The Instinct of Fear
Luke 1:30 Fear can be a trap, but if you trust in the Lord, you will be safe.
I don’t think that there’s a person on the planet who doesn’t have some favourite fears lurking away deep inside sometimes. And without even thinking about it, they rise to the surface and easily dominate our thinking. And when that happens, the truth is that imaginary fears end up ruining our lives.
You can learn a lot from watching cats. They can be lying there on the carpet thoroughly enjoying their decadent lifestyle, when all of a sudden they hear a noise, leap up and race off in fear of their lives.
It’s kind of true for us too. Fear is a normal part of our protective response mechanism. But we also have an imagination. When we were kids, we’d imagine all sorts of monsters lurking under our beds in the middle of the night. And even when we grow up, we can still have monsters in the closets of our minds.
Fear can ruin our lives. We conjure up all these ugly outcomes in whatever situation we’re in … and although they’re only imaginary, they truly end up ruining many a life.
Proverbs 29:25 Fear can be a trap, but if you trust in the Lord, you will be safe.
That’s a very typical Hebrew saying. It’s called a couplet – two opposites on different sides of the same coin.
On the one hand, if we allow our imaginations to conjure up fear in our hearts, imagining all those bad outcomes that could happen – it’s a trap, a snare, something that trips us up and robs us of life itself.
But now let’s flip the coin, because the opposite is trusting the Lord. God is good. God does love me. Come hell or highwater, life or death, He will be there every step of the way.
And when we do that, what’s the promise?
… if you trust in the Lord, you will be safe.
That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.
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