I am not going to quote verses from the Bible about how important it is for us to trust God. That would take up more time to go through than anyone reading this or watching the video would want to spend.

But what I will do is remind everyone of the last line of Kohelet (Ecclesiastes), which says that fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

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Now, when we use the term “fear of the Lord” it doesn’t mean to be afraid of him, but to honor and worship him. And with proper worship of God comes trust and faith in him: trust that he is in charge and faith that he will care for you so long as you honor and worship him. For the past five millennia, he has proven we can depend on him.

So why is there so much fear in the world? For example, for the past 5 months, people have been frightened to death over a virus that is deadly to a very minuscule percent of the entire population. People are polarized over politics, much more so than usual, and people are afraid to say anything that represents a godly or worshipful attitude for fear of insulting someone else. It isn’t just your opinion is wrong, it has degraded to the point where now if your opinion is different from mine, you don’t have a right to it!

I believe this general feeling of fearfulness is because we have, as a nation, stopped fearing the Lord. With the loss of that fear, we have also lost wisdom, which is why people wear facemasks while alone in their car, why corporations are jumping on the fear bandwagon because they don’t want to appear to be unconcerned. It is like the story of the Emperor’s new clothes, except instead of the Emperor being naked, the little boy points out that the Emperor’s mask is not doing anything.

God has been kicked out of our schools and our courts, and even in our government, which was formed specifically in order to allow us the freedom to worship as we want to.

Fear of the Lord is gone, and we all know the adage “Nature hates a vacuum”, so when fear of the Lord, meaning to trust and have faith in him, is gone, that space is filled with fear, meaning to be afraid, of everything.

People are too fearful, and that fear grows within us. When we add the lack of control and sense of helplessness that is generated by the media reports, designed to infuriate and upset people, we become violent. The racism-based riots we have been suffering with recently, none of which are new or different from the ones in the 1960s, aren’t so much a result of the unfortunate killing of a man, but more so from being the “straw that broke the camel’s back”, i.e. there is so much repressed anger and fear from the pandemic, or I should say media coverage and leadership squabbling over the pandemic, that the white police action causing the death of a black man just caused it all to come out.

That is my opinion, of course, and you don’t have to agree with it, but there is so much repressed anger and a general fearfulness in this country that the people are a powder keg just waiting for a spark to set them off.

We need to remember that God is in charge, and even when bad things are happening, it doesn’t mean he isn’t in charge. It usually means that he is watching and waiting for the right moment to intervene. History shows that often, in truth almost always, it takes a terrible catastrophe to occur before people begin to see they are truly powerless and the only power they can rely on is God’s power to save.

That is the difference between being fearful and being fearless- we are always powerless and when you don’t have God watching your back, that powerlessness is frightening. But, when you know God is on your side, you don’t have to trust in your own power because in our weakness, his strength is made manifest (I can’t take credit for that statement- it was said by that nice, Jewish tentmaker from Tarsus.)

So when you see someone afraid of the pandemic, or the riots, or anything, ask them why they don’t trust in God to watch over them. I’ll bet the most fearful people are the least faithful ones, and the least fearful people are the most faithful.

The way to overcome fear is not trusting in your own strength and trusting in God. He WILL take care of you- you only need to ask him.

Even in the valley of the shadow of death, he is there to protect and care for you.

Thank you for being here and please subscribe and share this ministry with others.  I welcome your comments and want to remind you, again, that you will find comfort through believing God is always watching out for you.

Until next time, L’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!