HOPE TRIUMPHS
WHAT ARE YOU AFRAID OF?
Image credit: LIZA SUMMER on Pexels.
By REVEREND TONY ZEKVELD
People are afraid, genuinely so. They are afraid of the future, afraid of disease, afraid of death. We fear because we feel unsafe and unsure. We feel that there is nothing secure to depend on.
Yet, ironically, what you fear, you end up depending on. Your mind and heart are fixated on that ‘one thing’. We trust what we fear.
One person I know has fear in her eyes, especially when she talks about ‘jadoo’ or black magic. She sees people using ‘black magic’ as a means to control circumstances and situations. She genuinely believes in it and claims people are using it on her, making her child sick or causing someone to hit her car. People know she is afraid of ‘black magic’. They use it to control her and to keep her afraid. She attributes bad things that happen to her to this power. This power controls her life day in and day out.
This is a hard way to live. The Bible says that “fear involves torment”. When fear controls you, you cannot love.
“There is no fear in love because perfect love casts out fear.”
What casts out fear? “Perfect love.” Jesus is perfect love. His love is entirely dependable and trustworthy. He proved it by sacrificing His life on the cross for the sins of all who believe on Him alone for their salvation. Fear is a result of sin, of not trusting in Christ.
Yet through His death on the cross, Jesus destroyed him who had the power of death, that is the devil. He did this to “release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage” (Hebrews 2:14-15). In Christ alone, will we find confidence and security.
By trusting In Jesus, we have no need to fear, not death itself nor the judgment to come. He bore God’s punishment in His death for all who trust in Him; and He gives eternal life.
The ability to live out His love is a sign of our faith in Him. Perfect love casts out fear.
I want to conclude with a very comforting passage for all who trust in Christ: “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, not things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39).
Jesus is the answer to fear!
If you want to talk more, feel free to phone or text Reverend Tony Zekveld (“call me Pastor Tony”) at Hope Centre at 416-740-0543. His email is hopecentre@primus.ca and website: www.hopecentrebrampton.com.