Breaking The Fear CycleSample

A Journey God Understands

My assurance to you begins with this: Jesus is not a liar. If Jesus knew that the command “do not be afraid” was unattainable, he would not have asked us to do it—yet this is exactly what he commanded.

In John 14, Jesus was at the precipice of torture. The night before he died, hours before he was about to sweat blood from anguish, he spoke these words to his disciples: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid” (v. 27, emphasis added). 

Jesus does not give to us as the world gives to us! Not the world that constantly reminds us that we have much to fear. Not the world that teaches us that we are not good enough, we don’t make enough, we are not worth enough, and we can’t control enough. We cannot look to Jesus to solve our fears with percentages, facts, and reassurances. But we can look to him to solve them well. 

Do not let your hearts be troubled. 

My friend, our hearts are troubled, aren’t they? But take it from Jesus. Take it from a man who spoke these very words before he was about to surrender his life for us. Our hearts do not have to stay troubled. 

Do not be afraid.

Can we really not be afraid? I say it can be true. I say through God’s help we can make it true in our lives. Jesus loves us, does not lie to us, and would not call us to something we cannot achieve. 

God has answers for us—good answers, reliable answers—and there is a way to live in peaceful freedom from our fears. It is not an easy journey, but it is a journey in which God draws nearer than he has ever been before. When we turn to him, when we are in the midst of our fears and we still choose to stay put at the foot of the cross until God lifts us up, then we will find the everlasting peace and hope that our souls so desperately desire. 

Do you believe it is possible to live free of fear? Why or why not?