We can do what God has called us to do – sometimes we just have to do it afraid.
I have lived the vast majority of my life afraid. I have also lived the vast majority of my life not doing what God has called me to do.
How did that happen, and how did I not see it?! (and then I wonder why God needed to be as dramatic as he was with getting my attention… Geesh)!
I was afraid I was never good enough, successful enough, pretty enough. You name it and I was worried about it. My mom always used to warn me not to “borrow trouble” but boy did I not follow that advice one bit!
And guess what – of all the things that I was afraid of – it never occurred to me to be afraid that my mom would die or my husband would betray me. Never! I never lost sleep about those things, but I sure did stay awake at night worried about how we were going to afford the fancy new car we HAD to have and I avoided taking risks or following my passions because I was afraid to fail.
So now that the bad stuff has ACTUALLY happened and I never once placed any fear in those things, I’ve realized that having fear is completely useless… and whatever God wants from me, it’s all going to happen whether I worry about it or not and either way, I can totally deal with it.
What’s the point of being afraid anyway? Fear is not an emotion from God. It’s also just useless! It can’t change anything. Yes ok, fear is helpful when a bear is attacking you, but aside from .01% extreme survival situations, it’s completely pointless (other than robbing us of happiness, enjoying life & staying hopeful).
I am not naive though – I get it. We are human (therefore flawed and easily pulled off track) and it IS hard to ignore the fear feeling when it starts to show its ugly slimy self. So sometimes we just have to do the thing afraid!
There are things that I know God wants from me that are quite frankly NOT anything that I want to do – blogging and social media being two of the biggest – and yet, here I am. I’m afraid of what people will think of me. I’m afraid of failing. I’m afraid of having all the ugly parts of my life exposed. And I’m doing it anyway. Im doing it afraid. I have spent too much time being afraid of things that were pointless, I don’t want to listen to the fear anymore. I refuse to let it win.
My prayer for you today is that you see that fear in your life for what it is – powerless! Our God is bigger, stronger, Almighty! Nothing is greater than our God, and if He has put something in your heart to pursue, you better believe He will see it come to fruition! God has a plan for you. Your life has a beautifully designed purpose, but unfortunately, it might require you to be uncomfortable in order to achieve that magnificent purpose. But I pray that you do it anyway. I pray that you let God win. I pray this for myself and I also pray that one day, I don’t even have to pray for this anymore – it will just be what we do. We just do it.
XO
Tay
*Please note that I am talking about the manufactured fears that we place on things. I am not talking about panic attacks, anxiety or depression. Those things might be helped when you give your fears over to Jesus, but please get additional help & support if you are suffering from any of these things. You better believe this girl has a script for the really rough stuff.
