Dealing with Fear

 The title of this post, "Dealing with Fear", does not reflect so much myself dealing with fear, as it reflects GOD dealing with me. I really didn`t think I was a fearful person until this past month when the Lord suddenly revealed it to me. 

The verse He initially used to wake me up to this dark reality in my heart was Habakkuk 3:19: Yahweh my Lord is my strength! He makes my feet like those of a deer and enables me to walk on mountain heights!! To be honest, I didn`t really feel like the Lord was speaking to me personally when Pastor Donny gave a message last month using this verse as the key verse. He talked a lot about fear and how fear keeps us from from being men and women of heights. He talked about how God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of POWER (love, and self-control). The gist of the conclusion was this: although NOT living with a spirit of fear does NOT mean that bad things will never happen, it DOES mean that He will give us the power and tools necessary to live above our circumstances, trusting in Him, even when faced with difficulty. The next day, I was faced by this same verse again while doing my homework for the Prisciller Shirer Bible study I was doing at the time. In her study, Priscilla wrote about the Lord`s divine protection even in the face of danger and difficulty. I immediately got that sense that the Lord was trying to speak to me, but I didn`t really know why. I mean, how often do I hear a same verse from the book of Habakkuk by two different sources two days in a row? I asked Him to examine my heart and show me if I had a spirit of fear in some area of my life. Unlike other times when my areas of struggle pop right out at me, I had to really dig in my heart and pray about this one, and I was amazed when the Lord started to reveal to me that I have been dealing with a spirit of fear as far as Michayla and Marvins`paperwork. It really shouldn`t have come as a surprise. This spirit of fear has been telling me that we are going to have obstacles and things will be difficult. Some of my symptoms have been negativity, procrastination and cringing within when asked about it. I also realized that I have been fearful about raising Michayla in this dark and sinful world. I`m sure this is a common struggle for moms, but I realize that I have a tendency to want to control things in her little life even already, and yes, we SHOULD be careful and take precaution, but I should not be living in fear. 

After sharing this revelation that God had given me to several groups of people and a couple individuals, my fear started to go on a roller coaster ride. As an attempt to organize and put what`s been going on in my heart this month into words, I`m going to try to write a paragraph about each issue separately. 

Paperwork: we had two different contacts that could have possibly helped us get Michayla`s birth certificate fixed fast, but both fell through due to unexpected changes at the registration office. One day I felt the Lord ministering to me during my quiet time though and showing me that JESUS is my FRIEND! He is my CONTACT, the one who allows me to have special favors from the Father! I can ask without fear. John 15:15-16 really ministered to me: "I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn`t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. You didn`t chose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name." I don`t need to put my hope in human "contacts" that can get this done for me faster. I have JESUS, the One who really has it all in His hands, as my intercessor, and my unity with Him allows me to go before the Father with my requests. This was really encouraging to me, and I felt peace! Praise Him!! He will do things in His timing! I have to admit though, that fear is starting to tempt me again as very important reasons to want to travel soon have popped up. I felt peace about not being there with everyone when Grammy died, although I was so sad that Marvin and Michayla didn`t see her in time. To be honest though, I am struggling with peace and surrender now as my babe, Cate, starts to plan for her wedding! My initial reaction was, I HAVE TO GO!! I was willing to even leave Michayla and Marvin for a few days if necessary to be there. As I have started to reflect more though, I am realizing again that God is dealing with me. What I fear has kind of come upon me, and I am desperately in need of surrendering this over to God. He will give me the tools I need to handle the disappointment if I can`t go. As a side note, I am now doing another Bible Study with the ladies called Missing Pieces by Jennifer Rothschild. Today I studied about God`s compassion. Sometimes in our pain, we feel like we can`t see it and we don`t feel like He cares, but His word teaches us that He is more compassionate and loving than even a (good)father and mother. He is providing for us, protecting us and caring for us in ways we don`t always understand. I believe He is good and compassionate. I believe that even if Michayla`s paperwork takes years, He is allowing this to happen and is caring for me by working for my good in this. Obviously I have some big lessons to learn if nothing else. 

