Cure For Fear

The cure for fear is the presence of a Person: against unknown fears, deliberate attacks against you, and diseases.


Scripture: Psalm 91:5-6

Transcript

Alright. Thank you very much. And hello, again, dear radio friends. I use those words advisedly; you are dear to me. Some of you I shall never see until we get to glory. Others of you I’ve known for many years. But I want you to know that God has fastened you securely into my heart. The heart strings as we call them are tied together in a Calvary knot. The love of God shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost who is given unto you. Yes, you’re dear to me; that’s not just talk. You care about this ministry and I care about you, even though we’ve never met. It’s part of the miracle of what we call Christian fellowship; Greek word koinonia, sharing of the very presence and power of the risen Christ. Thank God for it. I’m glad it’s true. Aren’t you?

We’ve been looking at the 91st Psalm. You wanna go on with me and look at some of those verses? We finished verse four, “His truth shall be thy shield and buckler.” Your shield and your bulletproof vest is the truth of God; all you have to do is proclaim it and live it. If you don’t live it, your proclamation isn’t gonna mean much.

Now he says, “Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night, nor for the arrow that flieth by day, nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness, nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday. Here you have it; terror, arrow, pestilence, destruction. This covers the areas of human fear. Has it ever occurred to you that all the different kinds of fear are met by trust in God. It certainly is a fact that you don’t stop being afraid just because somebody tells you not to. When I was a little boy, I was afraid of the dark. And someone in whose home I would be staying, most often it might be my uncle, Frank Setzler, would come stomping up the stairs having heard this whimpering little boy up there in the dark, fling open the door of the bedroom in that farmhouse home and say, “What’s the matter with you, boy? You shouldn’t be afraid. You’re a big boy. Now go to sleep, don’t be afraid.” Slam! And the door would close and he would go downstairs. You know, that just blessed me to death. No, it didn’t make me stop being afraid at all. You don’t cure fear by a lecture. You only cure fear by a person, when somebody’s with you that can handle the situation. Then you don’t have to be afraid.

Would you stop to realize, Beloved, that God is the personal cure for all kinds of fear. Well, what kind of fear? There’s the fear of the unknown, terror by night. You go to bed and you think, “Are all the windows secured? Are all the doors locked? What if somebody breaks in? What if there’s a fire? What if something happens in the wiring and there’s an electrical fire? Did I turn off the oven?” What if and what if? And then there’s a bad storm rumbling outside, and you think, “What if there’s a tornado?” And the wind blows so fiercely that it rattles the windows and shakes the house. And now and again, as it happens… We live up at quite an altitude. I think it may be 1,250 or more feet above sea level. We are about halfway as high as the Camelback Mountain that the skiers use. We can see it out our windows, see them coming down, in the wintertime, coming down to break their legs and their ankles. [chuckle] Oh, dear. I have to say I’ve never learned to ski because it seems to me so frustrating to get on two pieces of wood and start down an incline with the sure knowledge that you’re either gonna fall down or hit something. [laughter] Well, I’m just kidding. Some of you skiers are positively beautiful the way you slalom down the hills.

But anyhow, we are high enough up that we have a little altitude where we live, and I’m glad the air is clear and good, and I enjoy it. But, by the same token, when there’s a storm, you’re high enough up so that you’re closer to the electrical discharges that cause the thunder. And do you know something? When there’s a bad thunderstorm and the lightning hits somewhere near, the thunder is loud enough to make the pictures on our walls jiggle and get skewed, so we have to go around and straighten them all. Actually, the house actually shakes with some of those thunderclaps. Well, you get used to it after awhile, and you know that’s what it is. We’re talking about terror in the night. What if somebody breaks in? What if there’s a burglar? What if there’s a criminal out there? You’ve heard on the radio or the TV that there’s an escaped convict in the area. What if he chooses your house to break into and to hold you hostage? And you don’t feel well, and your heart is beating erratically, and skips a beat now and again. And you think, “What if I have a heart attack?” What if, and what if, and what if… The terror by night. Yes, we’ve gone through it, you and I, haven’t we? What do you do about that?

Well, the Bible says, “I will both lay me down in peace and sleep, for Thou, Lord, only makest me to dwell in safety.” From somewhere, I got a sweet little story about two children who had been put to bed, and it was dark, and they were discussing all the different things that might happen. A little boy and his sister, who was maybe two years older than he, let’s say they were about maybe three and five or something like that. And they were sharing the same bedroom and talking across the room, each from his or her bed. And so finally the little boy said, “I’m scared.” And he said, “What about the lions?” His imagination was working, and he thought there might be some lions around. “What about the lions?” And from across the room, his sister’s voice came in that clear childish treble, “What about God?” “Oh, that does it.” “What about the lions?” “No, what about God?” For Thou, Lord, only makest me to dwell in safety.

