Fear

“Fear doesn’t shut you down; it wakes you up.”

I quote the great Divergent philosopher Four...ok, maybe not a great philosopher, but a darn cute guy according to my wife. In any case, what he tells his new recruit Tris is a very important truth about who she is.

Fear, in and of itself, is not a bad thing but rather an innate survival response. Throughout scripture when angels appeared before man they always prefaced their announcement by “Fear not…” even good things can be prefaced by fear.

Also, we are told to fear our God...to hold such a reverence for Him that we can only shudder in awe at His majesty and sovereignty. The Psalms and Proverbs are rife with numerous applications of this type of fear.

Living in fear, however, is a whole different ballgame. Allowing fear to control and take over a situation is when we must begin to reassess our faith in God. Fear initially heightens our senses to the circumstance in front of us and we must take full advantage of that. It can generate motivation that can literally save your life. That said, we must not allow it to direct our thoughts and reactions to “play it safe” or run from the reality that is beckoning us. With our faith in God on firm ground we can boldly move towards that which frightens us and allow Him to do His work; to believe with all our heart that all things really do work together for good when Christ is at the controls.

In Psalm 139 David makes a beautiful statement, “I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” This is the fear that is appropriate in our lives. To accept that many things in life will frighten us, yet also embrace the knowledge that we don’t have to answer to the fear but, rather, to our Lord and Savior.

I can’t think of a better way to travel through this life.

Blessing!

Greg Morton
Copyright © May, 2015

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