Afraid No More

Purity of Mind: Day 13 – No Fear

1 John 4:17-18
God is love. When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. This way, love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature in us, so that we're free of worry on Judgment Day - our standing in the world is identical with Christ's. There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life - fear of death, fear of judgment - is one not yet fully formed in love.

Tonight’s devotion hit me pretty hard. I am a really anxious person, maybe even a little paranoid. I worry about lots of things, little things and big things and I worry all the time. Something I know are stupid to worry about and then there are other times that I worry if I am not anxious enough. There have been a number of times that I have been able to hand over the bigger things to God and experienced a real peace about the situation, but its not something that I do daily.

Tonight I realised, even though I think I already knew, that my fear/worry/anxiety is something that I have allowed the devil to have as a really powerful tool in my life and I need to put a stop to it. Earlier this year at my cell we did a study of fear, and the speaker (some American lady on the DVD) taught that the answer to fear is always God…and that there was nothing my God could not be the answer to. She got us to ask our most anxious questions, for example right now mine is What if there is a fire in Castlemaine and the answer is God. Its always what if….then God and I need to start holding on to this a little tighter.

At school I was given a bible verse to help me through my exams and that was Mark 5:36 “Don’t be afraid, just believe” in another translation it says ‘just have faith’. I need to start living this, really living this. I want to be fully formed in love, and fear is stopping me.

So God, break the chains that fear has in my life. I want to be free, I want to just have faith, I want the answer to my ‘what if’s’ to be ‘then God’. For the big things and for the little, everyday things. Do something new in me. Let me know that peace and freedom that goes beyond all understanding.