When I was a kid my family and I were visiting a small zoo. At this zoo, they had geese running around freely. I’ll never forget when I saw the geese turn toward me and my brother. He turned and bolted for us. We ran off inside as my dad jumped in front of us to get beaked by the geese, is that what its called? haha Anyway, this small event birthed a very healthy fear of geese in me for the rest of my life.
So you can imagine the fear that swept over me as I was running and happened upon a group of geese on the direct path I was running. They were on the trail and I had two choices: I could turn around and only get a total run of 1 mile or kindly run off the trail around them and get my full 3 miles in for the day. After slowing down significantly I decided I would kindly run around, childhood fear had nothing on my adult God fearing self.
As I ran past I couldn’t help but see the parallel that that moment represented in my own life all too often. Fear tends to paralyze us at times causing us to completely stop or turn around all together. The choice I had to make was between allowing a fear to cripple me another day causing me to only go so far. To run less. OR I could keep pushing forward through the fear and run a longer distance. Run more.
Thats it. Right there. Many times in my life I have chosen less than because of fear. Less of what God has intended for me because of fear. When instead he invites us to push forward, to hand our fears over to Him so we can experience more. More of him. Less of us. More Joy. Less sorrow. More mercy. Less judgment. More humility. Less pride.
I’m not one for resolutions. I believe any day, any hour is as good as any to choose something better. To lay down what we hold onto so that we are no longer allowing it to hold us back. When Fear creeps in it tends to manifest in everyone a bit differently. For me it manifests in control and apathy. Anytime those feelings creep up I know there is a spirit of fear over me that I must lay down and allow to die. When we do that, when we allow our fears to die something big happens. We begin to step in the more God has for us.
Maybe we fear losing our family so we have tried to control them. Maybe we fear failure so instead we’ve stayed put. Maybe we fear judgment so we have retreated into ourselves. Maybe we fear the busyness of the coming season so anxiety has set in. Whatever our fear is and however it has manifested I pray that we can let it go. I pray that we can allow our God to come in and fill us with the spirit he gave us. Which is not a spirit of fear. I pray we can step into the more God has for each of us. Whatever that more may be I pray you know God longs to place it in your hands. He longs for you to experience the joy of His fullness. The fullness in Him that you have when fear no longer has the reigns of your heart.
What are you fearful of? How is it manifesting? Will you lay it down at His feet today? I pray as you begin to answer those questions you know God has his arms open, ready to pour His fullness into you where that fear once lived.
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