swimming and fear

Last weekend I went on vacation to Galveston, and I was thinking of doing something that I had not done since at least 2007 (and maybe even before) and that is to go swimming. But I was afraid....not because I'm not that strong a swimmer (and it doesn't help when you are only 5'4" and not a strong swimmer...but because this is the first time that I had gone swimming post-medical crisis....I had taken showers, but being in a pool is an entirely different thing.

But in the end, I decided that this was my vacation and that I was going to go swimming. And in the end I had a good time and some wonderful time of relaxation.

It got me to thinking...how many great things do we miss out on because of fear? Fear makes so many things bigger than they should be and makes mountains out of molehills. There's an old saying "paralysis through analysis"...because we see what is there and we think that we can't do anything about it. So many of us instead of doing great and mighty things instead decide to limit our works to things that we can control and end up doing almost nothing.

How insulting is that to the King of Kings who has us in the palm of His hand? How insulting is it to Him when we say that there is something that we think is beyond His control, His care, or His power? He tells us "Perfect love casts out fear"....and perfect love is found in Him, therefore He casts out fear and gives strengh to those who need it. All we have to do is to attach ourselves to Him and take comfort that He will not steer us in the wrong direction or let us go.

So the question becomes, when are we really going to trust Him (knowing that He is greater than all things and that nothing can separate us from Him) and attempt to do things. We never know what we can accomplish until we say (through the Lord) to fear: "Get out of my way, God is my helper and with Him I am going to do great things for His kingdom!"