401: Don’t Give Into Fear

When it comes to facing the uncertainty in our world today, there are a lot of people that have given into fear.

At the time of this recording, the whole world has been in upheaval because of the Coronavirus. But even before this, and I’m sure after this is over, there is always something going on somewhere that is causing uncertainty. But we can’t allow ourselves to give into the fear.

I want to take just a couple minutes to share some thoughts about this.

If you’re listening to this, then chances are that you like to plan your life and have a certain level of control. But the truth is, that none of us really has control.

God is the only One that control in this world.

Yes, we have free-will and the ability to decide what we want to do, but we don’t get to control the outcomes from those decisions. We don’t have control over other people. We don’t have control over natural forces like storms or diseases.

So, while we like to have control in our lives, we need to learn to trust God. He’s not the cause of the turmoil we’re in, but He has control over it.

Proverbs 3:5-6 says, “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.”

This may be obvious, but we don’t have access to see the future or travel through time. While we can follow trends and make educated guesses on how things will turn out, we really can’t know for sure.

The Bible tells us, “Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow…” While a level of planning and preparation is good and wise, we don’t know what will happen tomorrow. In fact, we’re not even guaranteed that we’ll even have a tomorrow.

This can be difficult for those of us that like to make plans and eliminate uncertainties. We like to know what to plan for so we can make everything as smooth as possible. We want to reduce or eliminate risk.

But, when things happen that we didn’t plan for or expect, we see that we really don’t have control.

And it can lead to fear, if we let it.

“For God hath not given us the spirit of fear…” This is probably a well-known (or at least semi-well-known) verse, but it’s easy for us to forget it. We still find ourselves with various fears.

We may try to rename the fear as ‘worry’ or ‘concern’, but it’s still fear.

It’s not what God has planned for us. God doesn’t want us to live in fear.

The rest of that verse says, “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”

So what does this mean God wants for us?