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Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. - John 14:27 ESVEver get afraid? I certainly do. I get afraid for my own safety sometimes, or my children's safety or my wife's. I get afraid that the money won't be there for whatever. I get afraid that I won't make a difference in the world. I get afraid of the sound outside my house at 3am that I don't know the cause of. I get afraid when I watch the news and see what's going on in politics, or when I think about how we are slowly polluting our world, or when I think about the fact that there are weapons in existence that could literally kill pretty much every living thing on planet Earth, certainly including all of the human beings. There's a lot out there to be afraid of.
But you know what? Jesus clearly said in the Bible verse above that we can reject fear. We can simply not let it be part of our experience of the world. Apparently there's a way to put up a stop sign: sorry, Mr. Afraid and Mrs. Troubled, you're not allowed here! Doesn't that sound ridiculous? Again, remember, I'm not making it up. It's in the Red Letters, right there!
So how do you do that? Well through the rest of this mini-series we've learned that it's done by focusing on the things of God. If you haven't read the other posts, I invite you to click "Back to the beginning" below and go through them all. Let's practice turning that stoplight red, putting down that gate, and not letting fear in. Wouldn't a life free from fear be an amazing thing?
Back to the beginning