For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline. (2 Timothy 1:7)
We were rapidly descending through a night of thick fog at 200 miles per hour, but the seasoned pilot of the twin-engine Aero Commander was loving every dip, roll, and lurch. At one point he looked over at me, smiled, and exclaimed, “Hey, Chuck, isn’t this great?” I didn’t answer. As the lonely plane knifed through the overcast pre-dawn sky, I was reviewing every Bible verse I’d ever known and re-confessing every wrong I’d ever done. It was like hurtling 200 miles an hour down the Santa Ana Freeway with a white bedsheet wrapped across the windshield and your radio turned up just beneath the threshold of audible pain.
I couldn’t believe my companion-in-flight. He was whistling and humming like it was all a bike ride through the park. His passenger, however, had ten fingernails imbedded in the cushion. I stared longingly for something, anything, through the blanket of white surrounding us. Our flight record may have indicated two passengers on that eerie Monday morning, but I can vouch for at least three. An unyielding creature called Fear and I shared the same seat.
Drifting in through cracks in the floorboards or filtering down like a chilling mist, the fog called Fear whispers omens of the unknown and the unseen. Surrounding individuals with its blinding, billowy robe, the creature hisses, “What if . . . what if?” One blast of its awful breath transforms saints into atheists, reversing a person’s entire mind-set. Its bite releases a paralyzing venom in its victim, and it isn’t long before doubt begins to dull the vision. To one who falls prey to this attack, the creature displays no mercy. As we fall, it steps on our face with the weight of a Sherman tank . . . and laughs at our crippled condition as it prepares for another assault.
Fear. Ever met this beast? Sure you have. It creeps into your cockpit by a dozen different doors. Fear of failure. Fear of heights. Fear of crowds. Fear of disease. Fear of rejection. Fear of unemployment. Fear of what others are saying about you. Fear of moving away. Fear of height or depth or distance or death. Fear of being yourself. Fear of buying. Fear of selling. Fear of financial reversal. Fear of war. Fear of the dark. Fear of being alone.
Lurking in the shadows around every imaginable corner, it threatens to poison your inner peace and outward poise. Bully that it is, the creature relies on scare tactics and surprise attacks. It watches for your vulnerable moment, then picks the lock that safeguards your security. Once inside, it strikes quickly to transform spiritual muscle into mental mush. The prognosis for recovery is neither bright nor cheery.
PRAYER
Glory be to the God, as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, a world without end. Amen.
