“Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you” (1 Peter 5:7 NIV). This verse doesn’t seem to have received much attention in recent years. It was a favorite verse in a previous generation. In our house growing up, there was a needlepoint hanging of this verse. Needlepoint is also now a neglected art form. Women would sew the words of a Bible verse or some other proverb on a white piece of cloth, along with a border or other decoration. The piece would then be put into a frame and hung on a wall. It was a way to practice sewing. It was also a great way to meditate on a Bible verse, both for the one sewing and for those who read it. For a time, I think this particular piece hung in my bedroom.

Meditation on such verses is important because we often forget. They need to be drummed into our subconscious minds.

As people, we live with serious problems—sickness, financial problems, interpersonal conflicts, and many more. In addition to these, the people Peter was writing to were also facing very serious religious persecution, including the threat of execution.

In addition to the problems themselves, we are often anxious. We worry about these problems, even obsess over them. The problems are real, but the anxiety, the worry, can become a problem itself, wearing us down.

This verse invites us to cast or dump all of our problems on God because He can resolve them. More than that, it calls us to dump our anxieties, our worries, our cares, on Him. If we are able to do so, it frees us from a great burden and releases our energies to work on practical solutions to the problems. It is a hard thing to do, which is why we need to be constantly reminded to cast our anxieties on God.

The verse also gives us a reason to do this and a reason to hope—because God cares for us. God loves us. We may have all kinds of problems, but we are loved, deeply and completely, by the all-powerful, all-seeing God, who will ultimately carry us through and make everything all right. That is reason to relax and rejoice.