Skip to content Learning How to Stop Stress Before it Starts, Part 1 Nov 25 · 28 min ...more
Learning How to Stop Stress Before it Starts, Part 1
November 25, 2025 · 28 min
Deadlines, flight delays, traffic jams, crying babies - what do these have in common? For most of us these situations cause stress. Chip clarifies God’s solution for stopping stress BEFORE it starts.
Series Overcoming Emotions that Destroy November 25, 2025 · 28 min · Overcoming Emotions that Destroy
Deadlines, flight delays, traffic jams, crying babies - what do these have in common? For most of us these situations cause stress. Chip clarifies God’s solution for stopping stress BEFORE it starts. ...more Show the full description Show less Deadlines, flight delays, traffic jams, crying babies - what do these have in common? For most of us these situations cause stress. Chip clarifies God’s solution for stopping stress BEFORE it starts.
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Chip Ingram is an American Christian pastor, author, and teacher. He is the founder, teaching pastor and CEO of Living on the Edge, an international teaching and discipleship ministry.
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In this video 0:00 Learning to Stop Stress Before It Starts
Learning to Stop Stress Before It Starts 0:01 Deadlines, flight delays, traffic jams, crying babies, what do all these have in common? Well, for most of us, these situations cause stress, and under stress, our emotions can go astray.0:13 Today, we'll learn how God can help you stop stress before it starts. Stay with me.0:22 Welcome to this edition of Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. The mission of this daily program is to intentionally disciple Christians through the insightful bible teaching of Chip Ingram. Thanks for joining us0:34 as we continue our series overcoming emotions that destroy. For the past several broadcasts, Chip's talked about anger, where it comes from, how to control it, and the ways we can use it for good.0:46 Today, he makes the connection between our rage and frustrations and stress. But before he gets going, if you haven't already, subscribe to our daily podcasts. With a few simple taps on your phone, you'll0:58 have access to the full length version of our latest series. And whether you're commuting, exercising, or just enjoying your day, you can easily download a few programs to listen to anytime. So1:10 search for Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram today on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Okay. Here now is Chip with his talk, learning how to stop1:21 stress before it starts.1:24 Ephesians 4 26 says, it's the good summary of anger in scripture. Be angry. That's a command. Yet, do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger, lest you give the devil a foothold or an opportunity.1:37
1:49 decrease your relationship with anger and it's all tied into no matter what your environment or perspective, obeying Ephesians 4 26. I want you to circle the e, if you will, and I
2:01 wanna talk about your environment. I wanna talk about the environment that can allow you to be either more angry or the environment that can cause you to be far less
2:12 angry. And, I wanna read just a little section, My teammate I've never teamed up and done a book with someone before, and it's been kind of fun to get a woman's perspective, and especially someone that's worked with so
2:24 many people. She's a practicing psychologist and counselor. And she did this experiment. Just a couple paragraphs. She said, 1 day I decided to keep a mental log of all the times I felt angry. I wanted to
2:36 know how often I got angry, and what I got angry about, and what triggered the anger. I encourage you to try this too. The results were surprising and quite humbling. I was shocked at how often
2:48 angry feelings came to the surface. Prior to consciously counting these episodes, I had mistakenly assumed that anger was only an occasional visitor to my emotional arsenal. I was
2:59 wrong. Very wrong. I had to be honest about my feelings of anger, frustration, and actual infuriation. I had felt either flits or fits of anger at not being able to find
3:11 my favorite socks, running out of milk, the kids taking too long to get ready, the slow driver in front of me, the long wait at the pharmacy, the store that was closed on Monday, having to put gas in the car, the price
3:23 of the gas in the car, the long line in the slow service when I got gas in the car, the kids leaving their clothes on the floor again, the computer freezing on me again, and I was only halfway through the
3:35 day. Though some of these feelings could describe fleeting frustrations, when I was honest, far too many of them were actual anger. Then came
3:47 another humbling lesson. I realized that most of the day to day anger I experienced was all about small, insignificant stuff that I face all the time. When I
3:59 stopped and looked at how often I got angry and what I got angry about, I had to admit that it happened too much and too often. Then I took a further step. I asked,
4:11 what is it that contributes to the anger of my day to day life? And the answer was surprisingly simple. Stress. Stress.