Do you have some unnamed fear in your heart? Many of us do from time to time. You think as the years go by, “What if I have a stroke and I linger for months or even years, unable to move, and I’m a burden on my loved ones and all that? What if I have a heart attack?” What if, and what if, and what if? Unnamed, faceless terror. What do you do about it? Fight it? No, just turn it over to your blessed Lord. “Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night. Nor,” He says, “for the arrow that flieth by day.” Here is deliberate attack, arrows are shot at a target. And here is deliberate attack, you don’t have to be afraid of deliberate attack by somebody else. Aren’t you glad that’s so? It does seem as though there are people in the world that don’t realize that you and I are as nice as we really are. [chuckle] I’m always surprised when somebody attacks me, because I’m such a nice guy. [laughter] Yeah.

The arrow that flieth by day. Deliberate attack, yes, it does happen. I had a man say to me years ago, “I’m gonna get your job,” and he went to work at it. [chuckle] Well, he didn’t get it. [chuckle] God took care of me; I’m His boy. But it does happen. And always we think, “Oh, what I’m gonna do now?” Listen friend, thou shall not be afraid for the arrow that flieth by day. Suppose there is a deliberate attack made upon you by somebody, what then? Just trust your blessed Lord. Just specialize in obeying Him, “He that dwelleth in the secret place shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. Under His wings shall thou trust. Thou shalt not be afraid.” Specialize in obeying God. Let Him handle the arrows. Oh that’s a precious truth, isn’t it? Then He says you won’t be afraid for the pestilence, pestilence that walketh in darkness. Disease comes, what about it? The pestilence that walketh in darkness. Disease. What if I contract some great disease? What if cancer hits me? What if diabetes hits me? What if I succumb to high blood pressure? What if I have a heart attack? What if arthritis cripples me so that I’m all crippled up in bed and can’t move a muscle? What if? Disease.

Now, this is a very real thing and I’m talking to some people who already have become the victims of some illness or other, and you’re anchored, aren’t you? You’re there, maybe in a nursing home, or in your own home as other loved ones are caring for you. And here’s this man Cook, and he’s still able to get around, and he’s feeling fine, and he has the nerve to say to you, “You don’t have to be afraid of disease.” And you say to yourself, “Cook doesn’t know how I feel. He doesn’t know how I hurt. How can he say that? He doesn’t know what I’m up against.” I realize that, Beloved. And it’s true, I can’t feel exactly what you feel because I don’t live inside your skin. And some of you dear ones who are listening have a rough time of it, and you’re hurting this very moment. And if it weren’t for the merciful administration of Percodan or something else to keep the pain level down, you’d be climbing the walls. I know that. And my heart goes out to you. Now then, if that be so, and it is so with you, how do you reconcile this? “Thou shall not be afraid for the pestilence that walketh in darkness,” the diseases that hit us.

Well, I have to point out something, and you may not agree with me, but He says, “You won’t afraid.” It doesn’t say, “You won’t hurt.” He says, “You won’t be afraid.” And God either will remove the burden from my back or strengthen my back so I can bare it. He says, “Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me, for My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” Yes, there are things that we have to go through. Sorrows hit us and we cry. Sorrow and heartbreak is real, just because you’re a Christian doesn’t mean you’re not gonna cry when somebody is taken from you. Yes, illnesses come to us. I believe in divine healing. I have prayed for people and seen them healed. I’ve also prayed for people and they died. So I believe in divine healing at the command of the Almighty. We leave the outcome of the prayer to the God who hath done all things well. If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Heavenly Father give good things to them that ask him? He’ll give you bread, not a stone. He’ll give you fish, not a snake. He’ll give you an egg, not a scorpion. He’ll give you what is good for you, an answer to your prayer. I believe this with all my heart.

So I believe in divine healing, but I also know that God allows some of you, dear saints… God bless you, my heart goes out to you this instant. Some of you dear ones are hurting so terribly in your body. What is the answer to it? He says, “Thou shalt not be afraid.” You specialize in honoring God and he’ll make you a blessing in the situation. “Who always causeth us to triumph in Christ and maketh manifest the perfume of His knowledge by us in every place.” God wants you to be His perfume even when you’re in the crusher. God wants you to be His perfume even when you’re in a situation that seems intolerable, “Thou shalt not be afraid.” Under His wings shalt thou trust. Oh, I hope that’s of help to somebody, today. Bless your heart. My heart goes out to some of you who have such real burdens to bear. May God be real and precious to you this moment and all day long.

Dear Father today, help us to specialize in trusting Thee so that we can be victors in every situation. Through Jesus Christ our Lord I pray, Amen.

Till I meet you once again by way of radio, walk with the King today and be a blessing!



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