October is drawing to a close, and so is my time thinking about fear. I couldn’t be happier.

I thought this “month of fear” would be a soul-clearing exercise. It has been more soul-clenching than anything. The more I thought about this emotion, the more it haunted me. I think I might have been better off at the beginning of the month.

I avoided the keyboard these four weeks. It was a struggle to write a couple posts each week about getting around fear. The more I thought about fear, the less I wanted to write. I think I freaked myself out more than anything.

The topics on fear are limitless (fear of failure, fear of not being enough, fear of the future, fear of disaster, fear of temptation, fear of death, fear of sin, fear of the unknown, fear of what people think), but when it came down to it, I feel like the solutions could be summed up pretty easily.

You can say all you want about getting past fear, but I’ve found the best way is just to bulldoze through it as fast as you can, ripping a hole right through all the dangerous thoughts and finding a way out.

Way back at the beginning of the month I wrote about post about just saying “no” to fear, and it’s the closest I got to clarity, and I think I know why. Just saying “no” to fear is what God tells us about fear. (Duh).

• Deuteronomy 31:6: Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.
• 1 Chronicles 28:20: David also said to Solomon his son, “Be strong and courageous, and do the work. Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the LORD God, my God, is with you.
• Isaiah 41:10: So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
• Isaiah 41:13: For I am the LORD, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, Do not fear; I will help you.
• Luke 1:30: But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God.”
• Luke 2:10: But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.”
• John 14:27: Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.
• Romans 8:15: For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “”Abba,” Father.”

In other words:

• Don’t dwell on fear.
• Don’t even give fear a foothold in your heart.
• Fear does no good.
• Thinking about it more doesn’t show you a way out.
• Fear isn’t productive, neither is worry.
• Fear takes our eyes of God, which is exactly why we should recognize that fear is temptation.

Sometimes we like to justify our fear, listing the reasons we should get to worry. Sometimes in the dark of night, we give into fear, letting it stir our minds into a frenzy. Sometimes we confuse care and concern with fear and worry. But as soon as we find that fear taking a hold in our hearts, we must say no to it.

God makes his directives pretty simple: Don’t fear. Don’t worry.

Spending this month looking at fear, searching my heart for all the things that make my heart clench up, wasn’t fun. I’m not sure it was even that beneficial. What I learned in the end was that I should replace all that fear-gazing with God-gazing. Switching my focus from my fears to my God is the one of the only things that helped me. Learning to say “no” to fear-filled thoughts was one of the only other things.

So let’s move on, shall we? Let’s move on to November, the month of gratitude, and in the words of Philippians 4:8, let’s usher in a new mantra, “Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable–if anything is excellent or praiseworthy–think about such things.”

I have to say, writing this last post about fear is the easiest one I’ve had to write all month. Good night!

“Fear can keep us up all night long, but faith makes one fine pillow.” -unknown author 

When I chose the theme of “fear” for October, I had this blog entry in mind.

I knew I would write it, because this fear has a place in my life every day for just about as long as I can remember. Some days, I’m better at fighting this fear. Some days, I give it into this fear all together. This fear is the fear of not enough.

The first layer of this fear comes from living in an attitude of scarcity, instead of gratitude. I look around and find things that I don’t have enough of. I don’t have enough money or I don’t have enough beauty or I don’t have enough respect or success or feathers in my cap. I don’t have enough patience or courage or energy. Everything I’m lacking stresses me out.

But these fears are just symptoms of a bigger fear. I often look to money and things and success and beauty to cover up a greater fear. I clutch at these things as ways to distract myself from this fear, to cover it up. This fear is the deep down one: I am not enough, and I don’t deserve love and acceptance.

I clutch at beauty to cover my inside ugliness. I clutch at success because admiration feels like love. I clutch at things because everyone seems to equate them with peace and a good life. Beauty and success and material things seem to be the answer to my “not enough.” In my clear thinking hours, I know that money and success and things “can’t buy me love,” but they seem to be enough to garner people’s respect and even their envy.

Somehow, somewhere down deep, I think that if I collect all of these glittering treasures I will have enough. That “enough” will also solve my inner craving to be enough. I’ve chased. I’ve tried. The problem is…I’m right.

I am not enough.

Confronting this fear, this reality every day is not fun. This realization brings with it fear and disappointment. But it also brings the truth. I am sinful. Always have been, always will be. I will always struggle with the feeling of not being enough because I am not enough. I am not worthy of love because I am a sinner.