4:23 The relationship between stress and anger in my life isn't unusual. The more pressured, burned out, overwhelmed, or busy that you become, the more your anger will
4:35 lie at the foot of your feet, ready to explode at any moment. The key to lessening our anger is our ability to minimize stress. Final
4:47 line. The more stress we're under, the more likely it is that anger will make its appearance. Our goal is to reduce stress. And so I want to just encourage you,
4:59 in our time together, I'm going to be really, really practical, not an outline. I'm not going to go to all kinds of different texts. I basically wanna give some practical wisdom about how to reduce stress in
5:11 your life. I am a type A personality. I have been a workaholic. I have been characterized
5:23 by being driven. And I pastored anything from a member church of about 35 people, where 34 of them are related, that produced a lot of stress,
5:35 to 6 or 7000 people coming through the doors every 6 or 7 days, and a very large staff and big budgets and being totally overwhelmed. And so all I wanna know is I understand what it's like, and I just wanna walk
5:47 through some very practical ways that people far wiser than me, and many things that I've experienced that might help you. Number 1 stress reducer is
5:59 eliminate, hurry. John Ortberg went to teach at a large church in Chicago and has since gone back to California. But when he was ready to take that big step, and it was a big, big, big church, and he was gonna be the
6:11 teaching pastor with a team of guys, and he met with Dallas Willard and he said, you know, you're a wise man in the things of God. You've written, you know, books on the spiritual disciplines. What piece of advice could
6:22 you give me as I take my family into all this responsibility and all this pressure and all that I'm gonna face? And he said, you know, I got my pen out and he said, I'm just I'm gonna take lots of notes. This is
6:34 Dallas Willard and he's gonna. And he leaned back, and he looked at me and he said, Ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life. And I
6:46 said, okay, yeah, okay, good. So. No, he said that's it. Ruthlessly eliminate
6:57 hurry from your life. Speed and godliness are incompatible. Speed
7:10 and peace are incompatible. Hurry and loving others is incompatible. Hearing God's voice
7:23 and hurry are incompatible. Ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life. And, I heard that at a time when our
7:34 church was going through some significant growth a capital campaign, a building campaign. Someone mistakenly took a couple of the messages and stuck them on a local radio station, and then some other station, put it on
7:46 some other station, and that started down the road. And, to say that I was under pressure and living a hurried life would be an understatement. And I think there's times
7:58 in our life where God will give us a message that is so for us that the entire trajectory of our future can be changed if we'll just obey that 1
8:09 word for us in that moment. And I remember thinking to myself and then Ortberg is a tremendous teacher. If you've never read any of his books, I just highly recommend him. And
8:22 so, I remember deciding, I'm going to ruthlessly eliminate Hurry from my life. I mean, I was the guy, you know, the plane door, it's leaving, 1 more
8:34 person's getting on. Ingram gets on, okay, sits down, briefcase, gotta do some work, you know, I mean, doing this, you know, getting to a meeting 1 minute just before it starts because you can't be late, but gotta do 5
8:45 things just before you get there. Multitasking all the time. You know, talking on the phone, answering email on the computer, and 3 other things if I could. And he gave
8:57 some practical ways to do it. And so I went into training. I literally went into training. I took some of the suggestions. Number 1, for 2 years, I drove in the right hand lane of the freeway.
9:14 I mean, it was just I'm just gonna drive in the right hand lane. I'm not gonna be in a hurry. I'm not gonna count him how many cars go by in the toll lane.
