“Then I said to them, ‘You see the trouble we are in: Jerusalem lies in ruins, and its gates have been burned with fire.  Come, let us rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, and we will no longer be in disgrace.'”  Nehemiah 2:17

Walls are interesting things.  Though we have them and experience them in all sorts of places, we give relatively little thought to their existence in our lives.  As I write, I sit in a room surrounded by walls: four of them.  Those very walls serve a multitude of purposes; they protect, shelter, repel and give strength and stability to my existence.

Walls keep out the wind and elements such as ice, snow, rain and fog.  They trap heat so that we can be warm; they can create shade away from the bright and powerful sun.  They keep out wild animals and insects (though those pesky little creatures often find their way in).  They provide structure for a roof to go over our heads and anchors for a floor beneath our feet.  They allow us to enhance the quality of our lives when we paint them and display artwork on them.

As soon as humans could figure it out, they began building walls to protect themselves.  For some, that meant creating blankets or fabric sheets that were easily transportable and hung up by the use of poles or trees.  For others, clay was formed into bricks that stacked one upon another to form more permanent walls.  Still others learned how to log, which eventually gave rise to the homes we now have.  Those living in areas with stones and large rocks were inspired to gather them together and plaster them into structures.  And sometimes, simple earthen mounds were created to provide defensive man-made walls.  Mankind has been building walls for a long, long time.

In fact, as cities were built–and people began to congregate together in more confined spaces–walls were essential to the safety and well-being of those gathering places.  If you visit most historical areas throughout the world, you will usually find evidence of walls around or near those sites.  Walls were an absolute necessity for not only defining the borders of the city but also providing entry points, security, and protection.  More so, those walls and their good state of repair symbolized the strength of the people who resided within them.  Strong walls meant strong people.

Today, we have less visible walls.  You will still occasionally find them in older cities and towns, but we now rely on technology and more specialized jobs to provide a sense of security in our communities.  Police departments, security cameras, large fences and surveillance companies often do the trick in making us feel secure.  In the digital world, we even have “firewalls” and multiple-tiered levels of entry to keep secure what we want walled off from internet marauders.  At this very moment in history, we are using “walls” to protect ourselves.

Why do we need to think about walls in the context of trusting God?  One simple word, in.  As I unfolded its definition, I came across the word, immure. Before that, the other definitions of in seem to point to the concept of being “shut in”.  In immure, how something becomes shut in became a bit clearer: walls.  In fact, immure is literally a derivative of the word, wall, and its first definition is “to enclose within walls.”  Its obsolete definition (the definition that is not used so much anymore) is “to surround with walls; fortify.”  And that left me pondering…

When we decide to trust, to be effective in doing so, we have to put our trust in something.  In Psalm 56:3, we are instructed to turn to trust rather than the feelings of being afraid and then place that trust in God rather than in fear.  When we contemplate the definition of immure, we begin to see how better to do that.  Feelings are usually fleeting.  Emotions such as happiness, fear, surprise, anger and so on come into our hearts and minds rather quickly, and then, just as quick, they dissipate.  This is also true of trust.  You can have it one moment and be back to fearing in the next.

To transfer a more lasting mental state from fear to trust, we need to learn how to build walls around our trust.  We need to become adept at shutting in Trust and secluding it from the whispering of Fear and its friends.  Once we recognize and admit that we are feeling afraid, we need to immediately enclose trust into our hearts and minds.  The obsolete definition of immure calls on us to consider surrounding ourselves with godly walls that specifically fortify our faith in Him.

Interestingly enough, fortifying something involves strengthening it from attack.  That could include providing it with defensive works, surrounding it or protecting it.  Make no mistake, our ability to trust needs fortification.  We must furnish it with what is needed to help it resist Fear’s attacks.  That is how our trust and faith will become stronger in God and more effective when employed.  We can become more resilient in exposure to what frightens us when we surround ourselves with supportive walls. By doing so, we will be strengthened both mentally and morally.

The walls that we build will become like the walls of a city in the days of old.  At the threat of an advancing horde, the residents would take refuge behind those walls and close up the gates shutting themselves in for protection.  In that refuge and shelter, they could move from running from fear to what they actually needed to do to overcome the threat.  They could move from feeling afraid to trusting in the fortifications God had had them build.

