I don’t consider myself a fearful person. Calculating and brooding, would be the words I would use instead.
Still, as I grow in my relationship with God, He keeps unraveling areas of my life that I’m secretly afraid of. Areas I would not readily admit, but He knows I’m scared stiff about.
And how does He know I’m afraid of those things? Because in those areas, I like to be in control. I like to know what I’m doing and where I’m going. I put the pressure on myself to ensure I don’t fall my own hand (disappoint myself) So I hardly trust him with them.
But I’m learning that God has a knack for making us face our fears.
Since fear is the direct opposite of His love language (faith), get ready to hear instructions from him to face the things you fear, so that your trust in Him can grow.
So let me ask you: What are you afraid of? What can make your heart palpitate unnaturally and flood your arms with goosebumps? Or what can make you take two steps back and shrink two centimeters?
Everyone has something they fear. It could be weird or common, but believe me, we’ve all got it.
For example, I have a friend who fears getting broke. So she saves and saves and hardly ever spends on herself or others. Recently, God’s been teaching her to trust Him with her finances by asking her to give to certain people in need.
As scary as that sounds to someone who’s trying to amass enough for herself, she’s noticed that the more she gives, the more her dependence on God grows. She doesn’t rely on herself to get back the money she gives. She relies on God, who told her to give in the first place.
And the last time I checked, this friend of mine is financially buoyant, better off than when fear was her motivation for saving money.
Today, she serves as a challenge to me in this area.
So, the Holy Spirit just might bring you face to face with situations you fear, not so that you can be destroyed, but so that you can know (by experience) that He that is in you is greater than anything that may be out there. (1 John 4:4)
Yes, I’ve still got fears. Hidden ones, subtle ones…fears that I didn’t even know where there.
But as I walk with the Holy Spirit, He not only unravels my fears to me, but helps me confront them.
So when people of faith make bold moves or pray bold prayers sometimes, it’s not because they trust themselves or their abilities so much.
They just know (by experience) that their fears are smaller. Way smaller than God.
How about you?
Today, I invite you to get vulnerable with the Holy Spirit about the thigs or situations that scare you the most and let Him teach you to unlearn your fears.
This He does sometimes, by bringing you face to face with Jericho walls. Don’t back down or try to find your way around it. Take it! Take the wall!
Not without the presence of fear, but with the knowledge and trust that God is bigger. Way bigger than what may be staring at you in the face.
Remember, faith (absolute trust) isn’t some idea you carry in your head when you talk to God. It involves action. And as you begin to take action, you begin to speak His love language, what He loves to see (hear) the most: FAITH.
