When the World Feels Like It’s Spinning

From Fear to Faithful Agency

These past weeks, many of us have been carrying a quiet but heavy sense of unease. The news out of Minneapolis has shaken people. Some are angry. Some are scared. Some are simply tired. I’ve heard from families who are wondering what kind of future their children will grow up in. I’ve heard from people who feel helpless, as if events are moving faster than any one person can possibly respond.

In moments like this, fear spreads easily. It moves through emails, social media, conversations over coffee. Fear has a way of convincing us that everything is falling apart and that we are powerless to do anything about it.

But fear is not the same thing as truth.

Our calling in anxious times is not to be the loudest voice in the room, but the steadiest nervous system in the room.

Not to minimize what is happening, and not to catastrophize it either. Not to deny reality, but to meet it with grounded presence and thoughtful response. There is a difference between naming fear and amplifying it. One helps us feel less alone. The other

quietly multiplies the very thing we are trying to escape.

Good leadership — in families, in communities, in churches — does not calm people by pretending everything is fine. It calms people by reminding them they are not helpless.

So the real question many of us are asking is not, “How do we fix the world?” but, “Where can I place my energy in a way that actually matters?”

One helpful way to think about this is through three simple movements:

Ground, Connect, Act.

First, Ground. Before we can respond wisely, we have to tend our own nervous systems. An anxious person cannot calm an anxious world. This may mean limiting how much news we consume. Taking walks without our phones. Breathing slowly and intentionally. Remembering to sleep, drink water, and stay connected to the rhythms of real life. A regulated person can do more good than a hundred frantic ones.

Second, Connect. Anxiety thrives in isolation. It convinces us we are alone and under threat. One of the most powerful things we can do right now is simply stay connected. Call someone from church you haven’t talked to in a while. Check in on a neighbor. Share a meal. Show up to worship even when you don’t feel like it. Anxious systems fragment. Healing systems reconnect.

Third, Act. Not big heroic actions that try to solve national problems overnight, but small, embodied acts with real people. Write a thoughtful letter to a local official. Volunteer an hour a month somewhere tangible. Support a local family or organization. Offer childcare, meals, rides, or presence.

Agency doesn’t mean controlling the outcome. It means choosing where to stand.

For some, one faithful form of action will be protest. Not the kind fueled by rage or performative outrage, but the kind rooted in conscience — peaceful, grounded, and nonviolent. 

 Throughout the Bible, faithful people regularly show up in public to make injustice visible. The prophets stood in city gates and confronted kings. Jesus consistently stood on the side of the powerless — the sick, the poor, the excluded — and refused to look away from human suffering. The early church spoke truth to power even when it came at great personal cost.

Protest, at its best, is not about shouting at enemies. It is about showing up for neighbors.

It is one of the ways ordinary people say, “We are paying attention. We care. We refuse to look away.” Most of us think agency means changing the world. But more often, it simply means refusing to disappear from it.

Showing up. Staying visible. Staying human. Staying kind.

When the world feels overwhelming, it can help to shrink the frame. Focus on what is within arm’s reach. Choose one relationship to invest in. Do one embodied act of care each week. Speak hope out loud, even when you’re not sure you fully feel it yet.

We may not be able to control what is happening in our country. But we can still choose who we are becoming. We can choose to be grounded instead of frantic, connected instead of isolated, and active instead of frozen.

And in times like these, that may be the most faithful form of agency there is.

Your friend and pastor, grounded in love and walking with you, Brook