“Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” — Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
This column is back by popular demand. If you need to save it so that you too can be reminded of the “goodness of the Lord,” do so! What great things could happen in our lives if we would continue to keep these promises today? What is it you have been trying to do and have been praying for?
In the King James Bible, the phrase “fear not” or “Be not afraid” appears 103 times. This command is still valid today. We are charged not to be afraid, and the Scripture below will remind you why we must not be afraid. Fear or trepidation is faith in reverse. Fear opens the door to our enemy.
Look at exactly what God has to say about fear: “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)
God didn’t create us with a “fear gene,” not at all. Fear didn’t even enter the Garden of Eden until sin entered. Fear is from the enemy, pure and simple. The first time we find fear in the Bible is after Adam and Eve ate the fruit they had been commanded not to eat. Suddenly, when they heard God walking through the garden, the God who they had communed with daily before, they hid themselves because they were ashamed and afraid.
When fear is in action, you have decided that you cannot have whatever it is you want; you see the goal going in the other direction. Your goal moves away from you when you are afraid. Fear and faith cannot and will not operate simultaneously. The minute you begin to feel fear, your goal moves backward. That’s your non-belief at work.
When you say you “can’t believe” you got that job, you are offering up negativity, and you may forfeit it. We must practice speaking in the positive rather than the negative.
Another example is when someone is planning an event, and as you’re planning you say something like, “We can’t have an empty room, we’ve really got to get some people out to this event.”
Well, the “empty room” part of your comment will attract exactly what it is you’re saying. If instead you would say, “The room will be filled for this event,” and begin to be thankful for a filled room, then you’re speaking life into your event. You will be speaking from a point of faith rather than fear.
As Proverbs 18:21 says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue.”
When you examine your level of faith, all you need to do is look at your crop and pay close attention to what you’ve been able to produce — which makes you look at who planted the crop, doesn’t it? Now it’s time to look in the mirror. It was you. This is telling it like it is. It’s called “straight talk.”
It’s the truth that tells the mind what is really wrong. It’s not the economy, it’s not the elected officials, it’s not the government — it’s me!
Like the old Negro spiritual says, “It’s me, it’s me, it’s me, oh Lord. Standing in the need of prayer; It’s me, it’s me, it’s me oh Lord. Standing in the need of prayer; Not my mother, not my father; But it’s me, oh Lord; Standing in the need of prayer.”
It’s not what’s happening on the outside that’s the problem, it’s what’s going on within. This is being real. There will be a time when each of you must press toward the mark of the high calling, but as you do so, keep your eyes toward your future; faith is the unseen. Scripture says, “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you can move mountains.” Finally, Mark 11:24 says, “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, and it is the evidence of things not seen.”
Don’t put your faith in reverse. Faith is indeed our GPS where our Lord and Savior will resist those negative things that are happening around us!
Lyndia Grant is a speaker/writer living in the D.C. area. Her radio show, “Think on These Things,” airs Fridays at 6 p.m. on 1340 AM (WYCB), a Radio One station. To reach Grant, visit her website, www.lyndiagrant.com, email lyndiagrantshowdc@gmail.com or call 240-602-6295. Follow her on Twitter @LyndiaGrant and on Facebook.