Overcoming Anxiety and Fear

Anxiety and Fear

Anxiety is not all bad. It is actually a gift from God designed to protect us from danger. Anxiety is a normal part of childhood as children confront new and potentially dangerous situations. It was God’s original plan that anxiety was to be recognized and released as loving parents taught children how to avoid danger.

In this way, the anxiety would never become overwhelming and it would be channelled into learning experiences. Home would become a safe place to take risks and build confidence.

Anxiety was meant to serve us, not to be our master. It was a safety guardrail, not a road-block. Like all other gifts, Satan found a way to use anxiety against us to hurt, paralyze and ultimately to control mankind. Fear is the term used to describe the level of anxiety that is used by Satan as a weapon against us to disrupt our lives.

The Three Links in the Chain of Fear

1. PHYSICAL CAUSES

The first link is, again, chemical imbalances or physical causes of fear. In medicine, these are called the anxiety disorders. They are a type of depressive illness where the repetitive, unwanted thoughts are mostly fearful. In this disorder, a person can’t shut off the fearful thoughts and they just keep racing through the mind like a recording that can’t be stopped.

The symptoms may be mild, in which case the person is chronically tense, afraid, easily threatened by unfamiliar circumstances, irritable and unable to concentrate. They often have trouble sleeping, since it is too difficult to shut off the anxious thoughts. 

In severe cases, there can be panic attacks, where a person is consumed by fear and loss of control. Their heart pounds, and they sweat and shake and feel like they are going out of their mind. This illness can magnify the other causes of fear or emotional bondage to overwhelming severity.

2. DEMONIC INTERFERENCE

The second link is the harassment of Satan.

His weapons are lies, fear and intimidation. He loves to attack people with fearful thoughts that he inserts into their minds. Satan loves anxiety and depressive disorders, since those conditions make people so vulnerable to his inserted thoughts.

3. PERSONALITY INJURY

The most common cause of fear is personality injury, because all humans since Adam have been emotionally wounded by painful relationships

Wounds can begin very early. Even a foetus can be wounded by the fear that the mother may be feeling about her circumstances. Children may learn a lifestyle of fear if their parents themselves haven’t mastered fear. Children can get stuck in childhood fears if their parents don’t nurture and reassure them through this normal developmental phase. 

It is quite common for adults to struggle with fears from childhood, which become cruel masters. Satan loves these unhealed childhood emotions, because he can manipulate them and use them against people.

What is the Way Out?

God wants you to be free from fear.

The LORD is my light and my salvation

—whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life-of whom shall I be afraid? (Psalm 27:1).

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid (John 14:27).

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love (1 John 4:18).

If we are not living in God’s perfect love, we will be vulnerable to fear. Jesus never struggled with fear because He lived securely in the glow of God’s perfect love. God wants us to be so confident and secure in His love that we fully trust Him and follow Him fearlessly as a young child would trust their parent. Jesus will give us the courage to face reality with Him walking at our side. He will make it safe for us to become vulnerable and transparent in our intimate relationships.

Source: Emotionally Free by Grant Mullen