False Expectations Appearing Real

As I have mentioned, I have been involved in a Beth Moore bible study. I am currently working through her study called, "The Patriarchs: Encountering the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob" with a group of women at our church. It involves 5 weekly lessons to do on my own and then getting together with the group to discuss it and watch about an hour long video by the author. We willl do this for 12 weeks. Unfortunately, due to my work schedule, I have been unable to make several of the group meetings but I have been able to get my hands on a copy of the video tape to watch here at home with Shannon.

One week a main topic of the study was fear and how we, today, make the people of the bible out to be some kind of spiritual super heroes. In actuality, all of the characters of the bible, except for Jesus, were just ordinary people like you and I. As I read my bible I see that God does not typically waste words. Why then did he say, "Don't fear!" over and over again to his people? My guess is that it was because the person he was talking to was...afraid. Does a superhero have fear? Not in my world. But an ordinary person, like you and I does have fear. I feel that in many ways, by assigning these people "superhero" status we are doing them a disservice. Somehow, thinking that Abraham was not battling his emotions as he held the dagger over his son Isaac, or that Moses simply said, "Behold, the bush burneth" when it spontaneously ignited in the middle of the desert doesn't seem real. I am thinking it more likely that Abraham fought his tears and that Moses jumped back and said, "Whoa!"... or something like that.

Anyway, these thoughts have helped Shannon and I as we deal with our fears of going to Tanzania. Fears of moving our family to an entirely diferent culture, fears of leaving extended family behind, fears of health and safety, fears of our inability to do something so big. Fears of wether or not our house will sell and if the funds will come in. We will definitely need God to continually remind us to "Do not be afraid." Fear is after all just False Expectations Appearing Real, isn't it? As Beth Moore said in one of her videos, "Those who God uses greatly, fear God more than they fear their fears."