Through The Fears

So the men…hurried down to Egypt and presented themselves to Joseph. When Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he said to the steward of his house, "Take these men to my house, slaughter an animal and prepare dinner; they are to eat with me at noon." The man did as Joseph told him and took the men to Joseph's house. Now the men were frightened when they were taken to his house …So they went up to Joseph's steward and spoke to him at the entrance to the house. "Please, sir," they said, "we came down here the first time to buy food. But at the place where we stopped for the night we opened our sacks and each of us found his silver—the exact weight—in the mouth of his sack. So we have brought it back with us. We have also brought additional silver with us to buy food. We don't know who put our silver in our sacks." "It's all right," he said. "Don't be afraid. Your God, the God of your father, has given you treasure in your sacks; I received your silver." Then he brought Simeon out to them. (Genesis 43:15-23)

Fear is the devil’s greatest weapon. Fear steals, stunts and stalls a man. Fear can paralyze, pain and pummel. Fear works like a cancer. First it attaches, and then attacks and finally, it assassinates. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s historic words were right: “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.” I heard a friend describe fear with the acronym: “false expectations appearing real.”

So what are you afraid of? What worries you? What terrifies you? Phobias are funny things. One man’s anxiety is another man’s ardor. Many fear the dark (achluophobia) or even going to bed (clinophobia). Others panic at clowns (coulrophobia), dentists (dentophobia), work (ergophobia) and needles (aichmophobia). Some might think I have a fear of hair (chaetophobia) given my bald noggin though I’m really gripped by melissophobia (the fear of bees). Would you believe there’s even a fear of church (ecclesiophobia), probably driven by homilophobia (fear of sermons) or hamartophobia (fear of sinning)? And we mustn’t forget hippopotomonstrosequippedaliophobia: the fear of really long words!

One of my favorites is euphobia or the fear of good news. Maybe that’s the terror Joseph’s siblings felt when they trekked back to Egypt to replenish the family's dwindling food supplies. It had already been a surreal experience. Joseph initially jailed them and then released all the brothers but Simeon. The silver somehow stayed in their sacks and their first trip was miraculously fully financed. Now they’re back in Egypt and immediately slapped with a lunch invitation at Joseph’s private villa. Every time they turned around something good was happening. It was too good. Too good to be true.

You have to imagine, as the aroma of barbeque tempted their tastebuds, how easily fears shifted into overdrive. They don’t belong in this situation (foreign rednecks in a blue blood mansion?). They don’t know this man (could be a trap?). They don’t deserve filet mignon (poison? a final meal?). They just want to rescue their brother (without losing Benjamin), pick up the groceries and beat it for home. Even when they try to explain the “silver situation” they learn the steward wasn’t angry. He was paid in full. This is weird. Too wierd.

For most of us, our lives are marked by the fears that control us. We fear the big stuff, like death (thanatophobia) or disease (pathophobia). We’re afraid of failure (atychiphobia) or flying (aviophobia). We fret about wrinkles (rhytiphobia), weight (obesophobia) or waiting (macrophobia). We’re anxious about strangers (xenophia), speaking (glossophobia) or spiders (arachnophobia). You name it and we can fear it.

So what are you afraid of? What’s holding you back from experiencing the best parts of life? You can’t explore the world if you’re afraid to leave the backyard. You can’t live your dreams if you’re locked inside your nightmares. You can’t move forward if you’re anchored by anxiety.

If you seek a mantra to overcome any fear try this one: With God’s help, I can handle it. With God all things are possible (Matthew 19:26). I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me (Philippians 4:13). We have not been given a spirit of fear or timidity (Romans 8:15), but of power and strength (2 Timothy 1:7). Fears thrive in the future because they've already camped in our past. The reason they riddle, rock and ruin our lives is we can’t touch them nor change what happened. Fears fly elusively beyond this moment to make us look back. However, the present has no room for fear. It is what it is. So the simple mantra “With God’s help, I can handle this” is all we need.

It’s all we’ll ever need. Fear is a vapor that rises from yesterday’s failure, faults and faux paux. This moment is reality. Embrace it and enjoy it. It’s all you really have.


NOTABLE QUOTABLES ON FEAR:

"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself - nameless, unreasoning, unjustified, terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance." (Franklin D. Roosevelt)

"What we fear comes to pass more speedily than what we hope." (Publilius Syrus)

"All of us are born with a set of instinctive fears--of falling, of the dark, of lobsters, of falling on lobsters in the dark, or speaking before a Rotary Club, and of the words "Some Assembly Required." (Dave Barry)

"Why are we scared to die? Do any of us remember being scared when we were born?" (Trevor Kay)

Father, I am a man filled with fear. I am afraid of rejection and reproof, failure and the future. My life is sometimes gripped by what I cannot change nor alter. I can’t go back and my fear keeps me from going forward. So I simply ask for Courage to survive this moment. Grant me Your Wisdom to simply accept this day and whatever happens. I can handle whatever life throws at me if it is You that helps my cause. Amen.