Christian Living
What is fear keeping you from today? Is there something that you are aspiring to accomplish, but rather allowing fear to hold you back? Fear interrupts the ability to have faith operate in your life. Fear is a twin of doubt and the enemy to your faith. Fear and doubt keeps you from walking in faith. It's a negative cycle that prevents you from receiving answered prayers and robs you from enjoying an abundant life. Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see (Hebrews 11:1, NLT).
Many times our prayers go unanswered because we have allowed fear to enter our hearts. You cannot have both fear and faith operating at the same time. That is called being doubled minded. A double-minded man should not expect to receive anything from God according to James. You are either walking in faith or in fear. Sometimes we think it's noble to have fear towards something otherwise we come across as though we are careless. Contrary, fear is an enemy that traps people in and keeps them from seeing the wonderful working power of God.
I love what the Amplified Bible says in 2 Timothy 1:7, "For God did not give us a spirit of timidity (of cowardice, of craven and cringing and fawning fear), but [He has given us a spirit] of power and of love and of calm and well-balanced mind..." You have to understand fear didn't originate from God. We know that God is love; therefore, He has no fear to give.
Fear will prevent you of enjoying the good life. People are paralyzed from moving forward by all sorts of fear. It could be anything, from fear of relationships, stepping out into new territory, fear of confrontation, fear of illness or fear of not having enough, and the list can go on and on. If you have ever read the story of Job, talk about tragedy! Job recognized early on that his fears caused some of the negative outcomes in his life. He says, "What I always feared has happened to me. What I dreaded has come true." (Job 3:25, NLT).
When I decided to step out and launch my website, Beauty Secrets Spirit Soul & Body, it seemed like all sorts of fear entered my mind. My greatest fear was of rejection by health experts who would decline to partner with me. I wrote letters to several doctors and health experts and shared my vision with them for Beauty Secrets. I had thoughts like, "Your emails will get lost in cyberspace, they'll never have time, they won't reply..." I realized that if I was going to pursue my passion, I was going to have to resist fear and have faith.
I knew fear was the enemy of faith in my life. If I was going to see this project come to fruition, I had to trust God and be confident that my faith was going determine whether or not I would see the outcome I was believing for. Whenever thoughts of "fear" crept into my mind; I would refuse to entertain them and began to turn my focus instead on faith-filled thoughts.
I saw faith manifested through out the project. I received such favor with the web designer, computer programmer, and even the photographer who all supported my project and worked hard to ensure I received everything I envisioned the website to be. Not only did I receive responses from health experts and doctors from all over the country and around the world, but I even had some divine meetings with some of my favorite doctors.
In fact, one doctor did reject my request to publish his health articles due to his demanding schedule but graciously wished me luck. I was disappointed to say the least, but I didn't give up. I had a few months before the website launched and something inside of me- "faith" caused me to keep on believing. I really had my heart set on this particular doctor that I had been following for years who has made an impact on my family's health. What happened next was a miraculous intervention.
A month later this doctor was scheduled as a guest speaker at my church and to shoot a television show with my Pastor on "Stress". An associate Pastor approached me a few days prior to his visit and asked me if my husband and I could pick up this doctor and his wife from the airport, and drive them back and forth from the church and hotel while they were our guests for a couple of days. I was thrilled and couldn't even express how excited I was for the opportunity. We picked him and his wife up and immediately we all connected and had great conversations on health related issues of course. I hesitated to share the rejection letter with him. I didn't want it to be an awkward moment, and thought at some point, I would bring it up if it was appropriate. After all, we were going to be driving them back and forth from the church to their hotel for the next two days.
It wasn't until we took them back to the airport right when arrived at O'Hare that I had the opportunity to bring up the rejection letter. It was in our final moments together that a conversation sparked the subject, and when I told him about the letter that he rejected, we laughed as he and his wife stepped out of our vehicle, gave hugs and said farewell- I was granted full permission to use any and all of his health publications on my website. That was a divine moment! Fear, the enemy of faith has no victory in your life when you make a decision walk in faith. "Nothing is impossible with God." (Luke 1:37)
"You block your dream when you allow your fear to grow bigger than your faith." ~Mary Manin Morrissey
Duong Sheahan is the Founder of Beauty Secrets Spirit Soul & Body; a health and wellness website empowering women to achieve optimal health. http://www.beautysecretsspiritsoulbody.com
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