It is such fortifications–the walls of Jerusalem–that brought Nehemiah to tears and great sadness.  The news, that its mighty walls had fallen and the city had been burned, broke his heart.  Those walls had marked not only its strength, but also how far Jerusalem had fallen from God in not maintaining its reliance on Him.  The armies that destroyed the city weren’t random invaders.  They were God’s tool of punishment in response to how wayward His people had gone.  Those walls of disrepair were evidence of much more than just prior strength.  They had literally come to represent just how little His people had trusted in Him and His way.  When our walls begin to crumble or crack, you can bet that our faith and trust may be headed the same way.  That is why it is incredibly important to surround our trust in God with the appropriate walls of support and then keep them well maintained.

“They said to me, ‘Those who survived the exile and are back in the province are in great trouble and disgrace.  The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates are burned with fire.’  When I heard these things, I sat down and wept.  For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven.”  Nehemiah 1:3-4

“When I am afraid, I will put my trust in You.”  Psalm 56:3

Have you ever thought about what makes you strong?

Most of the time, we hear about someone’s strength in the context of what they are good at or, literally, physically strong in.  While, yes, some people are fit and strong, most of the time we are speaking of strengths far beyond what someone can do physically.

Strength comes from the root word, strong.  It can involve “mental power, force or vigor; moral power, firmness or courage; power by reason of influence, authority, or resources.”  See Strength. It arises with “effective force…or the power of resisting force, strain or wear.”  It may even appear when someone or something brings encouragement to another.

You can see that to be strong, your strength is measured by what you are strong in.  It can be in your physical abilities or mental power.  It is found in your firmness or courage as well as in your ability to influence or have authority.  It can even be found through the resources available to you.  While you can be strong enough to affect change, you can also be strong enough to resist an attack or aggression.  You can be decisively unyielding or strong in not compromising what you stand for.  Being strong impacts almost all the different arenas that our lives are involved in.

Seeing the various ways that we can exhibit strength leads us back to the word, in.  As we unfold the word in, we end up with the word, fortify.  Interestingly enough, the root of fortify is strong.  How do we then fortify our strengths or strengthen our weaknesses if we do not know what they are in?  This is especially true as we seek to build our faith by putting our trust in the right spot.

So let’s ask that question again:  What makes you strong?  Where are your strengths located?  What do they reside in?

Here are some arenas in life where you might find strength’s presence:

• Faith/Believing
• Leadership/Guiding
• Organization/Interacting
• Love/Nurturing
• Compassion/Relating
• Encouragement/Giving
• Education/Learning and teaching
• Service/Helping and aiding
• Assistance/Serving
• Kindness/Empowering
• Theater/Imagining
• Growth/Sowing and Reaping
• Development/Building
• Craftsmanship/Detailing
• Management/Directing
• Prayer/Interceding
• Courageous/Asking
• Quietness/Persevering
• Boldness/Collecting

When we experience something that incites fear in us, it is extremely helpful to know where our strengths are and where they are not.  Knowing what they are not should help us fall to our knees faster, and knowing what they are should help us discern that we need to turn to God first before employing them.  Understanding them should help us to fortify our faith in God.

Fortify is to:

1. to protect or strengthen against attack, surround or provide with defensive military works.
2. to furnish with the means of resisting force or standing wear.
3. to make strong; impart strength to.
4. to increase the effectiveness of.
5. to strengthen mentally or morally.
6. to confirm.  See Fortify.

By turning to God with our trust when we are afraid, we begin to strengthen our connection with the One who will see us through.  The choice to turn to Him and willingly put our trust in Him protects us against fear gaining the upper hand in our hearts.  While it doesn’t magically solve the problem, it is the beginning of what we need to face what is before us.

If we are going to let God be our strength, then it would be wise to consider how we can strengthen and fortify our faith in Him.  Almost all strength is built through exercise of some sort.  Exercise is defined as “bodily or mental exertion, especially for the sake of training or improvement…; something done or performed as a means of practice or training…; to use or display in one’s action or procedure.” See Exercise.  You see, exercise is not limited to just moving our bodies.  It is also something we can do mentally with training for the purpose of improving our cognitive responses to fear and its friends.

