Tag Archives: fear

Exodus 1: Who Is Afraid of the Men?

It started in Genesis when Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers and taken to Egypt. Then God sent a famine, which brought the rest of Joseph’s family to Egypt seeking food. Tears, forgiveness, and grace all flowed freely, as did favor. Because Pharoah favored Joseph, he also showed kindness and favor to his family.

And then Joseph’s generation died, a new king came to power, and everything changed.

And this is where we can learn an important lesson.

 He said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are more numerous and powerful than we are. Come, let’s deal shrewdly with them; otherwise they will multiply further, and when war breaks out, they will join our enemies, fight against us, and leave the country.” 

Exodus 1:9-10

Oppression doesn’t always come from a desire to have more power and control. Sometimes it comes from fear. Maybe we try to hold down and control the thing (or people) we fear the most. And maybe when it works, we feel powerful, and we want more of that feeling. Maybe.

But sometimes it backfires. Egypt’s king was afraid of the large number of Israelites, so he had them oppressed and what do you know? The more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied, and I wonder if that’s what happens when we try to push down and control the thing we fear. It just gets bigger.

So the fearful king tried a different strategy. He tried to control their population by killing off the boy babies, because boys become men and that was actually the fear the king was trying to hold down.

“…otherwise they will multiply further, and when war breaks out, they will join our enemies, fight against us, and leave the country.” 

Women didn’t go to war, men did. So the king needed to stop boys from becoming men.

And that right there is a rabbit trail I wish we had time to explore. Instead, the conspiracy theorist in me is just gonna throw out a few questions to ponder –

Why is our culture trying so hard to keep boys from becoming men? Why are they being encouraged to become girls? Why are they calling masculinity toxic and encouraging men to suppress who they were created to be? Who is afraid of men being men?

Thankfully, the midwives feared God more than they feared the king, and the plan to eliminate the growing population of boys who would become men failed.

What is your fear? How are you handling that fear? Is it working?

Do you fear God more?

As the Church, have we adopted the fear of our current culture and bought into the lie that men are bad, or toxic? God forbid. I pray that we will be the ones who fear God enough to speak the truth and who encourage men to be men. Godly men, but by all means, men.

Grounding the Planes

Been having trouble sleeping lately. It’s like, the minute I lay down, my mind turns into O’Hare Airport, with thoughts landing and taking off in every direction. At first, it was occasional, but lately, it’s just become my thing. And I don’t want it to be my thing. I also don’t want to take sleep aids, because I can develop an addiction to just about anything and I’ve had my fill of craving things that aren’t good for me.

But, I stumbled across something the other day, and now it’s underlined and had a highlighter taken to it.

Be at rest once more, O my soul, for the Lord has been good to you. (Psalm 116:7)

I want to learn to let this one thought interrupt every other thought. I want to learn to settle my soul with it. To teach my mind to lean into the truth of it.

I don’t think David was telling his soul to rest because once upon a time God had been good to him. I think what David knew was this…

God has been good, and He is being good, and He will always be good to me.

It is what I have most in common with David. The always present, never-ending goodness of God. I’ve also had abuse. Sickness. Grief. Pain. Depression. All the things a fallen world offers us.

So the question becomes, for me, which is greater? What will bring rest for my oft times frantic soul? Will the fear and anticipation of more of what hurts bring peace to the war in my mind? Or will it be the truth that no matter what happens, no matter what comes next, God will be good, because God has always been good to me?

For You, Lord, rescued me from death,
my eyes from tears,
my feet from stumbling.
I will walk before the Lord
in the land of the living. (Psalm 116:8-9)

He has done all of that and more. He entered the darkness of my life with the brilliance of His light and changed my course, forever. He cleansed me with His blood, forgave every single sin, removed my hard heart and gave me a soft one. He showed me what true love looks like, what mercy and compassion can do, and He continually reminds me that I have a home and this earth is not it.

So I’m working on grounding the planes in my mind with these truths. Remembering His goodness. Reminding my soul that He is with me in all things and He will always do what is good and what is right and I have nothing to fear. Calling my soul to remember what it believes about God rather than what it can imagine about what might happen.

I want to encourage you to do that too. Even if your mind isn’t an airport at night, we are all prone to fearful anticipations, to what ifs and what abouts. To wondering if we’ll make it through the worst case scenario presenting itself in our life. But we can do battle against all that and we can have victory in that battle. We can call our souls to rest once more.

We can remember God’s goodness to us at every turn. We can declare to our souls that He has been good, is being good in this very hour, and will be good forevermore. To us. To you. To me.

Are you with me?

genesis 20: fear

Big picture:  God called Abraham to become the father of many nations, to be a prophet and a patriarch, and to father the line that would bring forth the Messiah. 

