Know Fear
A SEW 2022 Daily Devotional - January 10th
Devotional
Fear:“A distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, evil, pain, etc…whether the threat is real or imagined.” That is the definition of fear according to the dictionary.
Look at these words: Distressing…Emotion…Real…or Imagined.
Yesterday we said the question “What are people afraid of?” might be the wrong question. So what is the right one? Maybe it’s “Why are people afraid?”
People are afraid of a lot of things: spiders, dogs, the dark, heights. Arachibutyrophobia is the fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth. There is a phobia for everything. But the nature of fear is not in the object. “The dark” or “a spider” is not the source of my fear. “Heights” or “dogs” have no capacity to invoke fear on us. We are the source of our fear and we find an object on which to place our fear. If we are afraid of the future…the future isn’t the source of our fear. We are. And we have placed our fear on the future.
That’s why Jesus could say things like “Do not be afraid” all through the Gospels as if we could just turn it off. Is it possible that we can choose to not be controlled by something that feels so real? Would Jesus command us to do something that was impossible?
Christ in you is greater than your fear.
Meditation Points
Isaiah 43:1
"'Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.' "
Psalm 27:1
“The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?”
Psalm 46:1-3
God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling.