What controls the decisions you make?
Do you make your decisions based on the way you’ve been treated in the past? If you do, your past controls you, and you may be reacting to things in your life instead of acting.
Do you make your decisions based on the Word of God, or does something else come between you and God? Even if you make your decisions based on God’s Word, do you agree with those decisions or are you harboring ill feelings?
Do you let other folks sow thoughts into your mind? A spirit of malcontent, a spirit of complaining, or even a spirit of violence can be somewhat contagious. If you have ever noticed how someone can come into the room and cause everyone else to be in a bad mood, you know what I’m talking about.
Before you act on what you see or hear, spend some time in prayer. People who prey upon your fears can easily color your thinking. They can use your fears against you.
Before you say you have no fears, let’s think about the different types of fear. There’s rational fear. You would not step out in front of a car for fear of being hit. Then, there’s fear of the unknown. People don’t like change because of the unknown. Fear of success or failure is ultimately fear of the unknown.
Promises can be used to control you too. Companies and organizations use promises of something better in advertisements. Politicians use promises when they are campaigning.
Some people and some governments use a combination of fear and promises to control people. Ideas like Nazism use fear to drive the listeners to a promise of something better. If you are fearful of being discriminated against because you are white, black, Asian, Christian, Muslim, Jewish, male, female, young, old, etc…, you can be persuaded to take actions that you may not otherwise take. If you are afraid of one or more of those groups, you will also take actions that you may not otherwise take. All for the promises of something better. In Germany, the promise was a better economy. The problem was said to be the Jews and the Communists.
For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
2 Timothy 1:7
If we are going to survive as a nation, we are all going to have to work for a better America. We need to be led by a spirit of power, of love, and of a sound mind. Those are directly opposite of a spirit of fear.
Fear is faithlessness. The gap between the things you can control and the things you cannot is filled with either faith or fear. What will you fill the gap with? Will you fill it with fear or with faith in God?
LIFE APPLICATION
Today’s challenge is to get real with yourself. Pray about the fears you have. Pray about any hatred you harbor toward your neighbor. Realize that sometimes that hatred comes from fear of the unknown.
And the apostles said unto the Lord, Increase our faith.
Luke 17:5
Ask God to give you more faith in Him, and to enable you to love your neighbor.