Dealing with fear (4)

To enter the Promised Land, the Israelites had to cross the River Jordan at flood stage. Were they afraid? Wouldn’t you be? Nevertheless, the only way to reach their destiny was to do the very thing they feared! When you let fear take hold, you become even more fearful and end up creating a debilitating cycle that works like this: Fear breeds lack of action. Lack of action breeds lack of experience. Lack of experience breeds ignorance. And ignorance breeds fear. It makes you afraid to do the very thing that would be beneficial to you. Taking action means you’ll have to move into the unknown and do the untried—and that can be scary. But if you give in to your fears, you won’t move forward. You don’t receive the benefit of what you avoid, nor do you gain the valuable experience that will make your life better. As a result, you remain ignorant about that area of life, and ignorance always breeds more fear, making it that much harder to push ahead and get things done. Harry Truman remarked, “The worst danger we face is the danger of being paralyzed by doubts and fears. This danger is brought on by those who abandon faith and sneer at hope…by those who spread cynicism and distrust and try to blind us to our great chance to do good for all mankind.” Somebody said fear is the darkroom where all our negatives are developed. It’s interest paid in advance on a debt you may never owe. And it undermines faith—in yourself, in others, and in God.