Don't Change History!

Have you ever been afraid? I mean gut wrenching afraid. My son has started having night terrors. He goes to sleep only to wake up an hour or so later screaming a blood curling scream, standing in the far corner of his bed holding onto his blanket and stuffed dog for dear life. He is disoriented and doesn't really know what is going on. All he knows and understands is that mommy or daddy are here now and everything is OK. Last night he would not go to bed. Every time we'd put him in bed he would scream and point to the shadows of his room. What could a 23 month old be so scared about? After placing an extra night light at the foot of his bed, I had no choice but to close the door and wish him sweet dreams. He cried for a few minutes and then went right to sleep. (Of course it was after 10pm so I know he was exhausted!)

There are all different kinds of fear. My first fearful memory happened when I was about 8 or 9 years old. I was going to have a lemonade stand to try and earn money to buy myself a bike. I had spent the night with a friend and we stayed up all night making every kind of Kool-aid and homemade crafts to try and sell the next day. I'm sure we left her kitchen in a horrible mess! That morning, my friends mother told her she couldn't have a lemonade stand with me and she got in trouble for all the mess we had made.

I was in my parents front yard dragging up a table to the top of the driveway, when I saw a car. My parents live at the bottom of a court so you can see any car that drives by the top of the road. I saw a long Cadillac-ish looking car drive by the top of the court only to slam on its breaks and screech in reverse. It really caught my attention. The man drove down the court and smiled and waved at me. "Oh my first customer!" I thought. He pulled his car around in front of my neighbors bushes so you wouldn't be able to see him from my parents house. He got out of his car, opened the back door, left the engine running and drivers side door opened. He had long brown hair, tight blue jeans and big cowboy boots...he looked like he was tiptoeing in his boots on the road and he kept looking over his shoulder at my neighbors house. All of a sudden I thought,"Wait a minute, he can't know I'm having a lemonade stand. I don't have a sign or anything, all I have is a table." When he was about 2-3 feet away, he reached out to me and my instinct kicked in, I ran as fast as my little legs would carry me. I knew-he wasn't there to get lemonade, he was there to get me! I stood in my parents carport with my heart beating so fast. My dad came outside a minute later and told me how proud he was of me working so hard to get money. Then he looked at my face and he knew, something was wrong. He kept asking me what was wrong and all I could say was, "That man! That man!" and point to the top of the driveway. My dad put his arm around me and walked me up the driveway. The man was hiding in the bushes waiting for me to come back. He heard my dad's voice and jumped in his car and sped off. My dad ran to the top of the driveway and tried to get the license number, but couldn't. We had to call the police and my dad went out looking for his car (my dad is a police officer too). About two weeks later at the local elementary school up the road, a man with the same description and car I gave, had a child in his car and a teacher had to pull the child out of the passenger window! He never "got" anyone to my memory, but he was never caught either.

Its amazing what you remember. I can't remember what I did yesterday, but I can remember what that man looked like and what I felt like, after all these years. I used to have nightmares and dream of what could have happened. I remember the scariest thought to me was, "What if Katie or Jeb would have been out there, what would I have done?" My younger sister and brother were about 2 and 4 years old. They loved to walk up and talk to anybody. What if he would have taken them instead of me? As I grew older into an adult, I had vivid dreams of being abducted and thrown in the back of a trunk. One dream is so vivid it feels like it really happened. It's been a while since I've had one of those, but the fear of being kidnapped has trickled to my children now. I am so careful to not let Randol ride her bike while there are construction workers outside. I don't want her to go in a public bathroom by herself and she's 8! Can I be with her every second of the day? Of course not. That's when I have to tell myself, "Let go and let God. He loves her more than you ever could, Marion. He has her best interests at heart." The fear of that man taking me, was a healthy fear, it quite possibly could have saved my life. It's worrying over something that hasn't even happened yet, that fear, I have to let go of.