9:25 If I get in this lane right here, I think let's see, 1 2 3 4, the yellow car got in with me, and, oh, man, I should've picked that line. You know what that tells you about your mindset? You must be really, really
9:37 important. You must be so important that you have to get wherever you're going that matters so much more than everybody else. What I realized, my hurry was rooted in arrogance.
9:50 And what he called grandiosity. My being overextended was rooted in my grandiosity. For all the right reasons, doing really pretty significant things for God, I
10:02 had come to believe unconsciously, it wasn't willfully, that I'd become indispensable. I had to be everywhere and do everything. And I had to hurry and the more of it I could do, the more God would be pleased.
10:14 You're listening to Living on the Edge. And before we continue today's program, let me ask you, is anger devastating your relationships with your family, spouse, or coworkers? Join us after Chip's
10:26 message to learn more about our valuable small group resource for this series. Stick around to discover how to confront this powerful emotion and harness it for good. But for now, here again is Chip to
10:38 continue today's message.
10:40 I, also went into the, discipline of when I get went to the grocery line of going to the longest line instead of the shortest 1. It's painful.
10:52 But then I just Hey, how you doing? Good. So you shop here often? Yeah. Pretty much. Yeah. You? No. I just come. You know, my wife sends me for stuff
11:04 and, you know, I pick up what I can remember. It's usually the wrong brand or something. But so, do you live around here? You know what happened? I started relating to people again. Pretty soon, the knots in my
11:16 stomach when I was driving, because I always had to you know, I could tell you when you get off this ramp, if you go in the left hand lane for the first 2 and a half miles, then if you go to the right hand lane, because
11:26 the exit comes this way, then you get back in the right hand lane, then you could I mean, I had I was always in a hurry. And I began to slow. Slow down. Slow down.
11:38 Slow down. It's really amazing, just the quality of life. I did something weird. I always tried to figure out how let's see, they say you have to be there. This was before 9 11. You had to be there,
11:50 so, you know, like an hour before flights, and so I would just I mean, everything was down to the wire. And then I decided, you know something? I think I'm gonna get there an hour and a half early. Sometimes 2 hours.
12:02 And I'm gonna get there early, and I happen to like a very good cup of coffee. I'm gonna get a very good cup of coffee. I'm gonna put my feet up. I'm gonna think about what's going on. Think I'm gonna spend a little time
12:14 writing in my journal. Gonna thank God for some of the people in my life. Maybe return a few calls. I think I'm gonna call some people while I wait that I just Have you ever just opened your phone and just thought,
12:24 wonder who have I talked to lately? Not for no reason. Bob. Tampa. Probably get a voice mail. That's okay. Hey, Bob. Yeah, do a new different beep. This is Chip. You know what?
12:36 I'm sitting in the airport in Dallas, and I just wanna remind you, God loves you, Bob. And you remember 2 years ago when we had that little meeting? You came to my mind today. I love you. You are a
12:48 friend like few I've ever had. And I hope you're doing well today. God bless you. And I just started doing some spontaneous, non urgent, not having to get it done,
13:01 eliminating hurry from my life. Now, do I have some regression now and then? You bet. But it, I still get to airports
13:12 early. I don't always drive in the right hand lane all the time. But I for a period of time, I just got that I gotta get there attitude out of me. And it
13:24 made a huge difference. I read a a poem that many of you will, recognize. And it was about that classic, Slow me down,
13:36 Lord. And then after it, there were some observations that we made. When I'm in a hurry, I don't notice the flowers blooming alongside the road. When I'm in a hurry, there seems to be more
13:48 irritating drivers on the road than normal. When I'm in a hurry, I don't strike up friendly conversations with those around me. When I'm in a hurry, I avoid people, places and things that take time and energy
14:00 and effort. When I'm in a hurry, I pretend not to see the person behind me in line who only has a few items when I have a cart full of groceries. When I'm in a hurry, my heart pounds, my muscles are tense,