Within the scenes that make up that big picture, we see Abraham’s humanity, particularly his fear of man. 

Abraham’s trust and faith in God to fulfill His promise to him did not necessarily extend to every situation. When he came up against pagan kings who could kill him to take his wife, he leaned on his own wits to save himself. Himself, not Sarah. Lest we think Abraham was perfect. 

But we need to find ourselves in this story, lest we think ourselves more holy than Abraham.

Being alone. Being without. Being judged. Being seen as less than. Failure. These are our fears, if we are brave enough to admit it. They are the taskmasters in our lives, and most of them stem from one fear that holds a large whip. Fear of man. Raw honesty compels us to confess that, often, the fear of man in our lives is bigger and louder than the fear of God.

How does that change what Abraham did? It doesn’t. But if we ask ourselves a simple question, and answer it with brutal honesty, we will discover a comrade in Abraham and move from judging him to understanding him, and us:

What have I done in response to my fear?

Who has been allowed in my life, not because they were right for me, but because I didn’t want to be alone? What, or who, have I sacrificed so that I could have more money, more things, more prestige, more of what someone else has? How have I sacrificed authenticity to avoid being judged? How hard have I worked to maintain an image that isn’t true because I fear what others would think if they knew the truth?

How much of the bondage I’m in is a response to fear?

Abraham feared being killed, so he put himself before his wife. If we could stand to be honest with ourselves we would find we are the children of Abraham in more ways than one.

But God.

He is committed to His plans and to His promise. He continues to rescue us, intervene for us and increase us.

we’re made for this

The story is this: disciples were sent ahead of Jesus, in a boat. Around 3 a.m. they see someone walking on the sea toward them, and think their eyes must be tricking them. Then the Someone speaks that He is Jesus, don’t be afraid.

{When the storm is building, listen closely.  “Have courage. It is I. Do not be afraid.” Because He has promised to never leave you, so you are never, ever, in the storm alone.}

And then Peter speaks (of course, it would be Peter). “If it’s You, command me to come to You on the water”. 

{Where are the ones who want to walk on water? Where are the disciples who want to do the impossible, willing to do something that feels unsafe? Where are we?}

So Jesus said “Come”.

{Come. Lay hands on this one for healing. Come, pray for that one and share the gospel with her in the middle of the grocery store because this is where I’m calling you to step out on the water. Come, step into unknown, go where you hadn’t planned, do what feels risky, give away what you’ve saved, forgive, apologize, bend low and wash feet and turn cheek and love. Let go of what you think you’re controlling and step into what you can’t control. You see, we’re all hearing Him say “Come”. We’re all invited to step out of safe, out of comfortable, out of what makes sense. We’re all beckoned to step onto water that moves under our feet and do impossible things. Are we doing it, though? Are we hearing “Come” and are we lifting our foot over the side of our lives, daring to walk in the power of Jesus?}

Peter did. “And climbing out of the boat, Peter started walking on the water and came toward Jesus.”

{There’s something in me that cheers for Peter in that moment. Something that feels like he’s walking on water for all of us. Being brave, taking the risk, daring to go into what’s unknown, because he wants to be like Jesus.}

And then fear came. Fear always comes. “But when he saw the strength of the wind, he was afraid. And beginning to sink he cried out, “Lord, save me!”

{Fear sinks us every time. Afraid of what someone will think of us. What will they say to me? What if I look foolish, go broke, end up with nothing? What if it’s hard and what if I can’t do it and what if it’s dangerous and what if I get hurt? What if it changes everything and what if I can’t control what happens? What if they don’t love me back? What if I’m wrong? What if it doesn’t work? Fear comes riding in on the strong winds of ‘what if’.}

But Jesus doesn’t let us go under. “Immediately Jesus reached out His hand, caught hold of him, and said to him, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?” 

{Fear doesn’t talk to us about Jesus. It doesn’t remind us about faith. Faith says “look up”, while fear compels us to look down and look around. To see the strength of the wind and the opinions and the risk and the utter loss of control that walking on water creates. Fear diminishes faith and raises doubt. Causes us to question what we’ve heard, what we know, what we believe. Shifts us back into a safe religion where we’re calling the shots, doing what looks good, doing what stirs approval in those around us. Doing what doesn’t rock the boat. I hate fear, but sometimes I feel safer with fear than with faith.}

There are hard things to be done. There is risk and brave things waiting for our ‘yes’. The Kingdom of God must keep advancing and it is violently opposed. The winds of opposition are strong but I think we were made for strong winds. I think we’re fully equipped to withstand opposition, to do the brave thing. I believe that risk ceases to be risky when we are walking with Jesus. I believe that He inhabits His people, His Church, and nothing will stop us, no weapon will prevail against us, and defeat is not our destiny. I think we are people with greater faith than fear. I think we’re made to rock boats.

