Saturday, January 14, 2012

NEARNESS THAT REPELS FEAR!!

Nearness that repels fear!

Verse for Today: Saturday, January 14, 2012

Lamentations 3:57 – You came near when I called You; and You said, “Do not fear.”

Today we are reminded by the Spirit of God that there is always a divine response when we cry unto God. His responses are always comforting and strengthening. He comes to us to dispel our fears and anxieties. He knows why we cry and has an answer to our cries. He gives us His nearness when our hearts are filled with anguish and frustrations. When He comes to us, He handles our most pressing problem of fear in our hearts first and then only moves on to different areas in our situations. He realizes how heavy our hearts are and how deeply we are afraid of our situations. His heart communicates with us in soft and soothing voice to dispel our apprehensions and anxieties. When He tells us not to be afraid, it means that He will handle all aspects of our lives which make us afraid. He guarantees to guard us against all consequences of the events which stand out in our situation to intimidate us. But in order to experience Him in our situations, we must open our eyes of understanding and our inner ears to listen to the voice of the Lord. When He asks us not to be afraid, all we have to do is to submit our hearts and minds to Him to fill us with His peace, power and strength. His presence will destroy all the darts of doubts, confusions and fears the enemy sends out to penetrate our hearts to make us loose confidence in life.

Dear reader, are you going through a time of intimidation from your situations and the people around you to put you in a pit or dungeon of false accusations, misrepresentations, loss or failure? Does the darkness in the pit or dungeon threaten you further and fill your heart with fear and anxiety? It is likely that the enemy comes to tell you that there is no hope for you. But remember, the enemy of your soul is a liar and the father of all lies. He knows fully well that your Lord is with you. So the only thing he can do is to sow the seeds of doubt, fear and anxiety in you and take away your hope and confidence in the Lord. Perhaps it is not beyond reason to expect any deliverance from your present hopeless situation. But when the Lord is in your situations, there is always hope, confidence and peace. Restlessness and sleeplessness will disappear when He is near. His Spirit gives us freedom from all entangling emotions. In Babylon, the Hebrew youth were gripped with the fearlessness from God while they were thrown into the fiery furnace. Daniel was able to weather away all negative emotions of a dark night which he had to spend with hungry lions. Peter enjoyed sound sleep the night before he was expected to face execution because the presence of the Lord was with him. Joseph and Jeremiah experienced the peace which passes understanding in the pit. Paul and Silas had the joy of the Lord in bondage in the dungeon which ended up in singing songs in the night. Today when we cry out of anguish and misery because of our besieging situations, our Lord comes near us to take away our fears and anxieties and fill our hearts with confidence and courage to face our situations. Our Lord is present in our circumstances to straighten out things for us. Others will fail us in our hours of greatest need because they have human limitations, but our Lord has immeasurable resources to meet the challenges of our situations. Let us continue to cry unto Him and hand our fears over to Him to handle so that we can be free and joyful.

Psalms 34:6 – This poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles.

Thought for Today

Just as a father has compassion over a child who cries unto him in dire situations, our Lord shows mercy to us by listening to our cries, coming near to us and driving out all our fears.




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