So what kind of exercise can we do when faced with fear?  Resistance.  Resistance is often used in physical strength training, and can be a crucial cognitive exercise to fortify our mental stamina and prowess in the face of fear.  And maybe, just maybe, resistance is one of the keys to building our mental and spiritual strength in God by specifically choosing to resist fear’s demands and, instead, put our trust in Him.

If we look back at the definition of in, which includes “the transition from one state to another” See In, we learn that many of our experiences will involve such transitions.  It is a beautiful thing to understand that there will most likely be a very natural movement out of one state and into another throughout much of our lives, if we are only willing to embrace such movement.  When we are faced with something frightful, knowing this truth should help us move more quickly towards God.  And we can propel that movement by actively resisting fear.  Through resistance, we will be able to loosen the feelings of being afraid from the grip they seek to have on our minds and decisions.   While we know that fear is a part of the natural response to concerning circumstances, we need not dwell with it.  We should oppose such dominating thoughts as we strive against fear’s domination and seek to restore God as our focus.

Let’s look a bit deeper into resistance:

1. the act or power of resisting, opposing or withstanding.
2. opposition offered by. See Resistance.

To resist goes on to include:

1. to withstand, strive against or oppose.
2. to withstand the action or effect of.
3. to refrain or abstain from, especially with difficulty or resistance. See Resist.

Now the question becomes how often do we actually resist the feelings associated with fear?  How often do we actually oppose them as they arise?  To withstand is “to stand or hold out against”. See Withstand.  Can we withstand the effect of fear when it comes calling?  Can we make efforts to oppose its presence in our lives?  I am thinking we can and should be, or God wouldn’t be telling us…repeatedly…throughout His word…to not to be afraid.  So, knowing this and in trusting Him, can we exercise our faith and trust that He knows what is truly best for us?

By resisting fear, and its many friends, we can strengthen our faith in Him.  When we actively seek to put our trust in Him, we should expect to be struggling against something else trying to take His place.  Moreover, it is not realistic to think that fear will just go away without a fight.  Rather, we need to trust that it is our job to resist and oppose it.  We can search for God and steady ourselves with the many strengths we know He has already given us.  In what we lack, we can build ourselves up with the knowledge that where we are weak, He is strong.  We can choose to believe that the strength He will give, or has already given to us, will furnish us with the ability to fight fear’s onslaught while trusting that God is truly the most powerful strength that we have to draw on.

Let us examine our strengths, know where they lie, and fortify our trust in God so that when fear comes, we are ready to resist it.

“The Sovereign Lord is my strength; He makes my feet like the feet of a deer, He enables me to tread on the heights.”  Habakkuk 3:19

“‘Do not let Hezekiah persuade you to trust in the Lord when he says, ‘The Lord will surely deliver us, this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.  Do not listen to Hezekiah.  This is what the king of Assyria says: Make peace with me and come out to me.  Then each of you will eat fruit from your own vine and fig tree and drink water from your own cistern until I come and take you to a land like your own…’ ”  2 Kings 18:30

Let’s understand something right now:  Fear doesn’t want you to trust in God.  It wants you to trust in it!

In a way, trust is not only the antonym of fear, but also the antidote.   Now there will be moments in life when you will need to actually trust the emotion of fear as it might be the impetus that removes something harmful from your well-being.  That is not the kind of fear we are talking about as that fear arises from our God-given senses and is meant to protect us from the harms that life can hold.

Fear is an emotion that God specifically created us to feel, and with good reason, as a healthy dose of fear often prevents us from straying off the right path and onto the wrong one.  Worthless fears, however, are quite different.  They are the fears that we really need to explore and consider as they are often the ones that lead us, or keep us relegated, to a path where an unnecessary amount of fear is grown and nurtured.  One of Fear’s favorite tool is to make us feel afraid and then expand and expound on all the potential feelings that might be connected to it.  As we engage those potentials, its sphere of influence webs out connecting to other decisions, activities and relationships in our lives.

In Jonah 2:8, we see that “Those who worship worthless idols forfeit the grace that could have been theirs.” An idol can be “a mere image or semblance of something; visible but without substance, as a phantom; a figment of the mind; fantasy; a false conception or notion; fallacy.”  See link.  A fallacy is “a “deceptive, misleading or false notion, belief, etc…an unsound argument” and in logic, it is any type of “erroneous reasoning that render arguments logically unsound.” See link.

