The Cure for Fear

Spiders.  Crazed gunman.  Car accidents.  Public embarrassment.  The dark.  Each of us is afraid of something.  What are your fears?  Better yet, how do you deal with them?  There is a Bible verse that I've known for years that tells us we were not given a spirit of fear but a spirit of adoption.  Michaela did something that made a light bulb come on in my head in regard to that verse.



"The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, "Abba, Father."  --  Romans 8:15

Family photo at church, dressed up for Chinese New Year

Lovely picture isn't it?  Michaela typically only cries like that for two reasons.  As was the case in the picture, she gets like this when she is very tired from sleeping badly the night before or missing a midday nap (often both).  We call her Grumpy Brunke.  The other situation that causes her to lose her mind like this is when she is scared.  She doesn't get scared of a lot of things.  Big dogs don't bother her.  Loud trucks don't scare her.  Strangers are her biggest fear.  If she hasn't spent a lot of quality time with you, you can cause a Michaela meltdown just by trying to pick her up.

A few weeks ago at church, Michaela was playing near me.  Someone she doesn't know very well walked up to her, bent down, and started talking to her and squeezing her cheeks.  Her face immediately distorted into the look of terror as tears tumbled down her cheeks.  She cried.  LOUDLY.  She spun around a few times until her eyes locked on me standing ten feet away.  She walked around the stranger and cut a straight path to me, crying all the while.  She reached her hand out and grabbed my leg.  Her crying stopped almost as soon as she touched me.  She sobbed a few more times as she caught her breath.  She looked up, her cheeks covered in tears but with a smile on her face as she said two words: "Daddy.  Up."

I couldn't help but laugh as I picked her up.  She had gone from meltdown to happy in just 0.9 seconds.  She was scared of the stranger but she knew that I would take care of her.  Once she had made it to Daddy, she knew everything would be alright.  I was her safe zone.  She handled her fear in the best way she knew how.  Run to Daddy.

If you've trusted Christ as your Savior, you were not give a spirit of fear, but a spirit of adoption.  Almighty God has adopted you as His son or daughter.  You are a child of God.  He loves you deeply.  You can cry out to God as a child cries out for their daddy.  God wants you to realize that He is more than just the man in the sky who is in charge.  He is your loving Daddy.

What troubles you?  What scares you?  What causes you to cry?  What leaves you worried?  Courage is not the answer.  Manning up and saying, "I'm not scared.  I can do this," is not the way to conquer fear.  The cure for fear is not courage and trusting in yourself.  The cure for fear is Daddy.  Would you give that a shot next time you are afraid?  Would you run to your Heavenly Daddy in prayer?  Would you grab onto His leg and ask Him to pick you up?  He loves you.  He cares for you.  He is bigger than those strangers that are scaring you.  He wants to take care of you.  He will walk alongside of you.  Run to him with trust and faith and watch your fears melt away in 0.9 seconds.