Stress doesn’t wait for a good time—but you can meet it with wisdom. In this episode, discover how Bible study guardrails protect your focus and faith when emotions run high. Learn why “Scripture interprets Scripture” also helps with decision-making, how to pause before reacting, and how prayer and community keep you steady under pressure. Guardrails aren’t rigid rules; they’re guides that anchor you in peace, not panic.
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Episode Transcript
This is episode 111, and this is your host, Latoya.
And this is Equip the Next,where you get equipped to lead,
disciple, and move the missionforward.
Stress knocking at your door?
Maybe these guardrails can help.
You don't want to miss this?
(00:53):
Sometime when we have a live,just to say hey.
Anywho, let's dive right on inas we approach the holiday.
I believe by the time you hearthis in America, we will be
having Thanksgiving tomorrow.
So that should be fun.
I used to cook really big mealsfor Thanksgiving.
(01:18):
I don't do that now.
I I just I'm I relax.
And I think the main reason whyI do that is because I already
cook all the time anyway.
So to me, it's like, no.
No.
I I used to.
I'm going to have a nice meal,but it's not going to be really,
really, really big because Idon't want to do it.
(01:40):
There's really nothing else tosay.
I just I just want to take iteasy and just rest.
Um, and so I I but I love thistime.
I love Thanksgiving.
Now, Christmas, I hibernate.
Only because I live in theMidwest and it is cold.
So I act a little, a littlescroogey because of the weather.
(02:02):
If I was somewhere in Californiaor somewhere where it's warm,
I'm pretty sure I wouldn't actlike that.
But it gets cold, y'all, um,here in um the Midwest.
Illinois is where I am.
And yeah, it gets cold.
So anyway, enough of that.
We are going to be talking aboutwhy guardrails protect your
(02:24):
faith during stress.
If you haven't already, I praythat you have, downloaded your
freebie, the five Bible studyguardrails for confidence.
I'm going to be pulling out oneof those today, but I'm also
going to share a littlepractical taste on it when it
comes to stress as a whole.
(02:45):
But I wanted to share, you know,stress that you have good
stress, you got bad stress.
Um, we don't want the badstress.
And it it happens to all of us.
We all sometimes will deal withstress at some point in our
lives.
It's just what it is.
We're human.
But why are we more vulnerablein stress?
(03:08):
It seems like that, right?
When we have stress, we we tendto be more vulnerable.
And guess what?
The enemy likes us like thatbecause he doesn't play fair.
He's not fair.
He wants you to be down, hewants you to be busted and
disgusted, so then he can justmake matters worse.
(03:30):
And sometimes we put onunnecessary weights that we
can't even blame on him.
And so I think that guardrailsdoesn't it's it's not meant to
um put boundaries or anythinglike that necessarily.
(03:50):
It's just meant to keep youfocused on him and not so much
on yourself when you have issueslike this, because sometimes we
can throw a pity party and feelbad for ourselves and we can
just go down this hole.
And so having some guardrailsthere keeps you focused.
And of course, there's moreguardrails of I just share five,
(04:13):
but you know, I I look at itlike stress clouds our judgment
a lot of times in just regularmanners.
And I'm really gonna share morepractical things here today, but
um, so I'm gonna take theguardrails that are on the
guardrail sheep, but I'm gonnaapply a practical approach to
(04:34):
it.
But it tends to cloud yourjudgment.
When you're stressed out, you'renot thinking clearly, you're not
making the best decisions.
That's just how life is, whichis why we have to use wisdom.
(04:54):
Um, because if we if we don't,and if we don't have a community
of people around us who canspiritually shake us up and be
like, wake up, we can leave roomfor worry to come in.
When you're stressed out, youyou're worried.
I always have this this motto orwhatever you want to call it,
(05:15):
where it's like, if I can'tchange it, I'm not worrying
about it.
Like if it's I if I can't doanything about it, I'm not
gonna, I'm not gonna stressmyself out about it.
I'm just not gonna happen.
And that has been a game changerfor me to help me um to at least
(05:38):
eliminate that part when itcomes to stress.
Yes, I do have, you know,there's times where I've been
stressed out.
Like I said, that's somethingwe've all fallen victim to.
Okay.
We are here on this earth, andat some point we are going to
feel stressed out, and that'swhy community, I think, is
(05:59):
important.
