But now, this is what the LORD says— he who created you, Jacob, he who formed you, Israel: “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine. – Isaiah 43:1

While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.’ Romans 5:8

Idle hands are the devil’s workshop; idle lips are his mouthpiece. Proverbs 16:27 (TLB).

 

Lord the Sky is Falling

Lord, my God, the sky is falling!
Where are you? We need you now!
I have faith, Lord, that you’ll provide,
I just wish that I knew how.

I know it’s time to prove my faith.
To demonstrate my Christian walk.
If I can’t have faith at this moment
Then who am I to talk?

And I swear Lord, I am trying.
I pray for our world every night.
Still, each morning as I look around,
On the people’s faces, I see fright.

 People are dying before our eyes, Lord.
Literally thousands every day!
And Lord, there are thousands more
Looking for you to show the way.

They are looking for a miracle.
Proof of your sovereignty.
But for those of us who love you, Lord,
We need no miracle to believe.

We look to you and we find peace.
Proof of your love is in our hearts.
You show it by your faithfulness;
By every blessing you impart.

You are for us, Lord, our good shepherd.
Who makes our every pastures green.
In the valley, we fear no evil
For, it’s your understanding on which we lean.

And now Lord, move in your church.
Make us fearless keep us whole.
Lord, the only miracle we ask of you
Is the restoration of our souls.
Linda Troxell, © 04/06/2020

Before I get started I want to acknowledge that all of the facts I have included in this blog are from an article in Atlantic magazine. It is the work product of a reporter named Uri Friedman. His is an article worth reading in its entirety. It appears in the March 18, 2020 issue of Atlantic.

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Did you ever imagine something like this crazy virus would happen in our lifetime? I sure didn’t. But evidently, those who know about these things knew it was coming.

It seems that we, meaning the collective we, in this case, were told about it in 2012 when the Rand Corporation concluded that, of all the possible international threats to the American way of life, only pandemics were capable of destroying it.

We were warned again in 2015 when a reporter wrote about and then Bill Gates gave a Ted Talk about, his algorithm model for how a new strain of flu could spread rapidly in today’s globalized world.

We were warned once more in 2017 when, a week before the inauguration, the outgoing president’s homeland security adviser met with the incoming president’s national security team.

It seems that the outgoing team conducted a simulation exercise with the incoming team exploring how the U. S. government should respond to a flu pandemic. The simulation was based on the outgoing administration’s experience with the outbreaks of swine flu, Ebola, and Zika.

We were warned in 2018 on the 100th anniversary of the 1918 flu pandemic, which killed 50 to 100 million people around the world. We were told then by experts that the “next plague” is coming and influenza is the most dangerous possibility.

In that same year, the director for medical biodefense preparedness at the National Security Council told us, “The threat of pandemic flu is our number-one health security concern.” And it cannot be stopped at the border.”

The very next day, National Security Adviser John Bolton dismantled the NSC’s unit for preparing and responding to pandemics. As a result, the White House official in charge of preparing a response to infectious threats left his post and was not replaced.

Finally, in both 2018 and 2019, we were warned when the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security included health experts, business leaders, and U.S. government officials in a simulation exercise of fictional novel coronaviruses that killed tens of millions around the world and disrupted all political, social and economic processes.

Everyone left those simulations convinced they needed to get working on this problem. Two months after the 2019 simulation a novel coronavirus emerged in China.

And if that is not enough to blow your mind, it seems that we have been warned every year since 2013 in the U.S. intelligence community’s annual “worldwide threat assessment” that a pandemic was the most likely threat to American safety.

And on each occasion, the intelligence officials pleaded with the government leaders to understand that this threat was not hypothetical.

The 2020 worldwide threat assessment, which reportedly warned that this flu pandemic was currently on its way to America, has been postponed. Why? No one knows.

When I first read this, which I admit was at a time when my mind was wracked with anxiety about this crazy virus, I was furious at our government.

How could they have ignored all of these warnings? How could they have put the whole world at risk like this?

But then, I got my mind back where it should have been, on God. I knew it didn’t matter that all those warnings had been given and ignored. It didn’t matter that they had put us at risk. What matters is that God has a plan and He has been in charge all along.

This means that those of us who are covered by the blood of Jesus have nothing to worry about. We know the way this ends. We win!

We win because, in the end, we will be with Jesus forever. But now, this is what the LORD says— he who created you, Jacob, he who formed you, Israel: “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine. – Isaiah 43:1

Please don’t get me wrong, this doesn’t mean that I stroll along through my day whistling and with no cares. I wish my faith was that strong and that constant.

But it isn’t. I still get scared. I still lose track of who I am and whose I am. But then I turn my mind back to God; sometimes sooner and sometimes later, but always eventually.

After all, even though I am convinced of my identity in Christ, I am still human. Being human, by definition means that I’m not perfect, so neither is my faith.

But we know that God loves imperfect people because, ‘While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.’ Romans 5:8. God makes room for our doubts.

But we can’t allow ourselves to stay in doubt because doubt is a foothold for the enemy.

It is difficult for us to keep our eyes on God when everyone is losing their jobs. It is difficult to still our minds and keep our faith when thousands and thousands of people are dying around us every day.

How do we believe all is well when we are told not to go out of our houses unless it’s essential? Can all be well if when we do go out everyone is wearing a mask and gloves?

Being Christians doesn’t inoculate us against anxiety. Of course, we trust God. But we still get anxious and we are not immune to fear.