14:12 my mind races. When I'm in a hurry, I rush through the day, and I rush by people. When I'm in a hurry, I don't ask people how they really are. Or if I do, I don't stick around
14:24 to hear the answer. When I'm in a hurry, my devotional life is a task to get done instead of a time to treasure. When I'm in a hurry, I'm abrupt with people. When I'm in a hurry, it feels like
14:36 life is a race to be run. When I'm in a hurry, I get angry more easily and more often. When I'm not in a hurry, I enjoy my food more. When I'm not in a
14:48 hurry, I smile more and just feel calmer. When I'm not in a hurry, life seems to be a lot more enjoyable and less stressful. When I'm not in a hurry, I'll ask about others,
15:00 about themselves, how they're doing. And I actually like hearing what they have to say. When I'm not in a hurry, my times in prayer are more meaningful. When I'm not in a hurry, I think I'm actually a
15:11 nicer person, more thoughtful and kinder to others. And when I'm not in a hurry, I'm more patient, loving, understanding and tolerant. When I'm not in a hurry, things just don't
15:23 bother me as much. See, we can talk about anger and the a b c d, and it's a secondary emotion, but your AQ, your anger quotient, will be determined
15:35 by your E, environment, plus your P, perspective, times your willingness to obey, Ephesians 4 26. So eliminate hurry. Second is downsize your expectations.
15:48 Most of us try to do too much too soon, and we feel overwhelmed, and it puts us under pressure. And because our expectations are so high and we're under pressure, then anger bubbles out.
16:00 Most dramatic experience ever. And this is not sort of my biography, but I just want to tell you how life really works. I think sometimes people get up and they come to a place like this. And so people think you're
16:12 way smarter than you are, way more holy than you are, and all of us are exactly the same, ordinary people with regular ups and downs. And, in seminary, I had a conviction that my wife should be home with
16:23 our kids. And that was a really important conviction because that meant I needed to support us and go to school full time, which was really hard. And so I would, get up at about 4 30 in the morning and study Greek until
16:35 7, catch a carpool, and in the carpool, I'd go to work from work, it's called at work, went to seminary from 7 until, about 4 30, and I would either read or be in class a hundred percent of the time, come home,
16:47 play with the kids, eat dinner, go to work at 6 30, get home at 11, do it again. So I was under lots of pressure. And, where I went to school, they wanted 3 years of Greek and 2 years of Hebrew, and it wasn't
16:59 always that it was so hard, but it was just so much to do. And I remember a guy that became a great mentor and a friend for the last 25 years was Howard Hendricks, and actually went to school to be around him. And I'll
17:11 never forget 1 day, he had a group of us together, and, you know, we were kinda whining about our lives and, you know, demands, and and he has this funny you know the problem, don't you? You know? No, professor. What's
17:23 the problem? The problem is you guys don't get enough c's. What do you mean? You don't get enough c's. He had this funny way of, you know, always doing like this with his nose.
17:37 And, c's? What do you mean? Yeah. You're a bunch of smart guys here. You came from schools where you're smart guys, and you think getting A's is where it's at. I got news for you guys. God doesn't care whether you get
17:47 A's. Secondly, no one's gonna look at your resume whether you got A's or not. You're competitive, driven, carnal guys. Get some C's. Love your wives. Have some fun. You know?
17:59 And, and so I was involved in ministry and I was involved in working and it was like someone just took the expectations and said, and I wasn't probably near as smart as a lot of guys, but
18:11 I was always like I always was 1 of those students who could figure out what was going to be on the test. So I always got really good grades. I'm just kind of street smart, but I'm not, like, super academic. And I said,
18:20 okay, this Greek class, zillion hours. I gotta read all these books. I'm supposed to have all these let's see. Let's see. 2000 words memorized and all this, and that's worth 10 percent of my grade. And when I get
18:32 out, a computer has all those words somewhere. So, okay. 10 percent, that gets me from a hundred to a 90. Not gonna do that. Okay.
