When I was very young—maybe five or six—my Dad watched a Steven King movie about werewolves (being older, I now know that movie is called,“Silver Bullet”). Being the oldest, I just knew I could handle a scary movie, so I asked him if I could watch it with him. Clearly recognizing this would be a bad idea, his answer was, “No, this is a movie for “grown ups” and it would be too scary for little kids”. He then promptly put me to bed for the night (He would wait to watch these types of movies until after we went to bed). Now, back then, I had a lot of trouble falling asleep (an issue I still have to this day) and so, instead of going to sleep, I decided to sneak out of the bed, crawl into the living room, hide beside the couch and watch a movie about a werewolf hunting a boy.
This proved to be a very bad decision.
If I had trouble sleeping before, it seemed impossible now, because when I finally made my way back into my room...it seemed like monsters lurked in every shadow just waiting for the chance to eat me.
It was at that moment that I had to decide which was scarier--telling my Dad that I was scared to death (which would involve admitting that I had blatantly disobeyed him) or deal with the fact that I might not make it until the morning considering I was sure my room was filled with werewolves and monsters.
It didn’t take as long as you might imagine to decide an angry Dad was better than a hungry monster.
So, I got up and went into the living room, told him everything about sneaking up and how I was scared of werewolves in my room. Of course, I was sobbing by this time, because I had used every bit of my remaining courage to make the dash out of my bedroom before I was devoured by shadowy monsters. I remember sitting on the couch across from my Dad and even though his face didn’t show a great deal of sympathy for me (he tried to warn me), he still let me stay in the room with him. And, even though I knew he was a little mad at me, just being in his presence made me feel less scared and anxious. Why? Because I knew that even if I had disappointed him by being disobedient, I knew that he would protect me. I somehow knew that even when I felt he was most angry at me, my Dad could and WOULD always protect me for one simple reason: he was my Father and he loved me.
We live in a scary world. There may not be werewolves, but there are far scarier things that cause anxiety and fear—bills, loss of jobs, car issues, messy marriages, troubled children, and stressful jobs. As if this isn’t enough, the nightly news is always there to remind us just how dark and scary the world is: wars, poverty, famine, disease, kidnapped children, murder, and apparently how in a few short years we are all going to boil or be drowned by melting glaciers due to something called, “global warming”. All of this creates a melting pot of things we should be worried about and fear.
And the truth is, most of these fears and worries we deal with are real. They are real situations that have real-life impact and consequences on our lives and the lives of those we love. They aren’t irrational and it’s not crazy that we feel fear about all of these things. It’s a fact of life that we will, at times, feel fear; so, the real question isn’t how to avoid feeling fear, but how to avoid LIVING out of it. Fear makes us anxious, angry, impulsive, and selfish. It makes us worry about “ME” more than anyone or anything around us. So how do we learn to deal with something that we are guaranteed to “feel” at one time or another? It’s easy to tell ourselves, “stop being afraid”, but it’s difficult to do when in those moments we feel so helpless. Fear is powerful and it can sometimes make me feel like that frightened little boy who stayed up too late and watched a scary movie.
For me, the key has been the realization that God is just as protective of me as my earthly Dad. That in those fear-filled moments when I feel so vulnerable, I can turn to God in the same way I ran to my Dad on the couch that night I watched the werewolf movie. That if I call myself a Christian, then I have to BELIEVE God is there and will be there no matter the situation. God has said, “I will never leave you or abandon you” (Hebrews 13:5). He isn’t angry at you or me for being scared or feeling fear or anxiety. He isn’t annoyed or disappointed in you for feeling these things; He just loves you so much that He doesn’t want you to LIVE out of those fears and anxieties.
God knows you're scared. God cares about your fear and anxiety. In fact, a very common theme throughout the Bible is God telling His people, “Do not be afraid”...”have no fear”...”be courageous”. He wouldn't have to tell us that if He did not know that we were going to face scary, fear-filled “things” throughout this life. So, He loves us enough to tell us that we don’t have to be afraid when those moments come--not because they aren’t scary and big--but because He wants to remind us that HE is BIGGER. He reminds us to let our faith in HIM be stronger than our fear of the situation.
Put simply: fear is the opposite of faith, and faith should be our response to fear.
Fear says God doesn't really care about me.
Faith says I KNOW God cares for me. (1 Peter 5:7)
Fear says God CAN'T come through because this situation is too big.
Faith says God IS IN CONTROL and nothing is impossible for Him. (Luke 1:37)
Fear says God WON'T come through.
Faith says God ALWAYS comes through for His children. (Romans 8:28)
The faith God calls us to is not pretending that situations aren’t tough or scary. It’s not even a faith that tells us to never feel fear. The faith God calls us to just asks us to trust Him. Trust Him when the storms of life get scary. Trust Him when the situation seems impossible to overcome. Trust Him that His directions for our life are for our good. Trust Him to keep His promises. If and when we can do that, the storms seem a little quieter, the situations seem a little less impossible, and the werewolves a little less scary.
If you’re in a place of fear today--take the advice of the 5 year old me--go and spend some time with your Father and let him remind you that He will always be bigger than the “monsters”.