Starting here at the bottom, in this harsh reality, is somewhere I start every day. Some days I run after things and beauty and money and success to cover up the knowledge that I’m not enough. But some days I remember the second half of the greatest truth I know.

Jesus is enough.

He is the only one who is enough. And through faith in his perfect life and death, I am also enough. What beautiful words. Although I am a sinner who struggles with her “not enough,” I rejoice in the fact that even though I’ll never be enough, I don’t have to be. Jesus gives me his perfection and his wholeness. He took my “not enough” to the cross with him.

God loved me even before I was enough. And he has brought beautiful words into my life. These words are perfection and sufficiency and completeness. Jesus is perfect. His grace is sufficient. He forgiveness is complete. How beautiful those words sound to my broken and lacking and imperfect life. He binds me up in Him. And that is the enough, that is the love, I’m always longing for.

I’ve always carried an illusion with me. The illusion is that someday I will get things figured out and stop falling on my face, quit saying the wrong thing, and finally stop blundering my way through my days.

LOL. As if such a thing were possible.

There are people who seem so smooth, so knowledgeable, so not prone to falling on their faces again and again. These people make me think it’s possible. I’m just not one of those people, although I have a dream someday I will rise like the phoenix out of the ashes into some sort of calm, smooth, more beautiful version of Yoda.

When I mess up, it hurts…mostly my pride. I had a conversation today, and I felt like I said the wrong thing. I got home, and it began to haunt me: what I should have said, what I shouldn’t have said, over and over, round and round in my brain. The more and more I thought about it, the more upset with myself I became, mostly because I realized what I said hurt my image. I was afraid of how my words would make me look and how my words would make others think of me, whether they would like me anymore or not.

Do you know what wasn’t on my mind? Whether or not what I said really was the right or wrong thing, according to God. I was too caught up in my thoughts of what people were thinking of me that I didn’t even stop to consider the fact I had said the right thing.

This whole thought process got me thinking about my pride. I should be more afraid of it. Too often my self-image/pride drives my thoughts, words, and actions more than what God’s word tells me. It’s a scary realization.

On my own, my sinful nature is a twisted, twisted thing. It twists the truth. It twists my motivation. It twists my attitude. Left to its own devices, my pride quickly takes over as my mode of operation, a self-interested beast driving my life, my plans, and my decisions. Pride is not patient or kind. Pride envies and boasts. It’s rude. Pride is self-seeking, easily angered, and it keeps records of wrongs. Pride rejoices in evil, when it puts me on top. Pride will lie to save its image. And pride fails me again and again. But pride feels right because it comes naturally.

Pride also seems to make sense in this world. Look out for number one! If you aren’t watching out for number one, well, you’ll never be number one. In many cases, pride drives the beautiful to become more beautiful, the rich to become richer, the successful to have more success.

Humility and God’s ways often do not make sense. Humility and God’s ways often hurt my ego, asking me to give up my own desires, to sacrifice, and turn the other cheek. Humility asks me to say I’m sorry, to acknowledge my sinfulness and my weaknesses. In humility, I realize that this life isn’t about lining up trophies, winning awards for best-looking and most likely to succeed. And it isn’t about getting a little bit of fame or a whole lot of it either.

Humility readjusts my focus from this world to the next. What is see here is mostly smoke and mirrors, glittering distractions. Humility draws me to the realization that God is God, and I am not. But in that acknowledgement I also find comfort: I don’t have to run on the hamster wheel of pride, where there is never enough, where there is always fear. Where pride runs, humility can rest.

In humility, I know that I’m a sinner, and I mess up again and again. I know that I can never be enough. In humility, I know that Jesus is enough. He’s my “enough.” When I look to him, I see that my mistakes, my shortcomings, my sins are forgiven and removed. Everything I’m not is everything He is. Everything I need is found in Him. When I abandon pride, I can fully see the beauty of humility because it is the beauty of grace.

I love simple things, things that are efficient, streamlined, to-the-point. I love directions that are clear and concise, and writing that is so straightforward, it’s breath-taking.

But lately I’ve been wanting that too much. I’ve been aiming for a simplicity that isn’t realistic, especially in my writing. Sometimes I wish I could write a post that says if you do steps 1, 2, and 3, your problem will be solved.  But life is not simple. It doesn’t work out into a neat little package most of the time (any of the time?).

Some Christian books and articles that I’ve read actually lay it out that way. If you just pray this much, if you just trust this much, if you just give this much, then this and that will happen in your life. We’d all like it to be that easy, but it just isn’t.