Quite honestly, many of our fears never come to fruition.  They are very much the definition of idol, a phantom; a figment that our minds have made up in response to the feelings fear has triggered in us.  How many times do we convince ourselves of the frightening future and then realize none of it came true?  They were literally a false notion in response to what triggered our fear.  How often does our momentary “sound” reasoning when engaging fear become not-so-sound after it has passed?  And why?  Because what we feared did not come true; what we conjured up to justify it was literally just figments of our imaginations.

Add to it that in Jonah 2:8, “”idols” is qualified by the word, “worthless”.  This qualifier is exactly how we know that God is not speaking to all fears, as some are, indeed, legitimate.  Let’s dig deeper to see if we can delineate between what makes some fears of value and others, worthless:

1. without worth; of no use, importance or value; good-for-nothing

The roots of worthless are literally worth + –less.  The adjective suffix of -less means to be “without” and indicates a “failure or inability to perform or be performed.” Let’s dig into the definition of worth to see if we can figure out a little more about worth-less by adding the suffix of –less to those worth’s definitions:

1.  without good or important that is enough to justify;
2. without having value;
3. without have any grounds (i.e., property to stand on);
4. without excellence of character or quality as commanding esteem;
5. without usefulness or importance to the world, to a person, or for a purpose.
6. without value.

http://www.dictionary.com/worth (modifications  and emphasis are mine).

Think about it this way:  Fear does not want you to take the time to weigh its value.  And why is that?  Because your haste is its ally as a rush to judgment leaves you no time to slow down and think.  When you take the time to engage a deeper evaluation, Fear knows you may find that you need to trust in something other than what it is promoting.  And Fear wants you to fear more; it wants its strength to grow in and through your feelings.  It is how concern can lead to worrying, which can bring about anxiety and then morph into intense feelings of panic.  Most of the time, if you slow down and watch, the original thing that ignited fear in you remains unchanged.  It hasn’t grown in threat nor faded from view; only the emotions associated with fear have grown in the inside of you and your thoughts.

Let us remember that we are not stuck in or with fear.  The antidote is to place our trust in God.  As we learned in other posts, trusting God requires us to exercise our faith while we control both our willingness and our actions in that regard.  It is our responsibility to make sure trust in our lives is being built correctly.  It is not snap-your-fingers type of magical thinking, but a conscious choice that deliberates on what, who, why and how we are trusting all the while testing each step for its sincerity and reliability.  Running after Fear and its friends–even if just in our thoughts–is not trusting God with your path.  It will be hard work to stop, pause and realign yourself with trusting God rather than continuing on with the presence of Fear.

In most instances, when we experience fear outside of an imminent threat, we have the luxury of being able to stop and ask ourselves if what we are fearing has true merit.  We will need to determine whether it really is adding any goodness or value to our lives.  We need to look closer at whether embracing our fear means that we will continually go without something that is useful to us specifically because of that fear?  Does our fear truly have any ground to stand on, or does that ground disappear as we better evaluate our concern?  Are we looking for justifications, or looking for truth?  If we respond as fear dictates, will it lead us to excellence in our character or more harm to our minds and hearts–to who we really are and are meant to be?  Are we being built up or torn down?  What would likely happen if we went without a response to those fears?  Let us ask what would happen to our world, the life of another, or a relevant cause if we left fear without a voice in our lives?  Go through that list and reconsider the inherent value of your fears.  If the answers line up more on the side of no real value added by being afraid, then you will know that your fear is in the realm of worthless.

To live by faith takes a concerted effort to understand what you are fearing and whether those fears are truly valuable.  With that effort, when dealing with worthless fears, you may feel a paradox of sorts as fear will make you want to run or rush–pushing you to believe you must act quickly–while faith will want you to exercise caution and turn to God first.  In 2 Kings 18, Jerusalem was being invaded by the Assyrians.  This massive army was already near the city when the commander sent King Hezekiah a message demanding that he surrender.  The message was sent in Hebrew, and King Hezekiah’s officials asked that they be spoken to in Aramaic for the city’s residents were all near the wall where the message was being shouted.  In that request, Israel’s leaders were trying to protect their people from the advancing army’s frightening threats, but the Assyrian commander–sensing that he could get the upper hand through fear-inducing words–decided to speak directly to the people:

“Do not let Hezekiah deceive you.  He cannot deliver you from my hand.”  2 Kings 18:29

Make no mistake about it.  Fear is that brazen.  It will shout out and demand that you not trust in anything but it.  It will be loud and impetuous.  But you know what else?  Fear employs all sorts of temptations to bring you to its side.  In its demands, it will be cloaked with false promises of peace, satisfying and nurturing solutions, and a new and easy place for you to dwell with your thoughts.  Ironically, this “new” land is just like the old spot you were in–the only difference is fear now has control of what goes on.  The words of that commander were dripping with deceit–they were invaders coming to pillage, plunder, destroy and enslave–but his words promised peace, nourishment, and success if they would only turn to him rather than their God-given leader.