I think we’re made to walk on water. We just have to get out of the boat.

steppingoutoftheboat-754x437#letsgo #letslookatJesus #dontlookdown #wecandohardthings #betheChurch  #walkonwater #belikeJesus

(Matthew 14:25-31)

i can live with that – part one

At the same time the Benjaminites did not drive out the Jebusites who were living in Jerusalem. The Jebusites have lived among the Benjaminites in Jerusalem to this day. {Judges 1:21}

I could go on about how I was in the book of Judges with no idea why I chose to go there. How I was reading along at more of a yada yada pace than taking a contemplative stroll. I could tell you about reading past verse 21, but not really because my eyes kept going back to it even though my brain kept wanting to move on. Get to something interesting. I could tell you all of that, but I won’t. I’ll just cut to the chase. Or to the quick. Whichever it happens to be for you.

What are you co-existing with that you should have driven out?

Personally, I needed a whole minute after that question. Could have been a month. A month of trying not to let it stop at conviction. Forcing myself to stay with it and not push it away as one of those oh, that’s good moments and then go back to being whatever it is that I am. Oblivious. Comfortable. Unconvicted.

I may need more time. But here is where I share my journey with whoever may be listening, so I’ll share a couple of miles or so I’ve gone with this so far.

The Israelites had been told to drive out the inhabitants that were in their promised land. Get rid of them. The promised land was the territory God had given them. Places He had given them the authority to dwell as His people.

What is the spiritual shadow being cast by this physical reality? What is my land, my territory of authority?

My home, family. My marriage. If I were still raising children, my parenting would be a place God has given to me, but now it’s my grandparenting.  Ministry. Calling. Gifting. My workplace. My relationships with God, and with others, inside and outside of the Church.

This is my land, my territory. God has planted me here and given me authority, spiritually.  These are the areas I have felt led to ask myself the question — what have I been allowing to co-exist with me here, rather than driving it out?

Some that I came up with apply to me, and some do not. Maybe they resonate with you, though.

Fear, including the fear of man. The fear of disappointing someone, of feeling their disapproval or criticism. That kind of fear will keep us in a place of striving, trying to please and appease. It will keep us from speaking the truth when truth needs to be spoken. Then there is the fear that comes when we watch the news. That’s the fear that can turn our desire to be informed into an obsession. And because we are obsessed with what is going on around us, we are continually fueling fresh fear.  And no, the answer is not to bury our heads, no longer paying any attention to the news. The news is not the trespasser on our land. Fear is.

{Also, for the record — fear includes control, because control is rooted primarily in fear.  Think about it.}

Pride, which includes a low self-esteem. Whether thinking too much of ourselves, or too little of ourselves — we are still continually thinking of self. Narcissism, which is pride on steroids, is rampant in the Church. One day on social media will confirm that, I promise.  Comparison is also rampant and is rooted in pride. Self-hatred, self-loathing, self-everything — all the offspring of pride.

Pride ensures that no matter where we look, we see ourselves.

{It also includes a judgmental and/or critical spirit, both of which can be traced back to pride.}

Apathy/Complacency. Couch surfing Christians. Those who believe they follow Jesus, but never actually follow Him past the couch. They keep their religion as a “private” matter, never talking about it with others.  Or, they post spiritual memes on their social media accounts and consider that sharing the gospel. It is spiritual laziness and we have made peace with it and allowed it to co-exist with us in every aspect of our lives.

I can think of others, can you? A religious spirit, unbelief, addictions of every kind, and compromise, just to name a few.

To figure out how and why these things are enemies that should not be allowed to co-exist with us, we have to consider what they destroy, or at a minimum, what they hinder in us. We’ll do that in the next mile. Stay tuned!

what has to happen for His word to be true

typing-on-keyboardAll the writer people are doing it, and something in me that wants to be counted among the writer people set out to do it too. Put fingers to keys and let flow something profound about the birth of Jesus. So I flipped over to Luke chapter 2 and got ready. But I never got past the first seven verses.

Because I saw this —

“So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David.” (Luke 2:4)

And then I remembered this prophecy — 

“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for Me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.” (Micah 5:2)

And then I went back to verse one and my mind blew up just a little.

“In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world.”

In that year, that month, Caesar Augustus had to call for a census.

But before that a man named Joseph had to love a girl named Mary and ask for her hand in marriage (or offer her dad six goats and a really nice rug).

And Joseph had to come from the line of David so that he would have to travel to his hometown of Bethlehem, the city of David, to register for the census.

