You Can Overcome Fear!
Our world is filled with horrifying problems, and many people are experiencing depression and discouragement. More and more are suicidal, especially in the Western world. Even the foreign policy of America and other nations has become very timid and fearful. What is wrong here?
Consider this profound observation from British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden in 1938 in the lead-up to the Second World War. “Hatred of war is good. It is sane and it is healthy,” he said. “But fear of war is not so good, for fear of war paralyzes the will, and no policy that is based upon fear, no policy which makes an appeal to fear, can be a policy that this country should follow.”
That is true, and what is happening in our nations today proves it! Fear paralyzes willpower and motivation, which prevents you from making hard decisions and doing great deeds.
The Prophet Isaiah pinpointed a crucial reason that few people see. He gave this prophecy about our nations today: “Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the Lord hath spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider” (Isaiah 1:2-3). This is correction from God for the end-time nations of Israel—especially the United States and Britain. And here He pinpoints the problem: “Ah sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that are corrupters: they have forsaken the Lord, they have provoked the Holy One of Israel unto anger, they are gone away backward. Why should ye be stricken any more? Ye will revolt more and more: the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint” (verse 5).
“The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint” means we are paralyzed with fear. This is a deadly destructive problem—whether to a nation or an individual.
Winston Churchill faced a time of crisis before World War ii, a time when men were faint. He said, “If you tell me that our party is definitely committed to the easygoing life, to the surrender of our possessions and interests for the sake of quietness, to putting off the evil day at all costs, and that they will go along with Chamberlain into what must inevitably be a state of subservience, if not indeed actual vassalage to Germany, and that you can do nothing to arrest this fatal tide, then I think the knowledge would simplify my course.”
Churchill used his political career to fight that faintness and to strengthen his nation for war against German tyranny.
Nations always must be ready for war if they are to survive. That’s the way the world is. It is a deadly fantasy to think otherwise.
The same principle is true spiritually: God repeatedly refers to His people as spiritual soldiers, waging spiritual war (e.g. 2 Corinthians 10:3-5; Ephesians 6:11-15).
Most people don’t understand that this world is in the midst of a spiritual war. That spiritual dimension is causing the disturbing, violent events we see around us. Scripture shows that the vast majority of people are deceived—and without realizing it, are actually fighting on Satan’s side!
But when you believe what God says in the Bible, you can not only be on the right side, but also gain incredible spiritual strength. In 2 Timothy 1:6-7, the Apostle Paul says that the Holy Spirit, which God puts within true Christians, is not “the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”
How desperately we need that Holy Spirit of power!
Without that Spirit, we are not complete. We don’t have power or godly love, and we don’t have a sound mind! When you look at leaders in this world, it is becoming more and more obvious that they lack that spirit and that sound mind.
God will give it to us if we do our part. This is how He wants us to live without fear! If we have a faint heart, we will be nervous wrecks, afraid of everything. The Creator of everything wants us to purge that fear and let Him give us His awesome power—and His love, and a sound mind.
To overcome fear, you have to realize that you are in a spiritual war, and become part of God’s army—and you have to fight.
You can be strong—not faint of heart, not fearful or indecisive, not having your willpower paralyzed. That is something worth fighting for!
“Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier” (2 Timothy 2:3-4).
Here God tells us how to become a fearless soldier. It has to do with coming out of this deceived world.
Many people think they have God’s Holy Spirit, but they do not. We offer a free Bible correspondence course that will teach you in detail how to prove whether you have that Spirit—the Spirit of power and love and a sound mind—and, if you don’t have it, how to get it! (Enrolling in the Herbert W. Armstrong Bible Correspondence Course is absolutely free. See the back cover of this magazine for details.)
Isn’t it worth putting forth effort like a soldier to get rid of a faint heart and the fears that so many people have? Doing so will change your life!