“‘Do not listen to Hezekiah.  This is what the king of Assyria says: Make peace with me and come out to me.  Then each of you will eat fruit from your own vine and fig tree and drink water from your own cistern….Choose life and not death!'”  2 Kings 18:31, 32

What happened next and what did King Hezekiah do?  The people stayed quiet and remained where they were just as the king had instructed them to do.  They did not act on those frightening words the messenger delivered.  They did not run in panic, but rather stayed quiet and waited. The king then humbled himself in prayer and petition before the Lord while sending some of his men to the prophet Isaiah.

Isaiah sent back this message, which seemed incredibly challenging to trust as the fearsome army they faced had conquered most of the surrounding lands.  Please see that our best hope lies with God and not with fear and its false promises:

“…Isaiah said to them, ‘Tell your master, “This is what the Lord says: Do not be afraid of what you have heard–those words with which the underlings of the king of Assyria have blasphemed me.  Listen!  When he hears a certain report, I will make him want to return to his own country…”‘” 2 Kings 19:6-7

Faced with one of the most advancing and powerful nations in the world, God told them said, “Do not be afraid.” God was bigger than their enemies, and it was King Hezekiah’s trust in His power that brought about the king of Assyria’s retreat.  God, today and tomorrow, is still more powerful than your fears.  Understand this, fear will blaspheme God.  It wants the power and control of your life.  It wants you to come to it, and live in its land of insecurity.  It wants to be your lord, and not your savior.   It is not about trust, nor facilitating it, nor growing faith.  The only faith it wants is yours.  When you focus more on what you fear than on turning to your God, you have given fear His place in your life.

So take the time to determine whether your fears are legitimate and well-controlled or worthless and growing in more influence in your life.  Real trust in God cannot be cultivated in the land of fear.  It is grown in quiet and humble prayer and faith that seeks Him before succumbing to Fear’s demands.  Start first by purposefully putting your trust in God as soon as you start to feel any form of fear…despite the difficult effort that may require.  It is in turning to Him with such trust that you will find true peace, strength and comfort to face what you fear.

“When I am afraid, I will put my trust in You.”  Psalm 56:3

“When I am afraid, I will put my trust in You.”  Psalm 56:3

In the last post, we learned a little bit more about Will and Put.  The two key parts of our God given design for moving in this world.  Will representing our intentions and Put being our efforts to put our decisions into action.

Truth be told, we have known Will and Put all of our lives.  Even as young babies, our “Will” brought us to our feet and our “Put” helped us understand better why we needed to be in motion.  In fact, Put was always looking for things to move for Will.  If you reflect on it, babies spend much of their time learning to move things, especially once they learn how to move themselves. In the first two years of any child’s life, some of the greatest lessons come in learning not to “put” certain things in their mouths.  As they mature, their wills become better controlled by their own decision-making rather than mom or dad’s constant reminders of “no”.  As life continues on, our Wills and Puts also continue to be stretched, exercised and challenged.

In that development, it is important to understand that Will and Put’s effectiveness in our lives is largely influenced and easily impacted by emotions, i.e., our feelings.  One of the most influential emotions is fear.  When sensing danger or feeling afraid, Will develops a tendency to answer every question or dream or hope with “no”, “not gonna”, or “isn’t possible”.  You know, the brick wall of the infamous words of “I can’t” that we all too easily throw out to keep our fears in check.  While we believe we are protecting ourselves through the shield of “I can’t”, the next thing we notice is that our world has grown smaller, darker and more apprehensive than before.  It’s almost as if Will has disappeared as he is no longer to be found in your decision making process.