There’s a very simple reason for this: we are not God. As much as I like to think I’m in control of my universe, I’m not. As much as I like to plan for the future, I can’t see it. As much as I check items off my to-do list, the results aren’t guaranteed. Sometimes this makes me very angry or frustrated or downright sad because life is full of so many questions and really hard situations. I’d love to find a way out of them myself.

But.

I find that when I’m pushed up against a wall, I realize how fully I’m unable to get out a situation by myself. I realize that I need help. These situations drive me to God, which is perhaps why he allows them into my life in the first place.

Life is full of problems and unknowns. I can’t change that, and Jesus told me it would be this way because this world is broken. Broken until the end of time. Daily struggles, hardships, burdens…they remind me of that this world is not my home. It’s a difficult, painful reality, but it is the truth that drives me to my God.

My God is wise and powerful. My God is all-knowing and all-seeing. My God can move the mountains and part the seas. He can change all of the things that I can’t. In fact, he’s changed everything I really need to have changed. He sent Jesus to conquer this world, to destroy death, and to defeat the devil. He changed me from a child of this world to a child of God. This world isn’t my everything. Heaven is, and it’s already been won for me.

I find myself so bent on trying to change things here, so afraid of what I can’t control. I focus so very much of my energy and time on my burdens, that sometimes I don’t focus anything on my blessings. I bring myself back again and again to these verses from Philippians 3:

“What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ ⁹ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in^[a] Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith. ¹⁰ I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, ¹¹ and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.

¹² Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. ¹³ Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, ¹⁴ I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

I don’t need steps 1, 2, and 3. I need a change of perspective, a change of heart. This kind of change is what the truths of God’s Word bring. In His Word, God assures us that that he is indeed God, that our salvation is won, and that He working all things out according to his grace-infused plan. When I focus my attention on these truths, I find that everything becomes so much simpler than following steps 1, 2, and 3.

Press on!

It’s funny how this blogging thing goes. I start out, all revved up to write, all excited by the encouragement I receive, with millions of ideas. And that lasts just about three weeks for me, until all of the adrenaline from the beginning peters out and I’m just plain tired. The blank page looks more and more like an enemy and less and less like my friend. (That little blinking curser? I think it’s out to get me).

When I get to the heart of it though, it’s not that I don’t want to write anymore, it’s that I am afraid to write. The fear is overpowering the love of what I do. Now that people are reading and sharing, I feel the pressure of eye watching, minds judging, fingers wagging. I feel the desire to write something new and exciting. I feel the tug to start promoting and sharing, to come up with a media plan and start submitting proposals. I feel the fear that I will fail at something that I have always wanted to do.

Instead of motivating me, fear paralyzes me. I have begun circumnavigating my blogging, walking a wide arc around my keyboard. Every other activity seems more appealing. Last night I chose cleaning my bathrooms instead of sitting down to write a blog. The voices in my head have become so loud, I can’t hear myself think.

Pressure. Paralysis. Both come from fear. Neither come from love. Fear overwhelms my hope to share God’s word, to reach out, to connect, to live honestly, to be who God made me to be. When I look around at how I might fail or what people might say, I’m not operating out of hope or love. I’m operating out of fear.

Where else is this happening in my life? Where else is fear overshadowing love and hope and action? I can see it in my relationships with people. I see it in my relationship with God. Fear distracts me from what’s important, what’s true, what’s real. It is a horribly powerful emotion.

Saying no to fear is no easy task for me. It means saying no to my ego and pride. No to the devil and his distractions. No to the easy way out.

And saying no to fear means saying yes to other things: yes to sitting down and writing, yes to taking God at his word, yes to praying, yes to one foot in front of the other.

When I think about all the stories in the Bible, I love that God uses so many people who were afraid, just like me: Abraham, Moses, Jonah, the disciples. Their stories are full of trying and failing, but also following and succeeding. I love that God assures us that real success is not conquering all, but learning to follow Him in faith…to say yes…in whatever he calls us to do.

My daughter is learning how to play piano. As I watch her trying to translate what she sees on the page into movement in her fingers, it’s taking me back to my own days of piano lessons.

