Perfect :Love Casts Out Fear

 

Despite monumental efforts by our government agencies, private enterprise, and especially by our healthcare heroes, the cases increase. Worldwide the death tolls continue to increase and the economic fallout is astronomical..Fear and anxiety abound. We may lose someone we love. You may already have lost someone you love.
How do we trust God with our fears, anxieties, frustrations, and maybe even anger in light of this deadly threat?

As a disciple of Jesus,I believe one answer is to remember that the worst that can happen to us leads to the best that can happen to us. Paul the Apostle was fearless in advancing God’s kingdom because this fact resonated deeply in his soul. He could declare to Christians in Rome, “If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s” (Romans 14:8).

Writing from a Roman prison cell, he could testify to Christians in Philippi, “It is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:20–21). You and I can be as certain of our eternal status as was the great apostle because such status is guaranteed not by us but by our loving heavenly Father.

God loved you and me before we were born, and God will love you and me after we die. In Scripture, God says, ‘I have loved you with an everlasting love.’ This is who you are whether you feel like it or not. You belong to God from eternity to eternity. Life is just a little opportunity for you to return the favor and say, ‘I love you, too.’”

The next time fear of mortality strikes, claim God’s assurance: “I have loved you with an everlasting love” (Jeremiah 31:3). Then substitute your name for “you”: “I have loved Stephen with an everlasting love.”

The Apostle John minded us,”There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear” 1 John 4:18
(NIV)


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