Although We Know There's Much to Fear

Has anyone watched the news lately?
If you have, odds are pretty good you've seen something scary, tragic, or hopeless.

Sometimes I just think about the world we're living in.
There are people who think it's okay to hurt other people to get what they want.
There are people who try to inspire fear of other people.
There are people who lie and cheat and steal.
There are people who do terrible things, even taking the lives of others.
There is prejudice and greed and violence and danger.

It can be overwhelming sometimes.

When it gets to be too much, I try to remind myself of a couple of things:

1) There is just as much good in this world as there is bad,
if not more.

When it seems like the only thing to see is the darkness, open your eyes.
Choose to see the good in the world around you.
Remind yourself that this is a world that contains:

Fields of wildflowers
Belly laughs
Crazy patterned socks
Ice cream
Stained glass windows
Disney songs
Sunsets
Nail polish
Birdsong
Glitter
Violin solos
80-year-old couples
Charities
Hot chocolate

and countless other little joys and daily miracles.

Notice the good that influences your world, and use the good inside of you to influence others.

2) Fear is the opposite of faith, and both are a choice.

Yes, there are lots of things to be afraid of. No, being afraid doesn't make you a sinner. But you can choose to have faith, to believe in good things to come, You can choose to pray and believe you will be heard. You can choose to have faith that even the scary parts of this life are part of God's plan.

Or you can choose to give in to the darkness around you. You can choose to live your life looking over your shoulder. You can choose to focus on all of the things going wrong and buy into the lie that your future will consist of that and worse.


The movie The Prince of Egypt is one of my favorites, mainly because of the incredible music. There is one song that really hit home for me this week as I was listening to the soundtrack, and that is what inspired this post.

In "When You Believe," all of the lyrics touch on this subject perfectly, but I want to focus on one line in particular:

"We are not afraid, although we know there's much to fear."

Life is never going to stop throwing curveballs, disasters, and hellfire in your direction, but it won't stop throwing you miracles, friends, and opportunities either. The world will get darker in some places, but it will get lighter in others.

You can choose to move forward with faith,
to pick yourself off the ground when you get knocked down,
to hum a faith-filled song to drown out the threats thrown at you.

You can choose to not be afraid.