Put, on the other hand, stops knowing what to do when Will disappears.  Filled with fear, she becomes too afraid to move anything.  She doesn’t know what to move out and what to move in.  She can no longer discern what to take out of the way to help Will, nor is she certain of what Will needs emotionally to make the best decision.  In a way, when fear invades you, your Will and Put often come to a screeching halt.

But sometimes, when Fear gets the best of Put, she goes into overdrive.  In her frenzy of trying to help Will, she unintentionally throws everything into disorder by moving too quickly.  Frantically searching through all the possible solutions, she only adds to the chaos Fear is creating rather than helping to bring stability and calm to Will.  As she senses Fear’s menacing influence, sometimes she haphazardly empties a closet or a cupboard that, in turn, only makes more room for more of Fear’s many friends: dishearten, anxiety, doubt, dread, panic, jitters, uneasiness, worry, discomposure–just to name a few.

Sometimes, thinking that Will needs to face Fear (without truly understanding whether the fear is truly valid), Put pulls indecisiveness from the shelf and replaces it with haste in hopes that Will can move forward.  But, before you know it, the situation has gone from bad to worse as haste often leads us to make mistakes in our judgment.  Other times Put mistakenly removes Will’s inaction and inserts manipulation or force to as a way to strengthen him.  However, what Will lacks in that exchange is what is often needed the most: the strength of self-control as controlling others does not lead to healthy relationships or exchanges.  Truth be told, the only thing we can really control is ourselves.

A crucial thing to remember for both Will and Put is that we are designed to feel fear–to be afraid–at appropriate times.  While they are not meant to control our lives, they will not be strangers to us.  God designed us to be acutely aware of their presence as our brain design speaks to this very matter.  There are portions of the brain that are activated when we sense fear’s presence. Learn more. In fact, those portions move quicker in determining our response than our conscious thought processes do.  It is why the emotion of fear will hit you first before you can even rationalize or contemplate fully why you are feeling what you are experiencing.

One of the portions of the brain that scientists largely believe handles our fear and emotions is called the amygdala.  It is a small twin set of almond shaped buds in the temporal portion of your brain.  More on the amygdala.  It is found in complex vertebrates including us–human beings. Id.  Yes, friends, that means all sorts of creatures feel and sense fear.  The amygdala’s role is to help capture, store and process emotion and memories. Id.  As it works to bring memory into our being, our brain encodes all that is associated with the event. Id. And with that memory, it stores everything relevant to what has happened: the date, time of day, smells, touch, lighting, weather patterns, sounds and anything else deemed remotely relevant. Learn more.

It is why people who have experienced something painful will sometimes flashback given the right environment that triggers their senses to tell their brain: “Hey, this is similar, shouldn’t we be afraid?”  It is also what brings back feelings of nostalgia when you smell something that makes you remember the love of another or an odor that represents being “home”.  Things like chocolate chip cookies baking or grandma’s banana bread cooling on the counter.  The data from your environment is being inputted into your brain to help with your decision making processes.  That input can, at the same time, trigger memories, good or bad, to come forward during the assessment of your situation.

So why is this important to know?  Because the feelings of fear (Fear’s friends) are embedded in the stored code of your experiences that have been relegated to memory.  What you have learned in earlier life lessons about fearful events can quite possibly influence your future decisions.

Our system of memory can have a direct impact on Will and Put when we believe we are facing something we fear.  Our brains are working faster than our minds to best assess the situation, and it pulls from prior lessons–stored as memories–to more accurately discern the threat level.  Thus, understanding better the role that the brain and nature has on directing our responses begs this question: Is there anything we can do to counteract fear’s affects when a situation triggers us to feel afraid?

“When I am afraid, I will put my trust in You.”  Psalm 56:3

Trust.  Not just any trust will help, but rather, it has to be our very own. Yours and mine; together we can encourage each other to trust, but we must take that step on our own to trust in God.  Now the interesting thing with Trust is that it acts like a connector of sorts to Will and Put.  Will helps with decisions and Put provides the support or effort to literally move those decisions into effect.  Now faced with Fear, we often find Will gone and Put frozen, or Will indecisiveness and Put in overdrive inserting and removing all sorts of things to try to reboot Will.  From a direct read of Psalm 56:3, it seems that the antidote to Fear gaining control over Will and Put is introduce them to Trust.