So, what can we do in such precarious times, times when we are stuck inside with our thoughts?

Well, one thing that I know I can’t do is to be caught in extreme fear or anxiety without a plan for what to do.

I don’t know, maybe it is different for you, but for me, if I don’t have a plan, I tend to do nothing. My mind gets stuck in a loop of fear and worry.

My thoughts get stuck in a constant replay of “I need to get my mind on God.” But I just don’t. It’s like my mind is stuck in quicksand. I don’t have what it takes to figure out what to do.

To help contain that danger I have devised several plans and they are ready and at hand so I don’t even need to think when I’m stuck in that place.

I have typed out all of the Psalms that are helpful in times of fear or doubt. Psalm 91 seems as if it was written for this particular time. Psalm 55 is good for a worried mind.

And most of the Psalms are soothing in some way. Once I had the Psalms that speak to me typed out I wrote a prayer based on each of them.

Of course, you can easily find prayers based on different Psalms online. But it’s so much more powerful when it is your own words mixed with the Word of God.

And don’t forget that finding the Psalms and writing the prayers is keeping you in God’s Word and out of the enemy’s grip.

In a similar way I have pages of various scriptures that are helpful  for different times. For example, I have scripture for praising God. Nothing brings us into the presence of God like praise.

So in times when I am simply overwhelmed and I don’t know what I need, I praise God. And with the scriptures at hand and ready to read, I don’t have to rely on my frozen mind to think of praise words.

I’ve also collected scriptures that help with fear, and some that help with anger, and yet others for anxiety. For example, for fear, I have scriptures such as, “The LORD is with me; I will not be afraid. What can mere mortals do to me? -Psalm 118:6.

I’ve used different methods to collect the scriptures. For example, when I felt it was important for me to be in God’s word for a while, I looked up the scriptures in my Bible’s Concordance and then copied them out of my Bible.

This worked well because I found, more often than not, I ended up reading verses adjacent to the one I was looking for; this kept me in God’s word for a good amount of time.

But more often I used the internet. I just Googled Scripture about whatever topic I was looking for. Then I simply copied and pasted the scripture onto a blank document. I have different documents for different issues, such as anger, fear, anxiety, etc.

Similarly, I have pages of short prayers to read when my mind is under attack. Some of them I wrote myself and some I copied off the internet.

Just as I did with scripture, I searched for prayers about the topic I was interested in and I picked the prayers that spoke to me.

Whatever documents I created, be it prayers or scripture, after I had enough items to get started, I put them in a notebook.

Until this day, whenever I come across a prayer or scripture I like, I add it to my collection. 

All of these things that I have prepared to get my mind off of my problems and onto God are organized in a notebook specifically for that purpose.

In this way, when I find myself lost in thoughts of fear or I’m feeling really anxious, I can get out the notebook and start reading things that draw my mind back to God.

In the Living Bible, Proverbs 16:27 says idle hands are the devil’s workshop. Idle hands are the devil’s workshop; idle lips are his mouthpiece. Proverbs 16:27 (TLB).

Well, I say that a fearful mind is the devil’s workshop as well. Don’t let him get his foot into your workshop.

It is not realistic to think that because we believe in God and because we have been saved by Jesus that we will walk through this frightening time without any fear or anxiety. We are Christians, not robots. We cannot always tame our mind, our will, and our emotions.

But one of the things I most often hear nonbelievers say about why they don’t like Christians is that Christians act like they are perfect and perfectly contained.

So, if we want to use this experience to draw others to Jesus we need to walk through it authentically.

We need to stop hiding the truth that we get scared too. Maybe then, nonbelievers will ask us what we do when we are afraid. And we can share our Lord with them.

Whatever God’s reasons for allowing this situation in the world, and whatever the outcome will be, we know He wants us to take the opportunity to share His word with the world.

Didn’t He tell us as much? –Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” – Matthew 28:19-20

 

Let’s Pray:

Lord, we, of course, don’t know why you have allowed this virus to come to our world and turn it upside down. However, we trust you, Lord, and we believe whatever the reason you will use it for the good of those who love you. That doesn’t mean that we won’t ever be afraid or anxious, Lord. It simply means that when we can shake ourselves loose of the fear and anxiety we will know it’s a lie, simply a trick of the enemy. So, we ask you, Lord, to keep us strong in this trying time. Let us remember that you never promised us we would have no trouble in the world. In fact, Lord, you promised us that we would have trouble in the world, but that we did not need to fear it because you have overcome the world. Help us to keep our mind on that, Lord, and on you, knowing that in the end, we win. We win in the end because you will come back and take all of us to live with you in paradise. We thank you, Lord, for your love and your blessings. We thank you for being our Good Shepard, whose voice we can hear and follow. Please keep us safe and keep our eyes on you.  We pray this in the holy name of Jesus, Amen

Points for Pondering and for Prayer
                               Or
Perhaps for Putting Pen to Paper

Have you been having trouble keeping your mind off of fear and on God in this time of the virus?

Do you know what, specifically your fears are?  Are they realistic, or are they unlikely to come true?

What do you do to soothe yourself when you become fearful?       Does it work?      Why or why not?

Do you think that gathering scripture and prayers to have at hand and read when you are fearful or anxious might be helpful?    Why or why not?

Whether you think it might be helpful or not, do you think you might try it?   If not, why not?

Write your own prayer to God asking him for help with the specific things of which you are afraid and asking Him to help keep your thoughts on Him.