Prayer fellowship is importantbecause it helps you to know
that you're not alone.
Sometimes you just need someoneto talk to, sometimes you just
need someone to listen to whatis going on, and then they are
outside of it, so they can giveyou hopefully some practical um
(06:26):
wisdom.
So when we look at theguardrails on the um on the
five, the five guardrails, Italk about number four, which is
let the Bible talk to the Bible.
Essentially, scripture caninterpret scripture.
(06:47):
I and I I mentioned that ifsomething feels unclear, try to
cross-reference it from anotherpart of the Bible or read in a
different translation.
Remembering that scripture againinterprets scripture.
Now, when I apply thatpractically, when I'm looking at
stress, it's important that wedon't jump to conclusions.
(07:09):
Just like with this garrail.
And see, that's why I love theabout the garrails because you
you apply it to studying theBible with confidence, but you
can also apply it to justpractical life situations.
And so sometimes when we'reremember, I said sometimes when
(07:29):
we're stressed out, we cancloud, we have cloudy judgments.
Some people do impulsive things,like some people go and spend
too much, some people might eattoo much, you know, um, comfort
eating or whatever.
It's important that we assess,we just take a break and
breathe.
And maybe this podcast is foryou.
Maybe you'll you feel stressedout.
(07:50):
Don't jump to conclusions.
Take your time to assess thesituation before responding.
I was teaching my son the other,well, not the other day, by the
time I'm by the time I'mrecording this, a couple weeks
ago, I was teaching my son aboutyou have to be careful, and
(08:13):
we've heard this, but you haveto be careful with what you say
when you're angry.
You really shouldn't say a lotwhen you're angry, because you
can't take those words back.
And stress is kind of like thatas well.
You gotta be careful what yousay, what you do, when you have
(08:33):
this bad stress on you, becauseyou can't take back what you do.
There's no do over, there's noum rewind button.
And so it's important that wedon't jump to conclusions.
I think I also shared in one umepisode about how um depending
(08:56):
on the lens you you you'reviewing things, you you could be
going through a season ofrejection.
Maybe you you're stillstruggling with rejection.
If somebody doesn't talk to you,you think they're not speaking
to you on purpose when theyprobably didn't see you.
Well, add stress to that.
Now it's it's it's inflated, andwe don't want to walk in that.
(09:24):
Like if you're stressed out,that's one thing.
Again, it happens.
Who are you surrounding yourselfaround?
Do you have someone that you cantalk to?
Maybe a counselor, maybe atherapist, maybe just a friend?
Do you journal?
And have you remembered or doyou remember that some things
(09:46):
are out of your control?
Now, if you've done somethingand then the result is not what
you thought it would be, andthat's stressing you out.
And if it's something that maybewas a mistake, apologize.
And what can you do if you cando something to at least
(10:08):
minimize the um the uh uh causeor the effect, sorry, the the
effect?
Can you do something?
If you can, ask the Lord, havehim lead you.
Remember, we talked about inJames, pray and ask him for
wisdom in that situation, and hewill give it to you.
But it's important that we don'tallow stress to isolate us, we
(10:34):
don't allow stress to weigh usdown, and we don't allow stress
to grow and fester and be evenuh heavier than it was supposed
to be in the first place.
So what I challenge you to dothis week is if you have had a
(10:56):
stressful moment this week, ormaybe in the weeks that passed,
I want you to pause and see ifyou could have applied a
guardrail.
If you are in a having astressful moment right now, this
week, pause, take a break, andsee if you can.
(11:18):
Hopefully, you've downloaded thefive Bible study guardrails for
confidence, but see if you canthen use some of these
practically, like from apractical standpoint.
So can you use any of those andapply them to what's going on
right now?
Maybe there's a verse thatstands out to you in your Bible
(11:41):
study reading.
And after you've gotten thecontext and you know exactly
what the what everything wasabout, how can you then um have
the application and apply thisin light of who God is?
See if you can do that.
(12:03):
So listen, again, I want tothank you for listening to Equip
the Next.
And if you would like to grabyour free guide, you know where
to go.
Equipthenext.com forward slashfreebie.
I want to hear from you.
Go to hello at equipthenext.comand remember grow in God's word
(12:23):
and lead boldly.
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