You see, Trust is quite different than Fear.  There’s an inherent and unshakable beauty that comes with Trust and it is especially visible when we look at Psalm 56:3.  Trust has the attributes of confidence, faith, hope, assurance, certainty, dependence, positiveness, safekeeping, trusteeship, and more.  See more about Trust.  Amazingly when we decide that we will put our trust in God, we are more directly linked with our Creator during that fear-inducing moment.  Let us remember, in our great concerns, that our God is the Creator of the universe.  He knows all of our days.  Trust, our emotional connector to Him, has a way of transcending all the frightening chaos without demanding full order, and hence, can override our overwhelmed brain and bodily systems.

This does not mean troubles magically disappear, pain stops and rainbows and sunshine appear.  Trust is exactly what Put needs to strengthen Will when we are feeling afraid.  Trust is what we need to counteract the disastrous effects of fear when it grows out-of-control.  Trust should be employed when worthless fears are nagging us and running down our ability to move in the appropriate direction.  It is not a trust in something tangible.  It is not in money.  It is not a trust in another soul, though sometimes God is so kind to send the support of others.  And it is not trust in our own strength.

“…I will put my trust in You.” (emphasis mine).

Our trust must be in God; truly and sincerely.  While it is very much a choice, it is really the only safe one we have when overwhelming feelings fall upon us.  Trusting in God is the key to calming Will and Put so that we can make the best decisions for our world and His.  Otherwise, it is Fear that begins to grow in controlling us, and friends, that allows Fear to gain the power and ability to impact His (and our) world in a way God did not intend for us.

Let us focus more on trusting God not just in the good times but in the more compelling times of fear.  It is crucial to the development of a deeper faith.  So, let us soothe Will and Put with the balm of the confidence that God is with us and ready to deliver us from the presence of Fear.  Let us choose to serve Him instead of the emotion He has designed in us, while understanding that even legitimate fears no longer serve to protect us when we are living our lives under their control.  Let us each see Fear, and its friends, for their limited value while letting God, and our willingness to trust Him, reign in our hearts, thoughts and decisions.

“‘If you are returning to the Lord with all of your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the Lord and serve Him only, and He will deliver you out of the hands of the Philistines.'”  1 Samuel 7:3-4

“When I am afraid, I will put my trust in You.”  Psalm 56:3

A few posts ago, we met Will and Put.  “Will” represents our willingness, our decision making process, that propels us towards what we want or need.  But Will doesn’t act alone as sometimes decisions, by themselves, are just the start of what we hope will come to be.  “Put”, the “put” we find in Psalm 56:3, is the driving force or effect that moves our decisions forward or backward.  In a way, it is the “effect” that goes with the “cause” of why we’ve decided something.

Will and Put work best when working together.  Will, by himself, thinks a lot and maybe even decides a lot, but alone, he’s not super effective.  You think I am kidding?  Many in this world would be thrilled if we could just “will” ourselves more healthy when we are sick, happy when we are sad, richer, thinner, prettier, and so on.  Many wish for world peace, unity and no more poverty or cancer.  But for most, willing something to be doesn’t usually change the situation.  Without Put (a concerted effort to bring that wish or decision), Will is just a pile of thoughts.

And Put–well, quite frankly–she will struggle immensely to find the right order, purpose or effect if she doesn’t have Will along in support.  She works hard, but without Will there to do his part, she gets lost in the why and what behind her efforts.  Imagine how ineffective and frustrating it must be for Put to continually try to bring about change, but have no Will to commit to it.  Over and over again, she tries, but it doesn’t stick, work or stay in place because where there is no willpower, there is no gain.

By design, we need Will and Put to be operating fully and correctly in our lives to effectuate the best decisions and actions.  When they are working and working well together, we will find that they will meet up with “In”–the very next word in Psalm 56:3: “I will put my trust IN…” (emphasis mine).  “In”, by a simple read, seems to be about a location, a specific spot.  We put refrigerated items in the refrigerator.  We park cars in a parking lot.  We live in homes or apartments.  We let the dog in.  We like to be in the “in” crowd.  As a result, “In” relates us to another space.  Let’s dig a bit into that word:

In

1. (used to indicate inclusion within a space);
2. (used to indicate inclusion within something abstract or immaterial);
3. …(used to indicate transition from one state to another).
4. …(on the inside; within).  http://www.dictionary.com/in/not citing all parts.