18:44 And then this other thing, you're supposed to read this, this, this, and that. Well, I wanna learn to do the exegetical work, this, this, this. That's what will help me be the man God wants me to be. I'm not doing that.
18:52 That's only 5 percent. And so I started to go the last couple years, and I would go to a professor and say, I just want you to know I'm not sloughing off. It's not that I don't care about you. It's not that I don't think
19:03 what you're doing is important. It's that all these words are in a book. When you, like, do the little quizzes on the vocabulary, I I won't do well. I'm not even gonna try.
19:15 I'm starting your class with a b. Okay? And I just bought myself 7 hours a week, and it'll probably make me a better dad, a way better husband.
19:27 And and and I just went through my classes. Now, you know what? As crazy as professor was, even after doing that, most all of us, we just got Bs and As anyway. But it was just that,
19:39 what who is putting the invisible gun to your head that says your house has to be absolutely spotless all the time? Who's putting the invisible gun to your head that says you always have
19:51 to return every call the same day? Or that this new thing, beep beep beep. An email comes. Oh, 0 my gosh. I gotta return the I mean, who made these rules?
20:03 I didn't get that it's been 7 minutes and they haven't returned my email yet. Why, if I'm doing something over here that's the will of God, how does someone electronically shoot something through a satellite
20:15 that says, It's now the most important thing in my life? Where do we start doing that? If I didn't know better, that would be stupid. That would just be stupid.
20:27 And then we get so overwhelmed, I've done this. Have you ever done this? You know, like, you get sort of those they're not quite spam. You know, they're like from Harry and David's and different people, you order some
20:38 stuff now and then, or Delta Airlines is telling me, you know, new fares. Have you ever felt like you're so overwhelmed that you wanna feel like you've accomplished something? And I sit at my computer, Delete that 1.
20:49 Delete that 1. Have you ever done that? You know, like, the day is going so overwhelmed. And I feel like I've done Harry and David, that one's gone. Delta Airlines, that's gone. There's 3 advertisements going. Boy, do I
21:00 feel good about myself. Is this nuts? Anyway. 3, learn to say no. I was privileged to get some mentoring from
21:12 Chuck Swindoll and as the radio was growing, every year they'd have this dinner and we'd get a chance And somehow, I got to sit next to him. And every year for about 7 or 8 years, he literally took me for about a half
21:23 hour, put his arm around me, and basically gave me that, now young man, here's what you need to remember. And it was amazing. And, so I remember 1 year, he said, 1 of the greatest things you'll ever have to learn,
21:36 learn to say no, kindly, artfully, and with excellence. And he said, it will save you so much. I mean, people need to
21:48 know you would love to, but the answer's no. And I thought, wow, you know, that is you know, I didn't really understand what he meant. And then there was a certain book that I thought would be really important and, you
21:59 know, we were friends, and so I, I called him or wrote him and asked him if he would endorse the book. And I got the nicest, most excellent, kindest letter that I I
22:11 mean, I felt like when I got done reading that letter, I was next to Cynthia, maybe the second or third most important person in Chuck Swindoll's lives. Wow.
22:24 No. I mean, it was just like, Chip, I appreciate you so much and what you've done, and have I glanced this, This is gonna have a great impact. I'm so excited.
22:37 Our time's together, and, you know, our board and the priorities, they've just limited what I can do. I would love to do it, but I just can't. Learn to say no, kindly.
22:49 Don't take stuff on in church. Don't do stuff for friends. Don't let guilt drive you to get your schedule. Because under stress, when you're doing stuff you don't feel really called to do, you get
23:01 resentment, and you're gonna have more anger.
