His Comfort.

"Do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand." Isaiah 41:10

At some point in all our lives we come up against the feeling of fear. Fear is one of those uncomfortable emotions, one that we would be happy to get rid of with the blink of an eye. It causes our hearts to race, our focus of attention to narrow and terrible possibilities begin to enter into our minds. I don't know about anyone else, but i wish i was just able to banish fear from my heart by my mere will power and just simply stop being afraid, but unfortunately it doesn't work like that for fear, you're not able to dismiss it that easy.

In the above text, there is just something about it that leaves us with this uncomfortable feeling. It's like the words, "do not fear" are a mere command that God is placing out there. It's our job to obey God, and when he says "do not fear," we should obey, but sometimes, no matter how hard we try not to be afraid, we cannot seem to make our fears go away.

The key to understanding this text is to see that when God says, "do no dear," it's not a simply command that he is placing on us as an authority figure. Those three words are words that are spoken with soo much comfort behind them. Just as they are spoken with comfort, following it comes a promise of God's presence being with us, in our times of fear. Just like a loving parent who speaks to their child who wakes up from having a bad dream, they say, "Don't be afraid, I'm here with you, you are safe." The parent isn't rejecting the child's fear, they are giving them a promise of protection. Now if the parent was to say, "Don't be afraid," then the child will learn quickly that the parent doesn't understand that the child is feeling scared and unprotected.

God comforts us in the way that a loving parent comforts a frightened child. God says to us, "I know your afraid; but i also want you to know that I am here with you. I will not leave you, I will give you strength, I will hold your hand so taht you will not fall."

God, you know how often I'm afraid, and you know where these fears have grown from, and you know how much i struggle with wanting to be free from these fears. Please help me to grain the courage and strength from your presence to overcome these fears. Please be with me. Please help me. Please uphold me with your hand.

God it's only now that i'm beginning to feel you more, please show yourself real to me despite the fears i have inside of me. I know your there, I know you haven't left me, and that you never will. God I need you, I want to have more of you in my life. LESS OF ME, AND MORE OF YOU!!!