The True "Toll" Trials Take on Our Health by Chris White

Here’s an interesting piece of news: losing your job may actually improve your health.  A study produced by University of North Carolina analyzed 14 years of statistics from the Center for Disease Control and found that when people face hard economic times, they tend to live healthier lifestyles.  The findings were that the jobless were more likely to exercise, eat a healthy diet, and lose weight.  The statistics also revealed that for every one-point rise in the national unemployment rate, the national death rate dropped by a half-percent.  The study noted several reasons for this which included that the unemployed had the extra time to take care of themselves and that reduced income makes it harder to finance habits like smoking.  Another position taken from the study is that indulging in smoking, fast-food, alcohol, and inactivity may simply be self-medicating behaviors related to working a stressful job.  The uncertainty of a job loss is normally considered quite stressful and for some, idleness turns quickly to depression which is a health issue with many other consequences.  But on the other hand this study seems to bear out another truth: we can be so busy and so successful that we neglect other aspects of our lives such as body-care and good health habits. 

Some great advice on Stress Management from the Mayo Clinic 

 From my spiritual perspective I see new meaning in the words of St. James 1:2-4: “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.  And let endurance have its perfect result, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”  In God’s economy sometimes a loss can truly be turned to a gain and we can gain the world and find it a true loss.  Think about it and trust Him with your life.  Your Creator always knows what’s best for his people.

36 ideas for Christians on "de-stressing" your life 

Moving From "Why Me?" To Action by Chris White

Patrick Carr was the biographer of music legend Johnny Cash and knew him personally for more than 25 years.  In a recent book about Cash, he relates a story of one of his infamous drug binges.  Apparently after about 3 days of bing  Of course the flashlight dies in the blackness of the cave and feeling hopelessly lost, Johnny Cash decided to lie down in the cave and wait for death to overtake him.  This went on for a few hours and then Cash said he heard God speak very directly to his mind: “Get up and search your way out of the dark.  Dying is not your choice but mine and this is not the day!”.  Obviously Cash listened and found his way out, eventually kicking his drug problem of many years.  Having battled depression off and on for many years, I could really relate to this story.  Sometimes you do feel like you are lost in a dark cave and death would be a welcome event.  God didn’t rescue him.  God told him to get up and find his own way out of the darkness.  I have no doubt that God blessed him in his efforts, but the point is some things in our lives can’t get better unless we put forth some work.  A great piece of advice I learned a number of years ago: asking God why something has or is happening to you almost never brings you peace.  Asking God what you can do about it and doing it almost always does bring peace for it is action that absorbs anxiety not paralysis.  Are you stuck with a chronic issue or protracted trial?  Quit dwelling on the why and ask God to help you find the what, then go do it.

ing and feeling disgust for himself, Cash wandered into a cave with many tunnels and a small single flashlight.