything He does.
4) "he may exalt you" - hupsoó, lift up, to raise the spirits by the blessings of salvation. Often seen as a sign of blessing or approval from God.
To cast our cares we must
focus on the blessings we
have through salvation. To
understand we are blessed and
approved by God through Jesus.
5) "casting all" - epiriptó, to throw upon. The deliberate act of transferring a burden or responsibility to another; to give it up to God.
To cast our cares we must
be deliberate, making a conscious
decision to throw our
burdens onto God.
6) "your anxieties on him" - merimna, care, worry, anxiety. To divide/separate*, implying a distraction that divides attention, dividing and fracturing a person's being into parts.
To cast our cares we must
understand that our anxieties
distract and divide us from
wholly living in the purpose and
plan God has for us. They
literally tear our being apart.
7) "because he cares for you" - meló, to care, be concerned, take thought, have an active interest or attention to. to care about, have regard for a person or thing.
To cast our cares we must
trust and know that God takes
an active interest in every aspect of
our lives. He is deeply concerned
about us. He cares for us!
I recently read an article where John Piper made a couple very succinct statements about these verses.
"to the degree that you trust the king's promise to protect you,
to that degree your burden will be lifted.
If your trust is small, you will still feel burdened,
but if your trust is great, your burden will be light."
"the casting of our anxieties means trusting his might and
trusting his care to fulfill specific promises that he
makes to his children in their various situations in life."
Do we trust that God is willing and able to carry all of our anxieties?
Do we trust that God's timing is perfect?
Do we trust that He is always faithful to fulfill His promises?
*compare this definition with the definition of peace (eiréné) which means wholeness, when all essential parts are joined together. In John 14:27 Jesus promises this is the peace He gives to us!