But before that, Mary had to become with child by the Holy Spirit at just the right time so that she was almost due to give birth when the census was ordered, so that once in Bethlehem, our Savior was born.

And all I can think is nothing is random.

There is order and strategy and purpose in everything God does to bring about His word.

And then my mind does a mad dash.

And we all, who with unveiled faces reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into His image with ever-increasing glory… (2 Corinthians 3:18)

What has to happen for this to be true?

Every mountaintop and every valley.

refiners-fire3Every crucible, deep water and wilderness wandering.

Every moment spent at His feet and every single one spent with my face to the hard ground of Gethsemane whispering “not my will but Yours be done”.

Every green pasture and still waters and invitation to the table with Him. Every stumble and every victory dance.

And every single trial.

Nothing is random and nothing is wasted. Everything is leading from glory to glory.

We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God: those who are called according to His purpose. (Romans 8:28)

What comes to me comes for me. Because God keeps His word. Always.

The Savior was born in Bethlehem, and I will be transformed into His image.

this uterus and the hard parts of the story

On Friday, September 30th I had some tests done, including a biopsy. On October 5th I was told I had complex endometrial hypoplasia, which is a thickening of the uterine wall. The complex part means it is abnormal and “suspicious” of cancer, even though the biopsy did not show any cancer cells. So, on October 25th I will meet with an oncologist, who is likely to highly recommend a hysterectomy. So be it. Goodbye, uterus.

So I’ve been processing all the thoughts and all the feels. At first, fear hit and made it hard to breathe. I thought of the people I know who have succumbed to cancer in the last year, including my older sister. But since then, I’ve talked to a couple of other women, including my younger sister, who had this complex endometrial hypoplasia and are fine. No cancer. So my fear has subsided considerably. But through all of the processing, talking and crying to God, I’ve learned a few new things…

okay

I can be afraid and still trust God. At first, I felt ashamed of being scared of this thing. My faith should be stronger than this, what will people think if they see fear in me, what kind of witness would that be, I need to be an example. But trying not to be afraid didn’t make me less afraid, it just kept my mind focused on the fear instead of on God. So I went to my favorite place in scripture, the Psalms, and discovered that often, David was afraid while he trusted God.

“Be gracious to me, Lord, for I am weak; heal me, Lord, for my bones are shaking; my whole being is shaken with terror…Turn, Lord! Rescue me; save me because of Your faithful love.” – Psalm 6:2-4

“How long will I store up anxious concerns within me, agony in my mind every day?…But I have trusted in Your faithful love; my heart will rejoice in Your deliverance.” Psalm 13:2,5

God, not fear, was always David’s final answer to his circumstances. Being afraid doesn’t mean fear gets to occupy the biggest place in my heart. It means that when I am afraid, I turn to the One I trust the most and I remember Him. I remember that Jesus holds my days, every single one.

When I am afraid, I put my trust in You. – Psalm 56:3   

created-for-his-glory

“Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth—  everyone who is called by My name, whom I created for My glory, whom I formed and made.”     Isaiah 43:6-7

This has to be my bottom line, otherwise, my bottom line will be me, and that never turns out well. But if I allow this to be more about God than it is about me, my perspective shifts and I stop projecting this thing out to the worst possible outcome. Instead, I whisper to God, and pray that my whole heart believes it…“whatever this is, whatever comes, my life is Yours and You get to decide how You will be glorified through it.”  The greatest desire of my heart right now is that whatever comes, God will be seen for who He is in the midst of it.

{Honesty check:} Actually, that’s not quite true. My greatest desire is that my uterus would stop being suspicious, and all of this would magically go away. Barring that, then by all means…let God be seen and may great be His glory.

change

Whether this turns out to be a simple deal or the worst case scenario, one thing is absolutely certain.

It will change me, but it will not change God.

God will remain exactly who He was before October 5th. Before my uterus became such a big deal. He remains trustworthy and good. He will do what is right, what is good, what pleases Him. His love for me has not wavered, His plans for me have not been derailed. Fear will try to tell me otherwise, but I have determined in advance where I will stand. My legs may shake, but I will stand on the unchanging goodness of God.

“ Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.“   James 1:17

The problem with God speaking truth to us is that He doesn’t speak it to just make us feel good.

Truth must be lived out if it’s going to change us. 

This life is my journey to walk out, but it is not my story to write. If it were, I would write out all the hard parts, the painful parts, the parts that scare me. But those are the very parts that bring me to the place of surrender, that force me to choose faith again and again, that bring me back to the reality that I am not in control, but I belong to the One who is. As difficult as it is to walk in those places, I have become convinced that He casts His shadow deep and wide over the hardest parts of our story.

How priceless is your unfailing love, O God!
    People take refuge in the shadow of your wings. (Ps. 36:7)