Casting My Cares

1 Peter 5:7

Casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.

I have been thinking about this verse recently and what came to mind is that Peter, the former fisherman, is alluding to the heavy and wet nets that he used to toss into the Sea of Galilee, wondering and worrying if he was going to catch anything besides weeds and floating junk. In the verse before, Peter speaks of humbling ourselves, admitting that we are weak but that God is strong. It then follows to give Him our cares for He can bear them better than us. We hand over the nets of control, all the what ifs we hold, into His mighty hands and trust.

When my appendix was, unbeknown to me, in the process of rupturing, the surgeon mentioned that I definitely had appendicitis (for he did not yet know of the rupturing either) and that we had to go into surgery asap. I asked him if there was any other treatment than the removal of the appendix. My Dad had mentioned to me over Christmas--with no awareness that I was going  to have an issue--that researchers were starting to hypothesize that the appendix actually plays a role in the storing of healthy bacteria. The surgeon noted that Scandanavian countries do not remove the appendix but instead treat it with antibiotics. The problem then can become that the patient does not get better and is much more likely in the future to have more severe problems with the appendix. It was pretty clear to me that the surgeon was not inclined to wanting to be second guessed by me.  

In the 2.5 seconds where I weighed my options, I decided to go with the removal. I cast my care on the expertise of the surgeon. I had to trust that God was working through his training and expertise. It was quite providential that I did so because when I went into surgery it was discovered that my appendix had ruptured and mere antibiotics, if I had opted for that treatment, would have been too little too late. Self-diagonosis is a dangerous business.

How much more do we need to trust Jesus when he identifies our sin malady and the only treatment that is available--His own sacrificing of His health for our illness. He redeems and remakes us. It is sad that we as a world are so quick to dismiss both the cause and cure for our troubles. We don't assess either correctly, as if Jesus dying on a cross was just an unfortunate event like He was a poor sucker at the wrong place and wrong time, not at the centerpiece of history in the battle between  good and evil--where He knew full well what He was getting Himself into and embraced it willingly.

Are we trying to be  Dr.'s to our own souls, essentially telling God that we know better than He the cure for what ails us, all the while the nets of despair get more and more tangled? Getting ensnared by our own treatment? Cast our cares upon Him for He care for us.