Faith Over Fear
Faith equips you. It allows you to consider what your flesh, on its own, won’t consider. It helps you receive more, even when you can’t see more. It enables you to think and imagine in ways your flesh won’t allow. Faith allows you to have peace while looking at “risk” or the unknown, because you're trusting that God has you.
I went to an event with a good friend of mine recently, and I knew nothing about it beyond the email they sent when I RSVP’d and a few Google searches I did the day before. When I arrived, there was a meeting with a bunch of company representatives and a chief of whatever. I found myself in the room with them and my friend as they discussed a problem they were having with communicating and planning together. As I listened, my friend started describing a solution that could help them immensely. The solution had a lot to do with AI; something most people nowadays see as “risk” because it’s so new and they know little about it. As my friend explained it (and it was the spitting answer to the problems they were having), I could see the expressions on the faces of those in the meeting. One representative responded, “That's a great idea, but one thing that I'm mainly focused on is how we would get the funding for something like this?” And my friend immediately said, “Why did your mind go directly to money?”
As I sat and witnessed this back-and-forth between my friend and a few of the representatives, I realized something about what my own response to my friend’s proposition would have been, had I been in their position. In that moment, I understood what my friend was offering. It wasn’t a random idea that might help; it was a different lens for viewing growth in their positions; not growth as climbing the company ladder, but growth in what they could do right where they were to become more unified.
I saw how these representatives wouldn’t even give the idea the time of day because they couldn’t fathom how they would bring it about. In reality, this meeting wasn’t about finishing or manifesting the idea right in front of them; it was about opening their eyes to the possibilities before them. But what kept them, and what would keep them stuck in their problems, was fear: fear about money, fear about “keeping the lights on” (another response), or fear of losing their jobs by pursuing something completely unknown, which at this stage was simply an idea. They didn’t want to talk about it further because they didn’t believe it was even a possibility, because of their fears. Even the process of brainstorming seemed to intimidate them, because of their fears. The thought of this made one person say, “If you told me that this meeting would be about brainstorming something like this, which I like, I wouldn’t have even come”… but you’re currently in a meeting, where these things are being discussed. And you want to disassociate yourself from it, all because of fear.
This made me think about walking with God and our spiritual journeys. There are certain things we won’t consider, or believe are possible, because of our fears.
When I think about this from a spiritual lens, I think about how your fears are based around your flesh or based in your own way of thinking outside of God. Those fears keep you from all of the possibilities of God; they keep you from a life in God. I think about how fear keeps you from experiencing the things that God wants you to experience. You won't even consider a word from God if that word made you feel uncomfortable, or if you couldn't see the outcome of that word. And so, you discard it or you just don’t consider it. Faith feels scary for people because they can't see the outcome. Funny enough, even in their own logic, understanding, and decision-making, they can't see the outcome there either. But here’s the thing about faith: faith requires you to trust something outside of yourself, and that is scary to people. Having to trust a word that you did not curate makes you feel uncomfortable, and that uncomfortability is what you run from. That's why you run from God. His words require you to trust Him. And if you don't trust Him, you won't move. You won't consider what He's saying because you don't trust it. And you don't trust it because you're leaning too much on your own understanding and ability to understand.
The beautiful thing about walking with God is that you don’t have to understand everything to move. God repeatedly tells us to trust Him, and that we can trust Him (Numbers 29:19 & Psalm 33:4). He says He has us, He’s with us, and He will help us; He says these things again and again (Isaiah 41:10, Isaiah 43:1-7, 10-11). And when He speaks a word, that is our opportunity to learn.
God loved us first; He spoke first. He told us the greatest thing we could possibly do and experience: to be fruitful, multiply, replenish, subdue, and have dominion (Genesis 1:28). And all of these things are good because they come from God, who is good (Luke 18:19). Only good can come from Him.
God telling us this, is love. And the best thing we can do is love Him back by obeying His word (John 14:15). In this exchange, there is relationship. And because there is relationship, it allows us to become more and more familiar with who God is. And why is this so important? Because knowing God is eternal life (John 17:3). It’s the very thing He sent Jesus for (John 3:16).
So when He speaks a word, that is our opportunity to live. You will not die. Surely, if you just obeyed, you are not in harms way. But, you have to trust this. And if you don't trust this now, that's fine. The way forward for you is trying this out. The best way for you to grow your trust in God, is to see if He will really have you. And you see this by trying and testing His word out. This is what He wants you to do. Not sitting behind your fears saying, “I don't know how this will end”, but truly trusting that God will have you. Even your first step in simply trying His word out is a trust/faith move. Because how could you know God without ever experiencing Him or learning of Him? You can’t. How could you have a relationship with God just off of the fact that you are human? You've never seen it before and you're not special like that, so it's not just “going to happen”. He knows you don't know Him, so the first thing that you should do is test His word out because that is the first step in you trying to get to know Him… and trusting Him.
Why am I saying this?
Faith is unknown to you, and that's understandable. But just because faith is unknown, it doesn't mean that it has to be scary; it's just unknown. And the best thing you could do with something that is unknown, is to learn it. And to learn, you must decide to move.
Your fears keep you from moving. Relying on your own ability to understand something is what hinders you; that is your bottleneck. When I was in that meeting, that was their bottleneck. Because the answer came with a lot of unknown parts, they resorted to looking at the future in a way that was familiar to them: through the lens of their fears. They don't look at the unknown as something that they can conquer, they just want to survive it. Each and every single one of us are more than conquerors, if we decide to be. And we decide to be more than conquerors when we decide to move in what God is asking us to do. Hiding behind your fears; you're not conquering anything. You're just hiding, and you'll never grow. You'll never become new. Insanity is thinking that you could stay fearful and become new at the same time. You can't. So decide, what will you decide to do?
The reason why I said that faith equips you at the top of this, was because as I sat in that room with those people, I saw the difference between me and them. No arrogance attached. I saw that if I was in their shoes, like me, Marcus, then I would have considered the possible solution that was presented to me (not just because it was my friend’s idea, but it was a potential way forward that I was not familiar with), and I would have taken a step towards growth. Whether that was towards the idea, or just having a better understanding of a way forward, I would be moving towards growth; more understanding that I didn’t have before. All because I do not lean on my own understanding, nor do I want to listen to my fears. I point them out, and I try with everything in me to not conform to them. Even when I have no idea of what's in front of me, or what’s ahead of me, I trust that God has me regardless. So I can consider things even when I don't know how they will come about or what I would even start to do towards them. All because my own understanding isn't my backbone, God is.
