Fear Not : What's up, 2016?

What have you feared lately? I know for me, at the end of a busy semester, there is a lot I have been fearful about. I have feared how I finished out the semester with grades. I have been fearful of even thinking of all of the packing I needed to do to haul all of my things back home for Christmas. I've feared the idea that the real world is getting closer and closer, and I'm not sure what exactly I'm going to do. Then there are the bigger fears that far outweigh my packing list and report card, fears like: ISIS, the presidential election, World War III? So how in the world am I supposed to screw a lid on the jar of all my fears? Especially during this busy time of year, how do you and I live joyfully, without being scared of the future?
For me, I have learned through this past year that I actually struggle with fear more than I realized. However, as I began to understand what a worrier I am, I also learned of how to go forward without letting my fears stop me from the living the life I was meant to live. When I am going through a difficult time, I usually make myself think of all the times in the past that the Lord has pulled me through or out of a situation and used that situation for good. It helps me so, so much to focus on God's faithfulness in my times of doubt. It equips me to truly understand that if God has been by my side every time I have questioned or doubted my situation before, why would He not do the same now?

As I was thinking of how much this exercise has helped me this year, I couldn't help but think of a story that had so much room for fear, yet it is now known as the greatest story you and I know--The Christmas Story. Now, don't roll your eyes too quickly. Yes, I know you've heard it a hundred times. To which I would like you to know: So have I. And yes, I know during this time of year you've heard it an extra two hundred times. And to that thought of yours I would like you to know: I feel your pain. But there is something so crucial about the Christmas story that does not get told enough, a part of the story that will make you understand why getting rid of fear should be your New Year's resolution for 2016 and for every year after that.

Take the Christmas story that you know oh so well, and let's go back 400 years before Jesus was born, in the end of the Old Testament. The Lord promised the Jewish people, who were living in a corrupt world much like ours today, a Messiah to come and save their lives from the darkness and sin of the world. Can you imagine? God speaking to a group of people and telling them not worry because he is sending a man, his only son, to save them from every piece of sin in the world. I can imagine those scared, fearful Jews were very relieved and excited, but then, picture this--Those same people wait 400 hundred years before God speaks to them again and the promised Messiah is sent to Earth. FOUR HUNDRED YEARS!! That is four generations of the world getting worse and worse and worse, as people fear more and more and more. If God promised you something, and then kept silent for four hundred years after you have already died and gone to deliver His promise, wouldn't you be possibly even more fearful than before?

The story gets worse for the Jewish people....If God promised you a man to save the world, what kind of man would you picture? I would hope that if it was just one man coming to save this horrible world, he would be a big, strong, warrior-like man riding a horse down from the clouds with lightening bolts in his hands. I feel like that's about what it would take to intimidate and change this dirt wad, and I'm pretty sure that's what most of the Jews at that time were hoping for as well. However, it is very far from what they received. Their Messiah, their superhero, their warrior with all the power in the world, was born a baby to parents in a cave-like stable in a horse trough. Wouldn't you be a little concerned with the God you put your every hope in after that action? Wouldn't you be fearful of your future and the world's future after seeing this part of God's plan? I know I would.

Luckily for you and me, we know the Christmas Story, we know that that little baby did save the world. The four hundred years of silence before he was born is just what we know from a sentence we read, but I don't believe that we really understand it. That small part of the Christmas story means ginormous waves of peace for the life you're living and will continue to live. If God could wait four hundred years for an already-bad world to get worse, then send a baby to save every person in it, why would He not pull you through now? Why would He not plan a future for you as amazing as Jesus'? Fear Not in 2016.

XX,
Claire