23:06 This is Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram, and you've been listening to part 1 of Chip's message, learning how to stop stress before it starts, from our series overcoming emotions that destroy. Chip will
23:18 be back shortly to share some helpful application for us to think about. Have you ever been told you have an anger problem? Has your temper damaged or ruined a meaningful relationship? Are the frustrations of
23:30 daily life weighing you down? Well, let's be honest. Everyone struggles to control this powerful emotion at times. In this series, Chip reveals the common ways anger manifests and shares
23:42 practical biblical solutions to rein it in before it destroys you and your most treasured relationships. Don't miss how to be, as Jesus said, angry without sinning. Well, our Bible
23:54 teacher, Chip Ingram, is back in studio with a quick word.
23:58 Thanks so much, Dave. There are few things that will impact your life, your family, your marriage, all your relationships, what happens at work than how you handle your emotions,
24:10 More specifically, the emotion of anger or the guilt, the shame, the devastation, all the things that surround anger when it's not properly understood or properly responded
24:22 to. And so all I can say is that I don't know where you can invest your time in the next few months, but let me encourage you that overcoming emotions that destroy you and your relationships
24:34 would be a great place to really invest. Let me just help you think this through. For some of you, you you've been thinking, we need to launch a bible study or the next small group series for our small group at church or
24:45 for our men or women's group or our Sunday school class. We ought to get this. Be thinking outside the box. This isn't just for you. God wants to use you as an ambassador.
24:57 Imagine the people in your network, if they understood anger, begin to use it for good instead of evil, the good that would happen in your homes, your churches, and your community. Act today.
25:09 Thanks, Chip. Well, to get your hands on this valuable resource, visit living on the edge dot org. Dig into this study with a group of friends and uncover how anger may be impacting you and what you can do to
25:20 harness it to grow spiritually, emotionally, and relationally. Get your hands on the overcoming emotions that destroy small group today by going to living on the edge dot org or by
25:32 calling triple 8 3 3 3 6 0 0 3. Atlas Nurse Tap special offers. With that, here again is Chip.
25:41 As we close today's program, there's 1 very simple question that I need to ask you. In fact, you need to ask yourself, which of the 3 things that create stress in your life do
25:53 you need to address? I talked about ruthlessly eliminate hurry, downsize your expectations, learn to say no. So so which 1 of those? If I just you know, we're sitting together and, you know, over a cup of coffee, you
26:05 know, and I said, okay. Which 1 of those for you would it be? What would you say? I I will tell you first and foremost, you will see your life change if you ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life. Of all the
26:17 things, especially if you're a Type A personality, high pressure job, and the other 1 was, that hit me was downsizing expectations. If you're perfectionistic and you want to do things really well, you keep
26:28 pushing and you put all this pressure on yourself thinking, you know, it's like gotta be an a plus all the time. And just a couple weeks ago, I was speaking at a place and they wanted all these notes and they wanted
26:39 them, you know, a week or 2 in advance. And I was in the middle of teaching a series. And I remember feeling all this pressure and stress. And then just as I prayed, God said, so do you have to have notes every time you
26:50 preach? And I remember thinking, well, gosh, Paul didn't have PowerPoint. He did okay. You know? And so I just told my assistant, would you just let him know that, you know, I'll have some notes because they were done,
27:01 but, you know, I'm just not gonna have any PowerPoint. And it was like the whole world got lighter and better. What do you need just to say, it's okay to let something go? You don't have to do
27:13 everything perfect every time, and see if that stress doesn't come down, and with it, the anger. God bless you. Give it a try.
27:22 Thanks, Chip. As we wrap up this program, living on the edge depends on listeners like you to help us us continue encouraging Christians to live like Christians. So would you consider becoming a monthly partner
27:34 to help others benefit from this ministry? You can set up a recurring donation at living on the edge dot org or by calling us at triple 8 3 3 3 6 0 0 3. That's
27:45 triple 8 3 3 3 6 0 0 3, or visit living on the edge dot o r g. Have listeners tap donate, and thanks for doing whatever the Lord leads you to do.
27:57 Well, coming up on the next edition of Living on the Edge, we'll continue Chip's series overcoming emotions that destroy. So I hope you'll join us. But until then, I'm Dave Drewey. Thanks for listening.
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