Devotional: January 2010

Living Life Without Fear (Part 3)

Psalm 34: 1-4:  I will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth.  My soul shall make her boast in the Lord; the humble shall hear thereof, and be glad.  O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together.  I sought the Lord, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears. 

I find holiday shoppers very entertaining.  From sometime a little before or after Thanksgiving until after Christmas, they are in hot pursuit of the perfect gift or sale.  An employee at a local retailer told me that a lady arrived at their store Thanksgiving night around midnight and intended to stay there until opening at 3 AM to be first in line for whatever special deal they were offering.  They camp out at Wal Mart & Best Buy and even take the risk of getting hurt or killed in the stampede all for the purpose of finding the perfect gift or deal.  That’s some serious shoppers!

David had that same kind of tenacity, except he wasn’t a sale-chaser; he was a God-chaser.  His whole life was spent in pursuit of a closer relationship with God.  You can tell that from His writings.  He was constantly talking about how great God is and what a wonderful plan God had for His life.  He was even called a man after God’s own heart.  It’s kind of like those Black Friday shoppers.  They’ve got a goal, a plan and there isn’t a person or thing that is going to stop them from getting to that sale!  That is the intense kind of pursuit that is the essence of the “seeking” found in Psalm 34:4. 

The result of David seeking God in the midst of his fearful situation was that God delivered David from his fears.  Deliverance is a definite possibility for you!  As we begin to seek God, we can enter into His presence.  In His presence, we gain a different perspective.  The situations that once seemed so daunting, now pale in comparison to His amazing plan for us that we couldn’t even catch a glimpse of because our eyes were blinded by fear and anxiety.  We begin to realize that a miracle is not a distant fairy tale but a feasible reality. 

Franklin Delano Roosevelt once said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”  There is a lot of truth to that.  Fear is a controlling enemy.  I played sports in school and have sung all my life.  If I get nervous before a game or concert, my performance is compromised.  There is an actual physical reaction that takes place in us when fear takes over. I think FDR made a pretty accurate analysis.