A lesson from Paul

Today, I had to pray for the spirit of fear to be taken away.

I suffered from a sudden attack of introversion, paranoia, and confusion. It was a remarkably scary day - I couldn’t even look my beautiful Dana in the eye.

What else can one do then, but pray?

Pray for God to take away that spirit of fear, and replace it. “For this reason,” Paul told Timothy, “I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God...for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.” (2nd Timothy 1:6-7)

That doesn’t mean He made it easy on me. It was a struggle the entire day, and I lapsed back into paranoia at about 7 pm. But He strengthened me enough that I was able to survive a school day with my alternative students, as well as a meeting with the administration over next semester’s plans.

The moral? Well, there are a few, I suppose.

Trust God. That’s the first and most obvious and necessary one.

And more than that, ASK Him for what you need. Don’t assume that just because He knows what you need, He’s simply going to give it to you without your asking for it. Remember the scene in the Disney movie Aladdin, when Ali is thrown into the ocean and the genie tells him he’s got to SAY the wish before the genie can grant it? Yeah, God’s a little like that.

But even more than that, it’s like how He wants us to pray for our DAILY bread - not a month’s supply all at once, but to keep coming back for what we need daily. Well, God will provide what we need to make it... but perhaps ONLY what we need to make it. He knew how much help I did and didn’t need to make it through the day.

Christ never said life was going to be easy. But He did say it was going to be worth it.

Dana was admiring how I make it through each day given all the health challenges God has entrusted me with, and how she didn’t think she could stay as upbeat as I do fighting as much pain as I fight. But the truth is, we are all given our crosses, and He makes sure they’re never more than we can bear... but also that they’re not so light as to be meaningless, either.

Remember, His purpose for us remaining on this planet (in part) is to develop us into the most Christ-like beings we can become. And that happens through challenges, challenges that develop our character. So, as much as we all would like to shout, “That’s as much character building as I can take, Lord!”, the trust is that He knows EXACTLY how much we can and should take.

That’s why despite the fact that there have been several nights when my pain has been so bad I thought about short-cutting my way Home... I’m still here.

He hasn’t figured wrong yet, and He probably won’t. If I do short-cut some day, then I’ll probably be the one who was wrong, and I could have made it through.

After all, I’ve made it through every test so far.