Fear Not
“Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. Isaiah 43:1 (ESV)
The other day I found myself looking through journals and ran across an entry dated December of 2013.
“Normally, I’m excited about a new year approaching, but this year is different. I’m not looking forward to the New Year that is approaching. I have a sense of fear and dread. I know that fear is not of God, yet it creeps in unknowingly at times. My heart is heavy, and if I had my way, I would stay in this year and not enter through the doors of next year.”
As I read that entry, all the emotions of that time washed over me again. I remember the feeling of dread that the next few days would bring. I remember thinking, “Would this be the year that my life would come crashing down all around me?” Then I remembered the years that followed and how God had opened my eyes to the fear that had me paralyzed. I remembered how He had touched my life. I remember how I came to live in the freedom of a particular fear that had haunted me for over half of my life. I remembered how God opened my eyes to a thought that became a feeling and had eventually become a fear without me even realizing it.
That’s how Satan works. He loves to plant thoughts into our minds. He knows that with me anyway, all he had to do was to plant the idea. He knew that I would nourish that idea until it grew into fear. He also knew that before I even realized it, he would have chains wrapped so tightly around me that it would stop God’s plan for my life.
He thought that by encasing me in fear that it would eventually destroy me. And it would have. BUT GOD…
For the next several years, God would take me on a journey to break those chains of fear. This journey wasn’t easy, but what I know now is that God loved me too much to leave me where I was. He loves you that much too. You don’t have to live your life in fear because He has redeemed you and has even called you by name, and you are His.
I pray that if you are struggling with fear of any kind, that God would open your eyes to the truth of His love for you. I pray that you would take every thought captive breaking the chains of fear and giving Satan no chance to sew any more lies into your life that will later turn in to fear. For our God is bigger than all of our fears!
I have made a list of verses that God used to break the chains of fear in my own life. I use them often when I feel it creeping up to my door, hoping to come inside and stay awhile.
I hope they will encourage you and strengthen you today to move past the lies of Satan and into the life that God has planned for you.
Verses on Fear: