Do not worry...

Again I say, do not worry....

No really, read why there is no need to worry...

Christ says in Matthew 6:34, "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." And in verse 27 of the same chapter, "Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?"

I know these verses by heart and often pray them instead of worrying. But still, I do my fair share of worrying and still have not added a single hour to my life. One of my latest worries was about Mandy's birth certificate. I never sent for it and frankly, forgot all about it until I ordered my plane ticket for Nashville and realized I would need Mandy's birth certificate so she could travel with me. I am leaving in a couple weeks and started panicking when I realized that I would have to order the certificate and the Vital Records site said to allow 5 days for processing and 10 days for delivery. Ahhh! That gives me 1 day late by my calculations. What am I going to do?... Oh dear, how am I going to get Mandy on the plane without a birth certificate? 

I worried and worried some more as I placed the order online yesterday morning (Monday). I freaked out even more when I got an email back saying they COULD NOT PROCESS my order because they needed me to sign an authorization form and fax it to them. Ahhh! I don't have a fax machine, so I asked my mom-in-law to do it from work this morning (Tuesday). The number on the form was wrong and she was unable to fax it! Ahhh again! I was really getting worried. I had ideas of driving the stupid form to Portland and begging them for the birth certificate so my baby could board a plane with me. I finally found a different number to fax the form to after calling the department, but waited all morning to hear if it went through or not.

For the rest of the morning I worried about that stupid authorization form, even praying, "God, what I am going to do?" I was so irritated at myself for not getting this birth certificate like 7 months 3 weeks ago. On the way home I got a call from my mom-in-law that the fax went through. Praise the Lord, I thought. He answered my prayer and hopefully (see how great my faith was?) the birth certificate would come before my trip in 2 weeks.

I just arrived home and got the mail. Mandy's birth certificate was in the mail box with a receipt dated for today. Yes, you read correctly. The Vital Records department defied all laws of time passage and the birth certificate is now in my worried little hands, no rush fee required. I can't think of any possible reason for this, only that perhaps God wanted to jump start my faith today. 

This was such an insignificant problem in the grand scheme of things, but for me, it was a big deal and God cared. I hope by sharing this I can encourage you to pray instead of worry and to have faith instead of doubt. Because really, God cares.