Michayla: I have definitely been confronted this past year and a half with an overwhelming realization of what a great responsibility it is to raise a child and how limited we are in our capability to protect her. There are ways we can and should protect her, people we should limit her contact with and supervise her with at all times, environments we should limit her contact with, boundaries we should place, things we should plain just prohibit, but when all of this is said and done, we are still so limited. If we depend on our own strength, I am more than sure that it will fail. All of this to say, when the Lord started to show me my fear, I realized that I have a tendency to be a control freak with her and need to monitor this closely in my life. That same week, a close girl sent me a message asking me to go pray for her because she had been experiencing fear at night and sensing weird things in her room. I went over there prepared with some scripture, and we talked and prayed over her and her room. The irony is that I could have never imagined that less than a week later I would be experiencing great fear at night to the extent of not even wanting to get up to go to the bathroom in the dark! There is no doubt I have been experiencing some dark spiritual attacks. This increased fear started after stumbling upon the blog of a Christian woman who grew up being the victim of a very violent and ritualistic sex trafficking trade in middle-upper class America and now anonymously writes on her blog (anonymous because she still fears for her life) as a way to share her story and allow the Lord to heal her in her process of finally having a voice that was silenced for so long. I have, in the past, felt burdened and extremely grieved for the victims of sexual abuse and horror, but for some reason, it just hit home so much more this time. In the last few years, I have had different close friends share their stories of sexual abuse with me and am very aware of the reality of it happening. Very sadly, the abuser is often a family member or someone very trusted. Since last year, this has been a huge fear for me as far as Michayla as I`ve seen people who are close to me experience it firsthand. I have realized that the main part of my wanting to leave Honduras right now is linked to being fearful in this area for our kids, not that things are any better in the US. I have this deep down fear that some naughty little boy or some trusted friend could hurt her in this way if we take our eyes off of her for even a second. Isn`t that awful? The Lord is confronting me with this fear though and showing me that I CAN`T REALLY PROTECT HER!! My bubble of protection will always be faulty. Only He can! So before I get completely off track, going back to my increase of fear that night. I went through a period of spiritual oppression where I was ridiculously afraid of everything, especially at night. Only Marvin knew I was going through this at that moment, and we spent some good times praying together about this. Things are going better in that area, but I am realizing that my fear hasn`t been that God CAN`T protect her. I know without a doubt that He can! My fear has been that He WON`T. I`m faced with that reality that bad things do happen to godly people and giving that up to the Lord as I think about my kids has been hard. He is speaking to me from all sides though. I am studying Job with Alejandra right now. It wasn`t our plan to study Job next, but the youth at our church are having a Bible challenge this month based on Job, so she needs to study it, and I jumped in with her. On top of studying Job, this new Bible Study, Missing Pieces, is speaking to me too. Yesterday as we watched Jennifer on video at the Bible Study, she talked about the questions we often ask. WHY? Why is this happening to me or to other people? She gave a testimony of a time she was asking this to God, and as she asked Him, she saw a picture of the cross in her mind, and her question changed. Why grace? Why love? That is what I have to cling to-I have to cling to WHO God is. He is worthy. He is holy. He is good. He is sovereign. He is almighty. And I DON`T DESERVE....ANYTHING! I am nothing but a living sacrifice, a humble servant, a redeemed sinner who He has taken and cleaned, forgiven, changed and used. He is my Master, and I take up my cross and follow Him. Please change this sinner`s heart oh Lord! I need You more desperately today that yesterday! 

To sum this all up, the Lord has also spoken to me this month through His Word about my necessity to "put on" what He has given me. I can`t pray for Him to remove fear from me without taking responsibility. He has ALREADY given me a spirit of power, love and self-control, and I am responsible to walk in it. Please be praying for me and my family as we walk out this process together.