Every fear we have can be traced to one big fear.
Will God provide? As the coronavirus continues, the effects are being felt far beyond the possibility of getting sick and dying. People are asking themselves many questions.
Will the financial planning we depend on in retirement hold up? Will we get laid off or sent home without pay? How are we going to pay mortgages, child care, medicines, gas, food?
Will there be food? Our grocery order was cancelled for the second time last night. The store shelves are empty of such basics as bread.
Services we depend on are being shut down or cut. People are being discouraged from going to doctors unless they are very sick. If one were to go, you may be further exposed to those who are sicker than you are.
Some hospitals do not have enough staff, beds or supplies to meet the needs of this growing health crisis.
Many have needs beyond just the physical. Those who are in nursing homes are now under “house arrest,” their loved ones not permitted to visit … the patients themselves not permitted to leave.
As anxiety builds, ways of self soothing are being cut off. Sports events, concerts, even church cancelled. Everyone is flocking to the internet and hoping it will hold up, so at least distance communication can continue.
The question hangs in mid air. “Will I have everything I need?”
The answer is a definite yes. We will have everything we need.
I love Psalm 23:1. Two different translations get to the heart of the message.
Psalm 23:1 in the New King James Version says,
“The Lord is my shepherd;
I shall not want.”
The Lord is our shepherd. He is responsible for leading us to food, water, shelter and all the rest. Therefore, we make a conscious choice not to want anything beyond what He gives us. “I shall” put the responsibility of choice on us.
The New Living Translation says
“The Lord is my shepherd; I have all that I need.”
Because The Lord is our Shepherd, we can relax. We can say with confidence “I already have all I need.”
When we do life from the point of view of gratitude, we begin to realize how much we already have. When we count our many blessings, we realize how rich we are.
We stop envying. We stop feeling deprived. We stop wanting more.
Satan’s key strategy is to make us feel God has not provided for us. Satan wants us to believe if God gives us anything, it is not enough. If it appears He gave someone else more, then satan tempts us to feel God shortchanged us.
Satan wants us to believe getting what we need depends on us. He wants us to believe God cannot or will not provide.
He wants us to remember every place in our past where it seemed at the very least, God was a little late or even worse, appeared not to have shown up at all.
Satan definitely does not want us to remember all the ways God did provide for us, did deliver us, and even gave us extra blessings beyond measure.
How do we put satan on the run and rest in the certain knowledge that God will provide?
Remember all the ways God has provided for you.
“Remember the things I have done in the past. For I alone am God! I am God, and there is none like Me.”
Isaiah 46:9
Refuse to think of anything other than God’s Mercy and Grace to you. Dismiss anything else that would try to rise up and distort your view of God.
“For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds, casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.”
2 Corinthians 10:4-5
Just as we choose “I shall not want,” we choose to use the mighty Weapons of The Spirit to cast down those rebellious thoughts.
We know before the battle what God says. So we will not be fooled when satan tries to get us to imagine anything different. We cast down what he offers.
We don’t let our minds spiral into worry. We capture every stray thought and bring it back in line with God.
When you remember God’s Goodness and totally evict anything else from your mind, you will be ready to truly enter into God’s Presence.
Enter thanking Him and praising Him.
“Enter into His Gates with thanksgiving, and into His Courts with praise. Be thankful to Him, and bless His Name.”
Psalm 100:4
Then listen carefully to what Jesus says. His Words are timeless and personal. He is speaking to you right now.
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear.
Is not Life more than food, and the body more than clothes?
Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?
Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin.
Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.
If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will He not much more clothe you—you of little faith?
So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’
For the pagans run after all these things, and your Heavenly Father knows that you need them.
But seek first His Kingdom and His Righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”
Matthew 6:25-33
As my father in law used to say, “We have a Great Sufficiency!”