Another time that stands out in my mind of when I was truly afraid was when I was 21 years old. I woke up in the middle of the night screaming in pain. I knew I should have gone to the doctor, but refused and told myself it was nothing. The pain subsided, but never really went away. The next day I went on as normal, but by the afternoon I couldn't hide the fact that something was truly wrong. My stomach had started to expand and all of my clothes were tight. I couldn't walk or move. It is the worst pain I have ever experienced (worse than birthing my 3 children!) By the afternoon when I finally agreed to go to the doctor, the nurses asked me, "Oh honey, when is your due date?" because they thought I was there to have a baby because my stomach was so big. They did an ultra sound and saw blood was filling up my belly, but they didn't know why or what was wrong. I was poked and prodded and had so many tests done. They kept saying that they may have to do a hysterectomy.They were trying to warn me that my daughter may be the only child I ever had. Finally in sheer agony, laying in a hospital bed with doctors all around me looking at my chart, I started convulsing to the point I almost fell off the bed from shaking so hard. It was like a scene from ER, only it was real. They ran me down the hall and into surgery immediately, telling my loved ones they had no idea what was wrong or when I'd be out. I can still remember the relief I felt when they told me to breathe in so that I could go to sleep-finally. All afternoon I had been asking for pain medication, but they couldn't give it to me because they needed to know what hurt to help diagnose the problem.

I remember waking up seeing a bright, fuzzy light. For a moment, I thought I'd died and was about to wake up in heaven. There was a nurse beside me and I looked at her and asked, "Can I still have babies?" She kindly smiled and said, "Yes Dear, now go back to sleep." I fell into the deepest sleep knowing my future babies were safe and that I was finally not hurting anymore. I had an ovarian cyst that had burst and it was like a hose, flowing blood into my belly. They took out a liter of blood from my stomach and almost had to give me a blood transfusion to get blood back where it was supposed to be. They told me that if I would have come to the hospital just a few hours later, I would have internally bled to death.

That was a different kind of fear. Fear of never seeing my family again and fear of not being able to have more children. I didn't have nightmares after that episode of fear, but I could not watch ER for about two years without having flashbacks and wondering what had gone on while I was on the operating table.

There are all kinds of fear, fear of losing a loved one, fear of heights, fear of spiders (or roaches!), fear of the unknown; on and on they go. What are you afraid of? Is there anything that haunts your dreams or controls your actions? Often the things we fear, never even happen. Where does that fear come from? Does God make us afraid to climb a tall building or to let our children ride their bikes in the road? No...only the Father of Lies does that. The Bible says,"For God did not give us a spirit of fear, but a spirit of power, of love and of self discipline." (2 Timothy 1:7).

Satan uses our fears to control us. Have you ever felt God's calling, but were too afraid to do what He asked? There have a been a few times where I felt God telling me to tell someone something, but the words would not come out of my mouth. What if they reject me or think I'm crazy? What if I make a fool out of myself? And God gently whispers in my ear, "They rejected me and paraded me naked down the side of the street, but I did it all for you. Will you do this small task for me?" Sometimes I do, and sometimes before I get the chance, (from procrastination), the moment is gone and so is the opportunity. Things happen in our lives for a reason. God uses the situations in our lives to further His kingdom. Satan takes these life experiences and makes us dwell on them and live in fear, instead we should offer them up to Him and ask Him what He wishes us to do with them.

Fear. Such a small word, but such a huge impact it can have on our lives. When God gives us a mission, no matter how crazy it sounds, we will not fail. He did not give us the spirit of fear-it states that so clearly in the Bible. Don't let your fears hold you back from being who God wants you to be and from accomplishing His purposes for your life. You will miss out on so many blessings if you listen to Satan's lies. Imagine what would have happened if Noah would have been too afraid to build the ark, or Moses too afraid to free his people? What if he would have run for his life when he saw that burning bush instead of staying and getting the 10 commandments? What if Abraham was too afraid to set out up that mountain with Issac and questioned God to the point of disobeying? What if Mary would have said, "I'm too afraid to be your Son's mother. What will my family think of me if I'm pregnant?" What if the disciples were too afraid to follow Jesus? So many stories, I could go on and on. Just like these courageous men and women didn't let fear control their lives, we must do the same. You could change history if you don't follow through with God's mission for your life. What is God asking you to do for Him? Will you step out in fear...or in faith?

"When I am afraid, I will trust in You. In God, whose words I praise, in God I trust; I will not be afraid. What can mortal man do to me?"
Psalm 56:3-4