Since “inclusion” was mentioned in a couple of definitions, I went to see what word was all about.  Of course, it meant “the act of including or the state of being included.”  Id./inclusion.  In relation to Psalm 56:3, that is kind of interesting to think on.  When we are afraid, we need to include God in our thoughts.  Most of the time, our thoughts build and grow around that which is causing us fear–leaving little room for God or His strength or His comfort to build our faith bigger than our expanding feelings of being afraid.

What was intriguing about the root of inclusion was “a shutting in.”  Id./inclusion.  It then instructed the reader to see the word, “incluse.”  Not seeing that before, I followed along curious to see what the heck that word was about.  Funny thing, it was defined as “recluse”, which was the first thing to come to mind.  Again in its root reference was “to enclose or shut in.”

Recluse had a second definition that caught my attention: “Also incluse, a religious voluntary immured in a cave, hut or remaining in a cell for life.”  Id./recluse.  Again its roots lied in “shut up or close.”  Id.  Now, I had not seen the word “immure” before so I decided to unfold this a little further.

Immure [a verbal derivative of wall]:

1.  to enclose within walls;
2. to shut in; seclude or confine;
3. to imprison;
4. to build into or entomb in a wall;
5. Obsolete. to surround with walls; to fortify.  Id./immure.

To have walls around us does usually strengthen or protect us so that led me to dig further down by looking at the word, fortify:

Fortify [is rooted in strong]

1. to protect or strengthen against attack; surround or provide with defensive military works;
2. to furnish with the means of resisting force or standing wear;
3. to make strong; impart strength to;
4. to increase the effectiveness of;
5. to strengthen mentally or morally;
6. to confirm      Id./fortify

“When I am afraid, I will put my trust in You.”  When I am feeling disheartened, I will put my comfort in You.  When I am anxious, I will put my strength in You.  All of these things, whether trust, comfort or strength, will require an effort from us to put those things “in” God’s hands.  During this process, we may need to take measures to wall off fear and fortify our faith.  It is no small matter to give God such vulnerable and weighty parts of ourselves rather than relying on them for our rescue.

It is interesting to note that part of “in” is “used to indicate a transition from one state to another.”  Id./in.  Sometimes I hear people speak of faith as if it is easy to trust God, but that doesn’t seem to be the case when we look more fully at the word, in.  Could it be that by unfolding His words, He is showing us that there is a transition period between what triggered our fear and how we can get past it?  We start to feel afraid often because there’s something that has frightened us.  But according to the word in, we are not necessarily stuck there.  Isn’t that a beautiful comfort to know that we can transition out of fear and into trusting God through the aid of Will and Put?  We don’t have to live where fear dwells.  We are not required to keep fear, anxiety, dismay and all of fear’s friends in our hearts, minds or decisions.

Looking back at the roots of inclusion, incluse and recluse, all of them speak to “a shutting in”, shutting up or closing.  And that left me thinking maybe when we experience something that makes us afraid, we have to employ both Will and Put to shut ourselves off from growing what we fear while purposefully inviting God (through our trust, our comfort and our strengths) into the situation that is causing us trepidation.  Putting fear outside of our heart walls and enclosing God in.  Isn’t it in trials and tribulations that we feel the most fear?  And yet, so often His answer is “Do not be afraid.”  God wants us to trust in Him more in those frightening moments.

It is true.  We really do have a choice.  We can choose to put our trust in fear–believing all too willingly in the potential of the worst of what fear threatens.  We can choose to put our comfort in things that do little to alleviate our situation but bring us momentarily relief or distraction from our feelings.  We can choose to put our strength in fixing things ourselves without really knowing whether those strengths are the best fix, or if it is even something we can feasibly do.  But what we really need to do is ask:  Are these choices building our faith in God?  Those choices, rather, place our trust and lives directly into the hands of fear.

To build true faith in God, we have to make sure that our Will and Put are choosing and moving our trust, comfort and strength to the right place: in God.  It is crucial.  Fear is a master at trying to convince, through an assortment of feelings, that we need to believe in it more than God.  Let us no longer fall for putting our faith in anything else, and let us fortify our trust in God by making sure that is where our faith is truly located!

“Seek good, not evil, that you may live.  Then the Lord God Almighty will be with you, just as you say He is.”  Amos 5:14