When I was learning to play the piano, I raced through the music. I was a little bit of a mad woman, playing loud and fast and according to my own beat. I was always good at sightreading, the ability to read and play the correct notes. I could tear my way through a song pretty well, but I was never good at slowing down. And I was awful at timing. I hated stopping to figure out a tricky rhythm, clapping it out against the tick-tick of the metronome or my own tapping foot. Timing drove me mad. Most of the time I ignored it because I simply did not have the patience for it. I just kind of forced the music and used the term “artistic license” pretty liberally (to the chagrin of my piano teachers).

I so often want what I want, when and how I want it. I want my life to play out exactly as I request. I force things. I push onward, instead of patiently waiting. When things don’t go as I planned, I’m upset about the resulting cacophony. I’m disappointed, frustrated, angry with God. I am also afraid. If this doesn’t work out, what then? If God doesn’t give me this, how will I make it through?

But life is so much more than my plans and ideas and desires, the notes I pick on out the keys, the way I think the song should sound. Life is about timing, and most of that belongs to God. He answers our prayers in the way and the time that he knows is best.

He knows best because he is God. I need to trust Him. He sees me.  He knows me, my desires, my dreams. He knows my strengths, my purpose. God also knows my limits, the length of my vision, the borders of my knowledge. He knows what tempts me, he knows my fears. He knows how I’ve made a mess of things. He knows what is best for me and my faith. He picks up my finagled notes, and he sets them to his timing. The result is music, the song that he is crafting out of my life.

I learning to appreciate timing more than I used to, the value of following the Master’s tempo, instead of my own. I know that trusting his timing results in a much more beautiful song.

Lord, sometimes I’m so afraid when things don’t work out the way I had planned. I’m sorry for not trusting you with my life. Please forgive me and help me trust your timing. Thank you, Lord, for the music that you make out of all my noise. For Jesus’ sake, Amen.

I’ve designated “fear” as this month’s theme. And perhaps the scariest thing is that I have so much experience in this area. In fact, it is taking my a very, very long time to write this first post on fear, because I have so much fodder.

There have been stretches in my life where my mode of operation was fear. One of those stages was in adolescence, and I wrote about that last month. I’m kind of going through another one of those stretches right now.

There was a period of a few years, not too long ago, when one bad thing after another kept happening. I felt like I was at sea in the middle of a storm, one wild wave crashing over my boat after another. Just as I would catch my breath, another wave would hit.

For the last year or so, though, things have calmed down. A little bit choppy, but no hurricanes, not even a lightning storm, really. But since the last storm has passed, I keep looking at the horizon, straining to spot the next one. Instead of relaxing, I find it eerily calm.

“What will happen next?” I keep asking myself. “Will my children get kidnapped or abused? Will I get cancer? Will my husband die in a freak accident? Will we fall down in some sort of financial disaster? Will world war break out? Will there be a school shooting at our academy? Will someone close to me go through something terrible? Will my children and grandchildren be persecuted? Will I? Will I lose someone I know, too young?”

I fear the next big, bad thing. I’m scared about what’s coming next.

There are a lot of things that help me:

1. God will be with me when the next storm hits.

2. God will work it out for my good when it hits.

3. No storm that happens here can separate me from his love.

4. God is bigger than the boogy man.

5. Yelling this in my brain: STOP IT!

Stop it. Stop it. Stop it. These big scary crazy horrible situations that I cook up in my head? They are TEMPTATIONS. They are things that the devil whispers in my ear, late at night, to get me to take my eyes off of the TRUTH that God is love, that God is in control. When I start feeling myself hyperventilate, sometimes just saying STOP IT really works.

It’s why Jesus simply said, “Don’t worry.”

Don’t worry…that’s it. Don’t worry…end of story. Don’t worry…run the other way. Why am I so surprised when this simple direction works?

Lord, help me to listen to you, to cling to your promises, to trust your words, to flee from worry. Amen!

We made it to October 1st. Hooray!

Thank you for shuffling through September with me, thinking about how to live more peacefully, and pondering the peace that only God gives. The peace of his grace, forgiveness, and hope overwhelms any month, any circumstance, and any trial. That’s why it passes all understanding. Thank you, Lord!

I’m taking on a new “theme” for October. It’s something that I’ve been thinking about a lot actually, and it fits in really well with this month, home to Halloween and all things creep-tastic. No worries. I’m not going to approach the “should Christians let their kids trick-or-treat?” debate. I’m going to talk about fear.

The things I fear, I’m finding, are things that a lot of people fear. Sharing those fears with others and lifting each other up with the comfort of God’s Word really helps me abandon worry and embrace the love that drives out all fear.

I hope you’ll come along.